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Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Horst Given Extension

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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#261 » by German Athens » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:07 pm

emunney wrote:I think parity is very real, but that only enhances the value of the best players. Having talent spread throughout the league means a single transcendent player is an unnatural talent concentration.

Also, just as an aside, the Dame trade has not been as wild a success as I hoped, but also Jrue has crashed harder than I expected. Dame has lost some value, but making that trade in reverse now would be insane.


Oh for sure. I think the hindsight piece plays more into what else could we have gotten for Jrue at that time. The jrue trade was probably the only one we’ve had where we traded the player at the right time in the last 5 years or so.

Going back to RP’s guy, would the regular season results be all that different the past two seasons if we had traded Jrue and maybe 1 1st for Maxey? I’d think not, but we would have a player on the upswing of his career, and still have an extra 1st and some swaps.

If we move off Dame that’s still probably the route we need to go. Get a player primed to make a leap, and a younger prospect.

I still think we could probably be a contender by keeping Dame and Giannis together, using that 1st and swap to get a capable third player better than Kuzma, but likely worse than 21-23 Khris, and then fill in the roster with better defensive talent in space, but with a declining Dame, the margins are likely narrower, and if it doesn’t work out, you’re likely in an even more difficult position.

This will be a big off-season.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#262 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:08 pm

emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#263 » by emunney » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:20 pm

BigO wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


You can't plan to win a championship. Is that what we're doing? Your plan to win a championship is to trade Giannis for Flagg? Then what? That's it? You wouldn't have the exact same problems you're demanding I solve?
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#264 » by tydett » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:26 pm

BigO wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


I think that's Em's point tho - is that the Bucks are just as close to OKC or the Cavs as they are to the Pacers because teams are just so close right now. Sure, the Cavs and OKC are baptizing the league in a regular season that has continued to show it's essentially meaningless. They have really good habits and strong rosters. But they also had these strong rosters, mostly the same, last year and both teams "underperformed" because they ran into a stretch of bad games against other good teams. Look at the Bucks circa 2019 - demolished the league, but ran into a buzzsaw that they couldn't figure out. I'm not saying the Bucks are the team to beat those two teams, but I think Em's point is the plan to win a championship is that Giannis and Dame, two all-timers, go on a heater at the right team as the role players on the squad, who have shown they can have stretches of really good basketball, and it coincides with bad stretches from other similarly-talented teams.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#265 » by Ron Swanson » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:27 pm

BigO wrote:
Ron Swanson wrote:A fun exercise that I recommend is going back to that 2008-2010 period of Mavericks basketball, cuz the parallels are certainly interesting. They were barely squeaking out 49-50 wins both years, Dirk was turning 30 and about to be an unrestricted FA, and everyone was assuming the window was closing really fast if not already shut. They had won a single playoff series in the last 4-years since reaching the Finals in 2006 (sound familiar?).

Lots of chatter even going back to 2007 after that historic playoff flameout about "getting ahead of it" with a preemptive Dirk trade (TBF, mostly revolved around Kobe who was fed up with Buss/Kupchak at the time). That 2010 turnaround doesn't get talked about enough though. They just needed the right coach (Carlisle) and the right veteran supporting pieces (Tyson Chandler, Shawn Marion) and the rest was history. So no, unless Giannis demands out this summer, I'm not punting on what I still believe will be the best 3-year championship window we have left in my lifetime. You can talk all you want about "parity" in this league and how the 3PT shot has changed everything, but the golden rule still applies to 95% of championship teams. And that's you don't even have a shot unless you have a Top 3-5 guy in any given year.


I don't think Tatum was a top three to five player.


Aren't you just answering your own questions here by assuming Flagg is gonna be a Top-5 guy though? And then the question becomes, which one of these tank teams that wins the lottery (Washington, Utah, Charlotte) would even trade it for Giannis considering they're in no position to immediately put a contending supporting cast around him?
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#266 » by Ron Swanson » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:34 pm

