Well, it could always be worse.

That was Bulls vice president of basketball operations John Paxson’s takeaway from his team winding up with the seventh pick in the NBA draft despite finishing with the fourth-worst record in the league.

“My mind immediately went to the fact that three of the top four are going out West and New York didn’t get No. 1,” he said Tuesday. “So that’s something in our favor.”

The Bulls have actually picked seventh each of the last two years, selecting Wendell Carter Jr. and Lauri Markkanen. They weren’t the only team to fall. The Cavaliers and the Suns also fell from second and third to fifth and sixth, respectively. The Knicks had the worst record and will select third. The Pelicans wound up with the top pick despite a 6 percent chance at the start of the evening.

“You’re always disappointed,” Paxson said. “But there’s luck involved. We weren’t lucky. We feel we have two very good pieces that we got in the last two drafts at No. 7. We’re just going to try to keep building this thing.

“We’ve gone on our board already. And there are more than seven [players] there that we like. Now we have to get in the process of getting to see them and know them and really dissect them. We’ll get to work now.”