What if…?
Without Nikola Vučević, Chicago Bulls performed practically the same
48 games with him · 2 without, in 2025-26
-0.3
points per game
The question
What would have changed if Nikola Vučević had not played?
This answer is not published
- The evidence does not support what would be claimed.
The evidence
Without Nikola Vučević, Chicago Bulls performed practically the same
The claim goes unshown because something specific is missing:
- · The sample is too small to hold it up.2 partidos — el umbral de esta unidad es 10
The fact
What actually happened, game by game, in 2025-26. None of this is an estimate.
With Nikola Vučević in the box score
-2.71 points per game
48 games · 23-25 · 116.8 – 119.5
Without him
-3.00 points per game
2 games · 1-1 · 127.5 – 130.5
The assumptions
What we decided in order to answer. If an assumption does not hold for you, neither does the answer.
- That the 2 games without him represent a whole season without him.
- That opponent quality is spread evenly across both groups. We have not controlled for it.
- That other absences do not systematically coincide with his.
The estimated result
Arithmetic on the two figures above, nothing else: the per-game difference carried over a 82-game season.
- points of margin per game-0.29
- Across 82 games that is -24 points of accumulated margin.
FactDerivedAssumption
What this does not prove
- This does not say he is the cause. A team without its best player also changes rotation, opponent and schedule at the same time.
- It rests on 2 games without him. At that sample size, a couple of odd games move the number.
- It is not a forecast for next season: it is what happened in the one already played.
From here
Where it comes from
Source
2026-02-01
Model input
not stated
Computation
not stated
This answer
2026-10-12
Where this comes from