Like, the only team I'm immediately calling up this summer if Giannis demands that I trade him, is New Orleans. It's Zion, their 2025 1st (currently #4) and the 2-3 picks and swaps we're still owed them. No other trade package is even entering my mind because what's even the point of a multi-year rebuild if you don't have your own draft picks? Trading him for some sole young blue-chip prospect or even a couple guys is dumb because even a best case scenario is likely just the 2002-2007 KG Minnesota years.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#267 » by emunney » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:35 pm

tydett wrote:
BigO wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


I think that's Em's point tho - is that the Bucks are just as close to OKC or the Cavs as they are to the Pacers because teams are just so close right now. Sure, the Cavs and OKC are baptizing the league in a regular season that has continued to show it's essentially meaningless. They have really good habits and strong rosters. But they also had these strong rosters, mostly the same, last year and both teams "underperformed" because they ran into a stretch of bad games against other good teams. Look at the Bucks circa 2019 - demolished the league, but ran into a buzzsaw that they couldn't figure out. I'm not saying the Bucks are the team to beat those two teams, but I think Em's point is the plan to win a championship is that Giannis and Dame, two all-timers, go on a heater at the right team as the role players on the squad, who have shown they can have stretches of really good basketball, and it coincides with bad stretches from other similarly-talented teams.


I honestly think it's silly to talk about plans to win a championship. In this era in particular, regardless of how good you are, the odds are against you. You have to win series against three other teams who are about as good as you. It's going to come down to who's making shots and who's healthy.

If we're not being literal about it and just talking about improving the team, I think we've got one really good prospect in Rollins who unfortunately we'll now have to re-sign, but in terms of internal improvement, that's where I'd hang my hat. For moves, philosophically I think we've got to get early career guys who are either blocked or unhappy or just actively want to play with Giannis. The easiest way to do that, to bring in the cream of that type, is trading Dame.

Generally speaking, you would think the guy who values Bobby Portis more than maybe anybody else in the world would understand that you don't need many assets or flexibility to bring in talent if you can identify it where it's hiding.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#268 » by fansinceforever » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:38 pm

emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.


You're right to an extent but there's not THAT many unknowns. There are OKCs, Cleveland's and to lesser extent, Houston's that sort of come out of nowhere but there's no Evan Mobley, Jalen Williams or Tari Eason on our roster that's going to elevate our ceiling like that. Hell, we don't even have guys like Aaron Wiggins.

While Giannis is better than anybody on their team and Dame has been good, we have no way of landing those next 2-3 pretty damn good, young players that all of those teams have. And their stars are 27/28 and younger.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#269 » by fansinceforever » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:39 pm

We can wait til the playoffs but there's a sizable gap between us and the Cavs or OKC.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#270 » by Ron Swanson » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:41 pm

fansinceforever wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.


You're right to an extent but there's not THAT many unknowns. There are OKCs, Cleveland's and to lesser extent, Houston's that sort of come out of nowhere but there's no Evan Mobley, Jalen Williams or Tari Eason on our roster that's going to elevate our ceiling like that. Hell, we don't even have guys like Aaron Wiggins.

While Giannis is better than anybody on their team and Dame has been good, we have no way of landing those next 2-3 pretty damn good, young players that all of those teams have. And their stars are 27/28 and younger.


Ok, I'm gonna push back on this because outside of Mobley (sure), those guys were all picked in the mid-1st round or in Wiggins case, the 5th to last pick in the 2nd round. Those assets/players are by no means "unattainable".
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#271 » by fansinceforever » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:46 pm

Ron Swanson wrote:
fansinceforever wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.


You're right to an extent but there's not THAT many unknowns. There are OKCs, Cleveland's and to lesser extent, Houston's that sort of come out of nowhere but there's no Evan Mobley, Jalen Williams or Tari Eason on our roster that's going to elevate our ceiling like that. Hell, we don't even have guys like Aaron Wiggins.

While Giannis is better than anybody on their team and Dame has been good, we have no way of landing those next 2-3 pretty damn good, young players that all of those teams have. And their stars are 27/28 and younger.


Ok, I'm gonna push back on this because outside of Mobley (sure), those guys were all picked in the mid-1st round or in Wiggins case, the 5th to last pick in the 2nd round. Those assets/players are by no means "unattainable".


That's fair but it's a prayer especially considering our current gang of flunkies running things.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#272 » by jakecronus8 » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:52 pm

Ron Swanson wrote:Like, the only team I'm immediately calling up this summer if Giannis demands that I trade him, is New Orleans. It's Zion, their 2025 1st (currently #4) and the 2-3 picks and swaps we're still owed them. No other trade package is even entering my mind because what's even the point of a multi-year rebuild if you don't have your own draft picks? Trading him for some sole young blue-chip prospect or even a couple guys is dumb because even a best case scenario is likely just the 2002-2007 KG Minnesota years.

San Antonio is the scenario I can somewhat see. If they won the lottery you could get Flagg/Castle/probably more picks and salary filler for Giannis.

