Josh Giddey has signed his new contract, and is relishing the opportunity to prove he’s worth it.

That pressure is the nature of the beast when you sign a four-year, $100 million contract on a big market team like the Chicago Bulls; a deal that ostensibly locks the Australian in as the high-profile franchise’s starting point guard for the foreseeable future.

The long-term commitment from the Bulls came after Giddey proved to be one of the NBA’s most productive players over the back-half of last season, but the Australian is eager to show that stretch of basketball was more than just an anomalous purple patch; that he can do it regularly, while impacting winning basketball.

“I’m looking to hit the ground running,” Giddey told ESPN.

“You don’t ever want it to be a two-month, three-month hot stretch… you want it to be a regular occurrence. I’ve had a great offseason, so [I’m] excited to get back there and get into it.”

But, before he could show that he can be a consistent, quality starting point guard in the NBA, he had to navigate what was a challenging contract negotiation over this offseason.

It was a tricky process for all restricted free agents — a cohort that included Giddey — because teams around the league didn’t have the necessary cap space to meaningfully engage with any of those players. An absence of leverage existed on both sides — Giddey could very well have just taken his qualifying offer and entered unrestricted free agency next offseason — so, while a good faith negotiation was taking place, the talks were necessarily a challenge for all involved.

It went down to the wire, stretching until early September — just a few weeks out from training camp — but a deal was ultimately struck that most regard as fair for both parties, with Giddey putting pen to paper on a new four-year, $100 million contract that keeps him in Chicago through the 2029-30 NBA season.

“Any time you’re a free agent, that kind of looms over you for a while,” Giddey said.

“Even during the season, you know at the end of it that you’re extension-eligible… it hangs over your head, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about it.

“The fact it’s done now, I can move forward; the next four years, I’m locked in with the Bulls. Super excited, love the city, they embraced me quickly, my teammates are awesome, the building, front office, coaches, everyone’s been awesome. Very, very happy in Chicago, and excited to be there another four years.

“That was the team I wanted to be at.

“There’s a lot of younger guys now, with Matas [Buzelis], obviously Noa [Essengue] coming through. I’m excited to be able to grow with the group we have, and build off our second half of last year.”

READ: Examining what Giddey’s deal means for Chicago

The contract was a result of a few things Giddey had demonstrated over the course of his young career; first, by showing his potential as a starter for a rising Oklahoma City Thunder team, before a trade to the Bulls allowed him to step into a more substantial role as a starting point guard under head coach Billy Donovan in Chicago.

The start of his stint with the Bulls was somewhat shaky, before Giddey emerged as one of the most productive players in the NBA; in 19 games after the All-Star break, he averaged 21.2 points, 10.7 rebounds, and 9.3 assists per game, while shooting an impressive 50% from the field and 45.7% from 3PT (on 4.3 3PA).

During that stretch, Giddey posted five triple-doubles — he had seven on the season, and is up to 18 in his career — and the Bulls won 15 of their last 20 games of the regular season.

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‘I’m looking to hit the ground running’: Giddey excited for new season

Josh Giddey has spent the summer working on his game ahead of the NBA season, after the 22-year-old signed a new deal with the Chicago Bulls.

“I think a lot of it comes with confidence, and I got that probably around the trade deadline,” Giddey said.

“With Zach [LaVine] being traded… not to say Zach was hindering anybody… [but] he was such a big part of what we did, [so] it opened up an avenue for me to step into a bigger role when he was traded. I tried to take that with both hands.

“And it wasn’t all about me. My teammates, they did an awesome job of helping me out, coaches put me in positions to be successful. Not all of it was me; I was very fortunate to have great teammates that made that success that I and we had possible.”

While the extent of the shooting efficiency during that stretch can be put down to the sample size, there’s reason to believe that element of Giddey’s game can continue to see an uptick. The 22-year-old’s three-point shooting has improved every season since he entered the league in 2021, from 26.3% during his rookie year, to 37.8% during the 2024-25 season, which also saw him shoot a career-high 4.0 attempts per game.

Over the offseason, Giddey split his time between Melbourne, Australia and Los Angeles, California, working out with Jordan Lawley and Phil Handy — both of whom are highly-regarded skills trainers in the NBA ecosystem — as well as decorated strength and conditioning coach Nik Popovic, with an eye toward improving the areas of his game required to be an effective starting point guard in the NBA.

“We wanted to hone in on a lot of stuff off the bounce, creation stuff off the bounce,” Giddey said.

“Seeking contact, so drawing fouls and getting to the line a lot more; it’s something I struggled with early on in my career… Continuing to develop a shot, handle; tighten everything up. I’m 22 years old so, naturally, a lot of my game still has work to do, and I’ve got a lot of room for improvement.”

Among the areas of improvement Giddey targeted, particularly during a six-week stretch working with Handy in Los Angeles, was creating out of the mid and low post, in an attempt to more effectively utilise his 6’8, 220 lbs frame.

“It goes hand in hand with the weight room, getting stronger and being able to overpower smaller guys,” Giddey said.

“I haven’t really used that to my full advantage in my career so far. I’m starting to figure it out now, and get into those spots where — it doesn’t have to be a 10-second isolation — it can be one or two dribbles, back my man into the paint and finish. Especially in the pickup games, that’s something I tried to work on and put an emphasis on.

READ: NBA Rank 2025-26 – Why didn’t Giddey make the list?

“Phil was unbelievable; I was with him for about six weeks. His stuff was pretty new to me, and it took me a while to get the hang of it but, once I did, it was great and I can see why he said I can implement things like that into my game and look to make that another weapon for myself.”

Now that Giddey is officially locked in long-term with the Bulls, and has the responsibility to lead them from the front, he’s hoping to guide them back into the sort of playoff contention that’s been a rarity for the franchise over the past decade.

The Bulls have qualified for the playoffs twice in the last nine seasons, and have been a play-in team — either the ninth or 10th seed — over their last three campaigns. It’s a tricky situation for any team to exist in — being too good to tank, but not quite ready to compete in the playoffs — but Giddey is confident his team can use its positive end of last season to lift themselves into the upper echelon of the Eastern Conference.

“No one wants to sit in the middle,” Giddey said.

“You want to get out of that middle section; you wanna be a top team. Every team does. Sometimes it takes time. We’re at a point now — especially with our group — where we believe we have enough, and I think we showed it at the back-end of the year.

“You can argue that it was against teams that weren’t playing hard, but we beat some very, very good teams, on the road. We had a seven-game stretch where we went on the west coast, and I think we went 6-1 or 5-2; we beat some very, very good teams. Lakers, Denver. We beat some very good teams, so that gave us confidence. I think that allows you to, moving forward, we can build off that.

“Hopefully everyone is healthy to start the season, I like to think we’ve got good depth, and the East is wide open… It’s very open, so we need to start the year strong. Our identity is a very fast-paced team, we get up and down the floor, defensively we have to be better and I think we will be. That’s a whole team effort.”