Chicago Bulls Ready To Sign Westbrook After Projected Jazz Buyout: Report

Russell Westbrook's NBA future remains unknown, with the basketball world eager to see if the Utah Jazz will buy him out.

The 2017 NBA MVP was shipped by the Los Angeles Lakers to the Utah Jazz before the trade deadline, but it was believed to be just a temporary stop. There is a growing belief that the Jazz will buy out the nine-time All-Star, although nothing has transpired as of this writing.

If he's officially bought out by the Jazz, the "current indication" is that Westbrook will join the Chicago Bulls before the NBA All-Star weekend, Bulls reporter Sami Hassan reported, citing an unnamed source. International Business Times could not independently verify this information.

Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN also reported that Chicago is the frontrunner for the services of the 34-year-old guard.

According to Chris Haynes of the Bleacher Report, the Chicago Bulls and the Miami Heat are the top two choices for Westbrook.

Aside from the Bulls and the Heat, the Los Angeles Clippers were also linked to the 6-foot-3 guard, according to Law Murray of The Athletic.

Paul George appeared to be open to the idea of adding Westbrook to the fold. But this is on the premise that the two-time NBA scoring champion would fit the Clippers' system.

"I mean if there's, you know, somebody out there — Russell," George said Friday in a video shared on Twitter by Clippers beat writer Tomer Azarly. "If it makes sense and obviously it goes with our team, we're all for it. You know, we need a point guard. But you know, [at] the same [time], I think we're good as well. If nothing happened, we got enough in this locker room to be able to make it work."

He continued, "But it would definitely improve our team if we had that traditional point guard to kind of get us in things and make the game easy. So hopefully Russell sees this and we figure something out."

But the reality of it all is that the Jazz has not yet officially bought out Westbrook. Until that happens, the California native will have to sit tight and then deal with the dilemma of where to play next.

He is due $47 million, big money that needs to be resolved first. He would be getting a much lower salary on his next team once the buyout is made official. Hence, it makes sense why Westbrook would prefer to join a contending team or a club that has a promising future.