I'd be happy for Giannis to have the opportunity to terrorize the league with Wemby to close out his career and I look at Flagg as potentially the next Giannis. Also have small hope with him growing up in the middle of nowhere that he'd be open to a long career in small market Milwaukee.

ETA: For context, I'm fully in the camp that believes the Giannis title window is closed in Milwaukee. I love the kid as much as I love the Bucks so I'd rather he get the opportunity to add to his legacy rather than put up numbers for middling Bucks squads.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#273 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:54 pm

emunney wrote:
BigO wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


You can't plan to win a championship. Is that what we're doing? Your plan to win a championship is to trade Giannis for Flagg? Then what? That's it? You wouldn't have the exact same problems you're demanding I solve?


No, you don't have the same problems.

If I am right about Flagg (I admit it's a big IF), then you get Flagg, a bunch of draft choices amd a few players in the trade and you get a wide open salary cap.

So the two roadblocks holding the Bucks back from improving are eliminated. That's the plan.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#274 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:56 pm

tydett wrote:
BigO wrote:
emunney wrote:I will keep hammering on this point even though I realize anybody who hasn't heard it by now isn't likely to: there is not that much difference between teams now. Two years ago, stories were being written about how the Thunder didn't have the top end talent and should trade SGA. They could have been right, but they weren't. The Raptors were a treadmill team. They made a couple moves, one of which would have been unthinkable a year earlier (getting Kawhi for a song), and they won a title. Almost every year a team comes seemingly out of nowhere.

There are so many unknowns. There is so much change. But one constant is how much more valuable a perennial MVP candidate type is than a perennial all-star reserve type. Just axiomatically, they are 5x harder to get. The competitive advantage they provide is even harder to reproduce by other means. Voluntarily trading a guy like that is the single worst thing you can do to a franchise.



Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


I think that's Em's point tho - is that the Bucks are just as close to OKC or the Cavs as they are to the Pacers because teams are just so close right now. Sure, the Cavs and OKC are baptizing the league in a regular season that has continued to show it's essentially meaningless. They have really good habits and strong rosters. But they also had these strong rosters, mostly the same, last year and both teams "underperformed" because they ran into a stretch of bad games against other good teams. Look at the Bucks circa 2019 - demolished the league, but ran into a buzzsaw that they couldn't figure out. I'm not saying the Bucks are the team to beat those two teams, but I think Em's point is the plan to win a championship is that Giannis and Dame, two all-timers, go on a heater at the right team as the role players on the squad, who have shown they can have stretches of really good basketball, and it coincides with bad stretches from other similarly-talented teams.


That certainly is a possibility and my trade idea wouldn't occur until after the season, when we could evaluate whether your scenario worked or didn't.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#275 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 4:58 pm

Ron Swanson wrote:
BigO wrote:
Ron Swanson wrote:A fun exercise that I recommend is going back to that 2008-2010 period of Mavericks basketball, cuz the parallels are certainly interesting. They were barely squeaking out 49-50 wins both years, Dirk was turning 30 and about to be an unrestricted FA, and everyone was assuming the window was closing really fast if not already shut. They had won a single playoff series in the last 4-years since reaching the Finals in 2006 (sound familiar?).

Lots of chatter even going back to 2007 after that historic playoff flameout about "getting ahead of it" with a preemptive Dirk trade (TBF, mostly revolved around Kobe who was fed up with Buss/Kupchak at the time). That 2010 turnaround doesn't get talked about enough though. They just needed the right coach (Carlisle) and the right veteran supporting pieces (Tyson Chandler, Shawn Marion) and the rest was history. So no, unless Giannis demands out this summer, I'm not punting on what I still believe will be the best 3-year championship window we have left in my lifetime. You can talk all you want about "parity" in this league and how the 3PT shot has changed everything, but the golden rule still applies to 95% of championship teams. And that's you don't even have a shot unless you have a Top 3-5 guy in any given year.


I don't think Tatum was a top three to five player.


Aren't you just answering your own questions here by assuming Flagg is gonna be a Top-5 guy though? And then the question becomes, which one of these tank teams that wins the lottery (Washington, Utah, Charlotte) would even trade it for Giannis considering they're in no position to immediately put a contending supporting cast around him?


That's a different question of whether a team will want Giannis. I think it's a probability that they would. Not all teams have my evaluation of Flagg. I may be on an island.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#276 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 5:05 pm

emunney wrote:
tydett wrote:
BigO wrote:

Then what is your plan to win a championship? I still haven't heard it. Pine for Jimmy Butler? More Kuzmas? Get another coach? Hope our second rounder is the next Jokic? Hope the other contenders all have injuries.

