Bucks News, Trades, Transactions - CP3/Gallo trade idea pg.81

[FrieAaron]

When could Donte ever reliably hit an open three?

NCAA Championship. Yes, not as a pro, but that was his billing out of college.

"He's had some good shooting games" isn't exactly the definition of reliable.

[MrHoneycutt]

Thannies imo.

I heard this as well. The question was when stating your name to you I say Yanni, but when saying your name to someone else its Giannis. Giannis said that is correct and stated that Thanasis would be Thanasi when talking to him.

So in my mind, sounded odd, but I thought it made sense. Found it somewhat interesting.

Correct.That's how it is in Greek.

Fun fact Thanasis is also called Thanos in Greek(that how i call my brother)

For sure, actually it wasn't the nicknames that I found so oddly compelling, but rather the timbre and vocal delivery that Pascke has been giving us as Bucks fans for some 30-odd years. No one else can sound so simultaneously befuddled and self-assured at the same time

[craig]

DDV's a really important wildcard. And his 3-point shot is central to that. He was bad last year, and his college record, both 3 and free, doesn't indicate that he was ever a consistently deadly pure shooter there either. *If* he emerged as a mostly reliable, deadly outside shot, he'd be a really good piece for us. That's a huge *if* and not super likely, but maybe the kind of*if* that works out favorably for teams that end up winning championships?

[crkone]

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/27763420/nba-30-teams-rated-top-contenders-bottom-tier

The Bucks and Sixers get to frolic in the junior varsity conference. They still make for an ideal fit-versus-talent contrast, at least on offense. The Bucks make sense: Giannis and shooting. Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons are never going to mesh as neatly on offense as the NBA's classic one-two punches.

And yet: I have pangs of anxiety about Milwaukee. Their best heavy-minutes lineup a year ago was Eric Bledsoe, Malcolm Brogdon, Khris Middleton, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez -- i.e. three guards/wings, Giannis, and a sweet-shooting center. One of those guards plays for the Pacers now. Another self-destructed in the conference finals.

The new perimeter-oriented versions of those lineups have some combination of Sterling Brown, Pat Connaughton, Wesley Matthews, Kyle Korver, and George Hill soaking up the Brogdon minutes. Brown might get first crack as a starter. Milwaukee should be all-in investigating whether he and Connaughton can handle more postseason minutes. Will Mike Budenholzer go that route, or default to aging veterans?

The bigger versions shift the Brogdon minutes to Ersan Ilyasova and (hopefully) D.J. Wilson. I'm not sure I trust those groups against the best competition. Does either lineup type have enough juice to overcome another ill-timed Bledsoe slump?

Maybe. Antetokounmpo is that good. Those creaky veteran shooters will get easier looks playing next to him. If Antetokounmpo improves his standstill triple to the point that defenders have to (kinda) honor him up top, the league might not have an answer. Al Horford, Philly's newest big, was an answer once, but Antetokounmpo solved him in last season's second-round dismantling of Boston.

We all know the questions in Philly. Rarely does a true-blue contender enter a season with so much uncertainty about so many fundamental aspects of its team. But the Sixers' size and talent are overwhelming. One of the rare defenders to trouble Embiid -- Horford -- is now on his team. Another, Marc Gasol, no longer plays for a contender.

Horford is a ballast against Philly's vulnerability when Embiid sits. A stat that blows me away four-plus months later: The Sixers outscored Toronto by 90 points in 237 minutes with Embiid on the floor during the conference semifinals ... and lost the remaining 99 non-Embiid minutes by 109 points. I mean ... what? Yeah, that's a small sample size. Whatever. A high-end playoff team losing one subset of minutes against one opponent by a Washington Generals margin is crazy -- and indicative of an issue that has dogged Philly for years now.

The Sixers are going to be brutal to score against. We tend to focus fit-related discussions on offense, but defensive fit is a thing, too. Point guards torched Philly last season until Simmons took the job in the first round and erased D'Angelo Russell. Now the Sixers have Josh Richardson, a long-armed menace, funneling those guys toward Embiid.

If they have to trade for one more bench guy, they will. Something in my gut just likes this team. Now they need to get Embiid to peak in May and June.

The Bucks might have also set the record for fastest transition from feel-good up-and-comer to contender facing almost existential pressure. Every slump will be magnified until Antetokounmpo says he is signing the supermax. If Milwaukee makes the conference finals, the entire league will watch with one thought in mind: Now we get to see if they have enough around Giannis.

All the noise has to matter. For some teams, it takes a real toll.

It can also push teams into risky future-for-present trades. The Bucks aren't exactly brimming with trade assets, but Jon Horst, their GM, proved last season in flipping four second-rounders for Nikola Mirotic that he will be bold.

[MickeyDavis]

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[Turk Nowitzki]

I didn't have any problems with their answers regarding Brogdon. I know everyone doesn't universally accept them as good reasons but they didn't BS anyone at least. They chose to pay other guys and didn't want to be on the hook for the repeater luxury tax earlier to pay him big money. We'll see how smart or dumb of a decision it was.

