Bulls hire Bryson Graham as Executive VP of Basketball Operations

Matt Lloyd was supposedly the favorite for the new lead Bulls job. Instead, Bryson Graham was the somewhat surprising hire and is the new Executive VP of Basketball Operations.

Graham has an interesting resume. He was a 6-3 guard at Texas A&M who didn’t play much. He worked on the coaching side with the Pelicans out of school, starting in their video room. He transitioned to the front office side, eventually becoming the No. 2 guy behind David Griffin. When the Pels let go of Griffin and brought in Joe Dumars, Graham moved on shortly thereafter to the Hawks.

That gives Graham the perspective of a college player, a member of a coaching staff, and various front office roles where he’s done pretty much every job at some point for the Pelicans. I can understand why that was an impressive resume point for the Reinsdorfs.

One of Graham’s major selling points is his eye as a scout. It’s always difficult to assign credit or blame for draft picks within a front office, but the Pelicans had some good picks while he was there. Dyson Daniels at No. 8 was okay. Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Trey Murphy were both nice pickups at No. 17. Yves Missi showed promise at 21 in a very weak draft. And Herb Jones at 35 was a steal.

There have been some misses too, such as Jordan Hawkins at 14, Kira Lewis at 13, and Jaxson Hayes at 8. Overall, it’s a strong draft record, and I have heard Graham was a big part of their overall scouting process.

Graham was with the Hawks last year and was in the room when the Pelicans inexplicably traded their 2026 first-rounder to move up 10 spots in the draft. He knew the value of that pick when, by some credible reports, the Bulls did not.

Graham has built up a sterling reputation (you can say that about any GM candidate). In 2022, he was named to The Athletic’s 40 under 40 and had some buzz as a guy who would get this type of job in his future. I have not heard anything but positive reports from beat writers in Atlanta and New Orleans (although I would be lying if I said I knew him at all or heard people talking about him prior to the last few weeks).

Some Bulls fans are expressing extreme disappointment at their guy not getting picked, whether that was Lloyd, Lewin, or someone else. I’d reserve judgment. I’ve said it several times online before, but it bears repeating here. We don’t know anything about these guys until we see their moves for a few years. Karnisovas was similarly regarded as a top scout, and his talent evaluation ended up being miserable.

For now, I’m keeping an open mind. We will learn a lot more about Graham over the coming months. These are the crumbs that I have to share a few hours after the hire.