NBC Sports Chicago Insider K.C. Johnson said Bulls guard Zach LaVine “privately has questioned” his role standing amongst the franchise in a Monday edition of the “Bulls Talk Podcast.”
“I sourced that out,” Johnson said. “The Athletic started it, and then I did some checking. Zach's a professional, he's a team player, but he's got a lot of confidence in himself.
“This is not like him being jealous of (forward DeMar DeRozan). He knows how good DeMar DeRozan is.”
A Dec. 20 report from Shams Charania and Darnell Mayberry of the Athletic stated multiple league sources have said the Bulls and Zach LaVine “are not seeing eye to eye.” There was a “palpable feeling” across different parts of the Bulls franchise of a disconnect over LaVine's situation in Chicago in the weeks leading up to the report.
“There’s a certain level of frustration in people trying to figure out what we can do to help right the ship,” LaVine told The Athletic. “I think with the players that we have, we try to put it on each other to right the ship. We have those type of guys, those type of mentalities where each of us have been number one options on a team before and then we all come together collectively.”
Zach LaVine fired back after he scored 21 points in a win over the Miami Heat in FTX arena, saying he was not the one who came up with the report to NBA reporters.
“It didn’t come from my mouth,” LaVine said. “It didn’t come from DeMar’s mouth. It didn’t come from Vooch’s. I don't get how these opinions are getting put on me like I said something.
“If I had something to say about the team, it would come from my mouth. That didn’t come from me… I feel good about the team. Obviously, we’re frustrated cause we’ve lost some games… It didn’t come from the horse’s mouth,”
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