Raptors should be interested in trade for Bulls’ Coby White

The Toronto Raptors have been fighting and clawing to get to 23-23 this season with the worst bench in the league and a major hole behind Fred VanVleet at the point guard spot.  A trade might be in order if they want to fix that, and Chicago Bulls standout Coby White could be an excellent fit.

White, picked seventh overall out of North Carolina in the 2019 NBA Draft, was putting up quality offensive numbers, but many dismissed them as the product of playing on a bad team. While the Bulls are a legit contender this year, White has been pushed to the side in favor of some more flashy guards.

In addition to Lonzo Ball and DeMar DeRozan coming to town, Alex Caruso has taken some of the shine away from White with his defense. Ayo Dosunmu continues to get better by the week. Could the Bulls move White ahead of an impending extension rather than give him the chunk of change he wants?

Reports from the last few weeks hinted that White could be available for the right upgrade. White might be worthy of mortgaging lots of future draft assets in order to acquire. Point guards his age with his offensive ceiling very rarely hit the trade market like this.

The Toronto Raptors should explore a Coby White trade.

In a month-long span from December 20 to January 21, White averaged 16.5 points per game and made 43% of his 3-point attempts. With a 6-5 frame that could help him cause matchup problems and a quick first step off of the dribble, White would be the most talented player on the Raptors bench by multiple orders of magnitude.

White’s scoring has dropped, but that’s only because of the competition for shots. While he’d come off the bench in Toronto, Nick Nurse would give him a green light to slice teams up from 3-point range as a reserve.

While is more than just a scorer. He’s committed to playing defense this season, and he’s become respectable on that end. He doesn’t need to be VanVleet on defense to have value.

To be frank, Toronto does not have any tradeable assets that are in the same tier as White at the moment. However, if they are willing to move off some of their future first-round picks in addition to parting with multiple bench players, a path to a deal can be found.

Perhaps a third team gets involved? Is this how Goran Dragic’s salary gets moved?

White is rookie extension eligible this year, but he is under contract for 2022-23 ahead of free agency. White would be this team’s Sixth Man for at least one more year. Considering that he’s scoring at an efficient clip despite all of the talent around him, it would be quite the coup if Ujiri pilfered him from Chicago.