[humanrefutation]

I mean, their answers were pretty much "we cheaped out for a year because we're going to enter the tax next year."

If it's your money, I get that logic. But it isn't my money, and as a fan, I want the best team possible. Their decision not to pay Brogdon may have deprived us of that. Perhaps all will be well with Wes/Donte/Pat at the 2, and/or Brogdon's foot will give out on him, and this will ultimately have been the right decision.

[Chuck Diesel]

The durability (or lack thereof) will be the only way not matching will be a good basketball decision. My bet is Brogdon>whoever starts at 2/whoever we trade Indy picks for/whoever we draft with Indy picks. If it really came down to Bucks medical people red-flagging more than the owners being thrifty then that’s fine.

[blazza18]

Yea, I absolutely believe if Brogdon never had injury issues he'd still be a Buck.

[Siefer]

I think Hill+Matthews+1st vs. Brogdon is surprisingly close, especially for the regular season. But, I keep coming back to that $10 million exception. If the primary issue wasn't the tax, why didn't we make sure we could snag that exception for later use this season? I suspect the answer is because any real use of it would put the team into the tax. If they'd argued Hill+Matthews+1st+the ability to absorb the salary of a mid-level vet during the season was worth more than Brogdon, I could see their argument.

[Ron Swanson]

Yep, that's the one thing that keeps me from crushing the deal too much. Almost assuredly you don't get George Hill back if you go over the tax to retain Brogdon. The two most obvious expendables were always gonna be Mirotic and Brogdon. Getting decent compensation back for him in the S&T was also crucial. It would have been pretty indefensible if they just let an RFA of his caliber walk for nothing.

[Bucksfan28]

Yea, I absolutely believe if Brogdon never had injury issues he'd still be a Buck.

Also may be getting paid more though.

[JayMKE]

It is what it is with Brogdon, I wanted to retain him but it's not like they got totally nothing for him & nobody to replace him so it's just a different direction. There was rumblings for quite awhile that Brogdon wasn't super happy here for whatever reason.

[Chuck Diesel]

I just think the “wanted out” thing is a nothing burger. He’s one of the top character guys in the league and retaining the best asset is almost always the right play. Brogdon’s intangibles are too elite to worry about chemistry. He’s a little irked to be back at first? So what. In the spring he’d have been playing his ass off to try to win a ring.

Anyway, excited to see who steps up in his absence.

[PG Graveyard]

I want to preface this by saying I love Brogdon as both a player and a person....But.

I still think the Brogdon move was a good basketball move. Getting 3 badly needed picks will help especially when they must have known they had Wes Matthews in their back pocket. I think Brogdon's overall impact is overrated when you consider we made the ECF last year without him and he didn't start until game 5 of that series anyways. The one thing I am worried about is the Pacers being in the lottery this year. I don't think that team is very good without Oladipo and they could get behind early in the season.

Also I really want to see what DDV and Brown can bring to the table. They are not Brogdon, but they don't have to be. Anyways super excited for the season. I really like this roster and everything going on in the organization. It should be fun.

[Balls2TheWalls]

I think that Hill + Matthews + 1st is a win if DDV or Brown step forward at all. I think it is smart to not go into the luxury tax right before giving a player a supermax and crushing yourself with the repeater taxes.

[JayMKE]

I think George Hill being as great as he was in the playoffs made them feel Brogdon was expendable, I don't think most people were expecting Hill to be a guy we'd want to sign long term before that. Agree that you got to give young guys like Sterling/DDV + DJ a chance too which is another reason Brogdon/Mirotic became expendable. If those young guys become something and with the additional picks, we've replenished the war chest a little bit.

[Wooderson]

I didn't have any problems with their answers regarding Brogdon. I know everyone doesn't universally accept them as good reasons but they didn't BS anyone at least. They chose to pay other guys and didn't want to be on the hook for the repeater luxury tax earlier to pay him big money. We'll see how smart or dumb of a decision it was.

I dunno, seems like the Bucks could have kept the starting 5 together while avoiding the tax the next two years. And then the Brook/Malcolm/Bledsoe deals would all be done by the time theyd potentially hit the repeater.

[BJ Sandered]

Going into the offseason I thought Brogdon was the most important player to re-sign, but there were some logical reasons to not pay him such as health concerns etc.

[MVP2110]

I didn't have any problems with their answers regarding Brogdon. I know everyone doesn't universally accept them as good reasons but they didn't BS anyone at least. They chose to pay other guys and didn't want to be on the hook for the repeater luxury tax earlier to pay him big money. We'll see how smart or dumb of a decision it was.

I dunno, seems like the Bucks could have kept the starting 5 together while avoiding the tax the next two years. And then the Brook/Malcolm/Bledsoe deals would all be done by the time theyd potentially hit the repeater.

Just curious how do you expect us to sign those 3 while staying under the tax?