Milwaukee Bucks Team Review

 

2020-21 Finish: 19-63

 

Season Highlight:

Keep on building! The plan was never to be winners right away. Everyone had seen this movie before� Milwaukee GM shuns veterans, goes hard after as much youth and picks as possible, builds up an impressive stable of prospects and eventually turns it into an unstoppable contender which can only be slowed down if people stop feeding the monster picks for guys coming off of rookie contracts. They have Zion, Shai, Mobley, Achiuwa, Hayes, and a few others who look like they could stick around for a while

 

Season Lowlight:

Well � some wins would be nice, but again � that�s not the plan. This section got really easy when longtime GM badwolf quietly signaled his departure from the NSL. Now that he lived through all of the losses, somebody else should be able to take over and immediately register the team�s best season to date. Losing such a strategic mind and visionary GM will be a tough pill to swallow for an NSL franchise that hasn�t felt much success. Hopefully one of these anxious newbies can come in and do the job that badwolf started.

 

Best Trade:

The Houston Rockets send Juan Hernangomez to the Milwaukee Bucks. Milwaukee Bucks send Goga Bitadze to the Phoenix Suns. The Houston Rockets send a 1st-Rounder (Bkn) to the Milwaukee Bucks. as part of a bigger deal.

The jury is still out on Goga, but that unprotected 2023 Brooklyn 1^st is not looking too shabby right now. Juancho probably has similar production to Goga right now, but definitely not the upside� But this is a 100% badwolf move, and it was a calculated addition of a pick that could have some upside.

 

Worst Trade:

The Chicago Bulls send Cedi Osman to the Milwaukee Bucks. The Milwaukee Bucks send Chandler Hutchison and Isaiah Joe to the Chicago Bulls.

Osman is probably the biggest contributor of the 3 players right now, so maybe it makes sense in that vein. I would actually say that Isaiah Joe, despite being the lowest rated coming into the draft of these 3 prospects � has the best chance at a longer-term career. Not a bad loss on this trade at all though

 

Other Notable Trades:

Not really much else there� Badwolf didn�t have to rebuild because he drafted his own team� and we were only 2 years into this, which meant there weren�t too many guys aging out of the system and ready to flip yet. He did make some moves to buy some 2nds, always a great move if you can pull it off.

Free Agency:

How�s this for a change from nearly every other team in the league� the Bucks will not be focusing on retaining their own free agents nearly at all. Instead, they, along with the Hawks, are the only team that can offer any Free Agent meaningfully more than the MLE. Restricted Free Agent Hamidou Diallo is their only guy whose name will even be called � but he�s restricted so it�s low drama. If they bring him back, they�ll have 3 roster spots to fill � potentially down to 2 if they bring in 2^nd round pick Jeremiah Robinson-Earl.

Where will they go? How will they spend that money? If badwolf were here -he may very well not use it and try to find some contracts to take on and deals to facilitate in order to bring in more picks and prospects. I�m guessing most other GMs would see this as an opportunity to go on a nice spending spree with minimal competition. They have a pile of GM points that there is no point in saving and they can afford to go after any player. Do they try to make CHA/POR sweat and put the full court press on CP3 or Kawhi? Do they try to go after guys who have little competition like Kelly Oubre and Duncan Robinson? Try to steal a sign and trade candidate? The options are plentiful, but the insight into what they�ll do is minimal.

 

Star:

Precious Achiuwa

This is obviously compared against expectations a bit, as SGA and Zion are the stars of the team in name. However, Achiuwa played in 81 games, 69 starts and averaged 9 and 11. He didn�t quite work himself into the place where he�s on the same franchise-cornerstone level of the big names � but having a non-lotto rookie come in and give you that kind of production is amazing. Especially when you consider that he did it pretty efficiently and not just because of inflated minutes on a rebuilding team.

 

Flop:

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

To me the flop is always what somebody provided versus what they were expected to provide. Therefore, SGA playing in well under half of the games (34) is a huge blow to the expected value of his season. Zion and SGA barely combined to play a full season and rarely took the court together. Shai was more ball dominant when he was available and didn�t put up bad numbers � but they weren�t much of a step forward from his 2019 numbers that he put up over 82 games. Worse, it seemed like at times, a lot of the reason he was sidelined was because of the rebuilding status of the team and not major injuries. SGA will be looking for a bounce-back year in 2021 with an improved cast surrounding him.

 

Draft Grades:

Milwaukee Bucks / B+

Picks - 3,36

Players - 3. Evan Mobley, 36. Jeremiah Robinson-Earl

You cannot go wrong with these top picks, Mobley will be a star in this league for sure. Great pick for the Bucks, and nabbing Robinson-Earl could be a steal too. Who knows what he will become but I like the addition.

 

The Future:

As I�ve said� this whole thing is �future� � it was part of the plan. With a solid young core in place and 3 more possible lotto picks in the next 2 seasons the future is bright. Obviously their own success can undermine a couple of those lotto picks, and with as much young talent as they have, merged with the veteran presence of a few guys, they certainly could make the playoffs in the next two years � as long as that is actually their goal. I�m also not super sold on Achuiwa, Mobley and Zion being a good combo � especially when Shai and Hayes are not guys that really stretch the floor a ton at this point.

Minus any possible Free Agent splurges, their roster currently looks like:

C: Precious Achiuwa / Juan Hernangomez
PF: Evan Mobley / Thad Young
SF: Zion Williamson / Aaron Nesmith / Cedi Osman
SG: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander /  Robert Woodard II / Hamidou Diallo
PG: Killian Hayes / D.J. Augustin