{"id":2008078,"date":"2026-06-24T10:30:33","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T07:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2008078"},"modified":"2026-06-24T10:30:33","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T07:30:33","slug":"in-drafting-caleb-wilson-and-dailyn-swain-bulls-evp-bryson-graham-makes-his-plan-known","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2008078","title":{"rendered":"In drafting Caleb Wilson and Dailyn Swain, Bulls EVP Bryson Graham makes his plan known"},"content":{"rendered":"
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There wasn\u2019t much mystery surrounding the Bulls\u2019 first draft pick Tuesday night. There was almost no way for them to mess it up, even if they\u2019re (presumably) no longer in the messing-things-up business.<\/p>\n

With the fourth pick in a \u201cbig four\u201d NBA Draft, the Bulls just had to wait and see which three players went before them and then turn in the remaining name to the commissioner. That\u2019s not to say Caleb Wilson will become the best player that was available at that spot, but it\u2019s pretty clear that right now, he was the best player available.<\/p>\n

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Nothing is more stressful than making a decision, so this was a nice way for Bryson Graham to ease into his new role as executive vice president of basketball operations.<\/p>\n

As expected, predicted and mock drafted, the last guy remaining at No. 4 was Wilson, the erstwhile North Carolina freshman forward, and that\u2019s who the Bulls selected Tuesday night. Everyone knew it was happening. Everyone except Wilson, apparently.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tried not to read into the media,\u201d he told reporters Tuesday night. \u201cI didn\u2019t wanna get attached to the Bulls and it didn\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then it happened. And Wilson showed that he was immediately attached, repeating the team\u2019s long-held marketing slogan \u201cSee Red\u201d on national TV.<\/p>\n

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Chicago Bulls go with \u2018safest pick\u2019 in UNC\u2019s Caleb Wilson<\/div>\n
Zach Harper and CJ Moore<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
{“@context”:”https:\/\/schema.org”,”@type”:”VideoObject”,”@id”:”https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/video\/lXU7Bzq7XvPkpbs\/”,”url”:”https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/video\/lXU7Bzq7XvPkpbs\/”,”name”:”Chicago Bulls go with ‘safest pick’ in UNC’s Caleb Wilson”,”description”:”The NBA Daily crew discusses the Chicago Bulls selecting UNC’s Caleb Wilson with the No. 4 pick in the 2026 NBA Draft.”,”uploadDate”:”2026-06-24T02:04:13.672Z”,”duration”:”PT1M33S”,”thumbnailUrl”:”https:\/\/cdn-media.theathletic.com\/video-stream\/auto-thumbnail\/lXU7Bzq7XvPkpbs\/OcHg1L1oXQ4M.0000000.jpg”,”contentUrl”:”https:\/\/video.nyt.com\/athletic\/streams\/lXU7Bzq7XvPkpbs\/OcHg1L1oXQ4M\/OcHg1L1oXQ4M.m3u8″,”transcript”:”Caleb Wilson out of UNC. Uh, this is maybe the best athlete in the draft, um, wild motor, incredible, incredible motor and hard worker. Um, a lot of skills that I think can lean into what the Chicago Bulls do well, which is run alongside Josh Giddy. I think things will be simple for him offensively to out the gate. Uh, and then with Matos Buzelis, those two guys can. Run in transition a ton as well. They just traded for Nick Claxton, another guy, another length guy that, you know, Bryson Graham, the new general manager for the Chicago Bulls, talked about Slap. That’s the big acronym that’s going around. Um, I think it’s great marketing, you know, shout out to him for coming up with that, but Caleb Wilson fits the build on, on slap, which is size, length, athleticism, physicality. Uh, what do you think, Caleb? I, I mean, he’s the safest pick here, right? And, and I think his emergence early on in the college season, you would know this better than I would, but there seemed to be this real reaction from executives around the NBA of like, oh, we didn’t know he was a competitor like this. We didn’t know he had this dog in him like this, and I think that is what made him instantly, look, there is AJ, there’s Darren, there’s Cam, but after that, it became, oh, Caleb Wilson’s definitely the 4th guy, and you have a lot of great guards in this draft, but I think people discovering that about Caleb Wilson really made it to where like, oh, this is a must-have NBA prospect.”,”ineligibleRegion”:[“BI”,”BY”,”CD”,”CF”,”CU”,”IQ”,”IR”,”KP”,”LB”,”LY”,”ML”,”NI”,”RU”,”SD”,”SO”,”SS”,”SY”,”UA”,”VE”,”YE”,”ZW”],”publisher”:{“@type”:”NewsMediaOrganization”,”@id”:”https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/#publisher”,”name”:”The Athletic”,”url”:”https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/”,”foundingDate”:”2016-01-25″,”logo”:{“@type”:”ImageObject”,”@id”:”https:\/\/theathletic.com\/app\/themes\/athletic\/assets\/img\/the-athletic-wordmark-black.png”,”url”:”https:\/\/theathletic.com\/app\/themes\/athletic\/assets\/img\/the-athletic-wordmark-black.png”,”contentUrl”:”https:\/\/theathletic.com\/app\/themes\/athletic\/assets\/img\/the-athletic-wordmark-black.png”,”creditText”:”The Athletic”,”height”:”60″,”width”:”435″},”publishingPrinciples”:”https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/edit-guidelines\/”,”sameAs”:”https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Athletic”},”author”:[{“@type”:”Person”,”name”:”Zach Harper and CJ Moore”}]}<\/p>\n
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