Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show
Cody Westerlund talks Bulls' fortune in landing 4th overall pick in NBA Draft
11 May 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What led to the Bulls landing the 4th overall pick in the NBA Draft?
Rahimi Harrison-Grody. That sounds so crazy. 104.3 the score. Wow, I like that.
Middays 10 to 2 on 104.3 the score. Everything says it's that, but you got to go through your process. You know, there's so much more.
Chapter 2: How did Bryson Graham's hiring impact the Bulls' draft strategy?
The combine this week, you get a chance to talk to these kids. You get a chance to bring them into your gym at some point and watch them work out, get their measurements. There's still a lot of work to be done. We're excited that we're in the top four, but I don't want to draw a line at four, you know.
That is Bulls Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations, Bryson Graham. This is Rahimi Harrison-Grody on 104.3 The Score. The Bulls own the fourth pick in the NBA draft thanks to the lottery that concluded yesterday. And our Cody Westerlund.
Chapter 3: What are the implications of the Bulls jumping five spots in the lottery?
He's at Cody Westerlund on X. He's the editor at thescorechicago.com. He's our Bulls reporter. He's here in studio. Hey, Cody.
Good to be here, especially after a really good week for the Bulls, if you think about it. Great week. It had been a lot of good weeks. It starts with Bryson Graham officially being hired, speaking midweek, and then Sunday ends with them jumping five spots up to number four overall in the NBA draft.
well and i think about the position that we were all in talking about this last year where it comes down to that coin flip the reason it came down to the coin flip was the difference in the josh giddy buzzer beater game for example or any buzzer beater that year it didn't have to be josh giddy it was any result in the last few minutes but that's certainly the one that uh is easy to pinpoint the
the plot writer is like when you're writing the script that's what you're right it was a one game difference and then we see it come down to the coin flip and that's when cooper flag goes to the mavericks and modest buzellas was representing the bulls he's end up he ends up talking to the reporters afterward and and this time around it's bryson graham talking to everybody about jumping up when they only had a 20 chance to get into the top four
Chapter 4: Which top prospects are expected to be available for the Bulls at 4?
Yeah, it was just a completely different vibe from the year before. Because look, these last two drafts, they were a really big deal in the NBA. Two really strong drafts. Cooper Flagg, obviously, last year in 2025, probably being the biggest prize of any prospect here in a long time. But look, the top four... is a really good spot to be in for the Bulls.
I think it's a little bit more scrunched together, the talent level, the top four of this class, and Cooper Flagg last year, obviously. But it's interesting for the Bulls' perspective, too. Getting the four pick, it's almost like from a scrutiny standpoint, you'd rather have the pick certainly number three or number two, whatever it would be.
You want to have as much optionality and choice as you can.
Chapter 5: How does talent evaluation differ for the Bulls under Bryson Graham?
But they could really just sit there and take whichever prospect of the top four falls to them. Obviously, AJ Devansa is expected to go number one overall. Darren Peterson, Caleb Willison, Cameron Boozer follow in some order.
Most people think Peterson's going to go too, but the Bulls can kind of just sit there and it doesn't have to be a super hard decision, which shouldn't be confused with the fact that They'll still do their entire pre-draft prospect or evaluation with all the prospects, all the top prospects that they can and see if anyone can move up on their board.
But I expect when the day comes on June 23rd, it should be a pretty easy decision for the Bulls at four.
Listen, it's easy to be optimistic. I'm sorry. It's easy to be more optimistic about Bryson Graham than we were about Arturis Karnasovas in the same situation just because AK didn't have a good track record when it came to drafting.
Chapter 6: What strategies should the Bulls consider with their cap space?
Any of his perceived draft successes, whether it's Io, whether it's Modest, guys fell to him. I was at Io's draft watch party down in the South Loop and
he went in the second round it just kept falling falling right into their lap and then modest you could say the same thing happened to him falling out of the top 10 i'm curious as to how much you found his comments to be refreshing bryson grahams talking about his approach to talent evaluation in the draft specifically
Yeah, he reiterated, best player available. Best player available a couple times in that interview session yesterday. And then he went on later, near the end of the interview, and was given more specific examples. Like, I don't care if he's a 6'4 guard. I don't care if he's a 6'11 big man. Might have had placeholders in there, obviously, in his mind when he's telling us that.
But he's just kind of paraphrasing their player profile.
Chapter 7: How do Caleb Wilson and Cameron Boozer compare as draft prospects?
I don't care who they are. You take the best one, who you think is going to have the best NBA career, and you essentially figure it out. So...
I don't think ā that's the mindset almost all teams have, unless you're a contender at the highest level and you're picking in the 20s in the first round and you know you need to plug in a guard to surround LeBron with shooting or something, which might be a bad example because the Cavs always traded their first-round picks to get proven shooting. But you get the idea there.
So that's the strategy every team should have. I think it's a strategy that, in the back of their mind, AK and Mark Eversley had too. They just didn't execute it very well. But look ā He's coming in here and trying to prove a point to fans first, I think.
Chapter 8: What are the potential impacts of Giannis trade rumors on the Bulls?
This is a different mindset. Here's who I am. Here's what I expect. And there's no doubt, add as much talent as you can. And remind me, too, later in the interview, I want to get to a point that I think is a better tell for the Bryson Graham era than the draft. I think his free agency is a part of that. But as it pertains to the draft... Yes, I expect him.
If there's two 6'11 forwards he gets at 4'15", same player profile, that's fine with him because this is certainly going to be a 3-4 year rebuild, I think, in his mind.
Well, and that's it too, Cody, is the fact that everybody seems to understand there has to be a tearing down process here to build this thing back up in a way that, regardless of the tanking laws adjusting, needs to be actually long-term, not a flash in the pan, the right way to do this in the NBA. I feel like Michael Reinsdorf put it out there when he talked about Oklahoma City.
You can say that, but it's going to take some work and some destruction of what we know.
He almost ends every answer with that, too. Bryson Graham saying, there's a lot of work to do. This is a step in layering it. You mentioned the word refreshing earlier, I think. To me, one of the most refreshing parts so far for him is just he seems to have a realistic grasp of how big the challenge is.
He's not coming in here, and to go back to the point I made a little earlier, I think free agency ties to this. The Bulls could have upward of $60 million in cap space worldwide. What does he do with that cap space? To me, it doesn't feel like he's trying to add a ton of immediate help.
And I think the most important thing he could do this offseason would be to use some significant portion of that cap space, whether it's $20 million, $30 million. It doesn't have to be all $60 million. but take on a bad contract to get a future asset in the draft. You'd love a first-round pick in the future, but sometimes a bad contract can also come with a good young player attached to it.
Maybe the bad contract you take, you can flip Pat Williams' bad contract that isn't as high as someone else's, and you get a draft pick or a young player with it. So I think that will tell us a lot if he uses ā a third half of that $60 million in cap space to take on someone who's not really helping them right away. I think that'd be really smart. I think he should do it.
I think it would really further his big picture vision too.
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