If we were close to the top teams, I could see it. We are closer to the Pacers than we are to the Cavs or OKC.

And again, I would not trade Giannis unless I thought that Flagg was a franchise changing player. It's a high stakes risk that I wouldn't do for any other player. And I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D


I think that's Em's point tho - is that the Bucks are just as close to OKC or the Cavs as they are to the Pacers because teams are just so close right now. Sure, the Cavs and OKC are baptizing the league in a regular season that has continued to show it's essentially meaningless. They have really good habits and strong rosters. But they also had these strong rosters, mostly the same, last year and both teams "underperformed" because they ran into a stretch of bad games against other good teams. Look at the Bucks circa 2019 - demolished the league, but ran into a buzzsaw that they couldn't figure out. I'm not saying the Bucks are the team to beat those two teams, but I think Em's point is the plan to win a championship is that Giannis and Dame, two all-timers, go on a heater at the right team as the role players on the squad, who have shown they can have stretches of really good basketball, and it coincides with bad stretches from other similarly-talented teams.


I honestly think it's silly to talk about plans to win a championship. In this era in particular, regardless of how good you are, the odds are against you. You have to win series against three other teams who are about as good as you. It's going to come down to who's making shots and who's healthy.

If we're not being literal about it and just talking about improving the team, I think we've got one really good prospect in Rollins who unfortunately we'll now have to re-sign, but in terms of internal improvement, that's where I'd hang my hat. For moves, philosophically I think we've got to get early career guys who are either blocked or unhappy or just actively want to play with Giannis. The easiest way to do that, to bring in the cream of that type, is trading Dame.

Generally speaking, you would think the guy who values Bobby Portis more than maybe anybody else in the world would understand that you don't need many assets or flexibility to bring in talent if you can identify it where it's hiding.


Horst did great job in getting Portis and Lopez, when their value was low AND the Bucks had cap space to do it.

You have to remember we have no tradeable picks (except 2031) and little cap space now. Yes,it's possible to find a scrub who becomes something, but that's not a good plan for improvement.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#277 » by BigO » Thu Mar 13, 2025 5:12 pm

Ron Swanson wrote:Like, the only team I'm immediately calling up this summer if Giannis demands that I trade him, is New Orleans. It's Zion, their 2025 1st (currently #4) and the 2-3 picks and swaps we're still owed them. No other trade package is even entering my mind because what's even the point of a multi-year rebuild if you don't have your own draft picks? Trading him for some sole young blue-chip prospect or even a couple guys is dumb because even a best case scenario is likely just the 2002-2007 KG Minnesota years.



I never suggested trading Giannis for just Flagg. It would include multiple first rounders and a player or two. I'd even throw in Dame for extra value.

The idea you'd rather have Williamson and the New Orleans draft picks than Flagg and let's say the Wizards draft picks doesn't resonate with me. I only proposed this because of Flagg. If he's not part of it, I'm keeping Giannis.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#278 » by Dick Tate » Thu Mar 13, 2025 5:37 pm

BigO wrote:I can make this trade, because I am a RealGMer, not a real GM. :D

A real GM won't be able to make a trade for the top pick in this draft.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#279 » by Profound23 » Thu Mar 13, 2025 6:04 pm

Trading Giannis for Flagg would be like taking Laettner #1 overall instead of Shaq.
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Re: Bucks News, Transactions, Trade Ideas - Rollins Converted to Standard Contract, Will be a RFA 

Post#280 » by paulpressey25 » Thu Mar 13, 2025 6:26 pm

BigO wrote:I never suggested trading Giannis for just Flagg. It would include multiple first rounders and a player or two. I'd even throw in Dame for extra value.

The idea you'd rather have Williamson and the New Orleans draft picks than Flagg and let's say the Wizards draft picks doesn't resonate with me. I only proposed this because of Flagg. If he's not part of it, I'm keeping Giannis.


While I wouldn't trade Giannis unless he asked out, I'm totally good with at least talking about trade ideas. Because we know once the Bucks get eliminated in round one or two, ESPN gonna be all over it.

If Giannis asks out, I do like Ron Swanson's concept of a Pelican's trade assuming they'd win the lottery for your guy Flagg. Zion, Flagg and our future pick/swaps back from the Jrue trade would work for me.

But there are complications to reclaiming our draft capital. I'm not sure we can get our 2025 #1 back. I think the Pels dealt it around and Brooklyn holds the rights unless it's 1-4 (which it won't be).

Pelicans still hold a 2026 swap with us which we could get back, but on the last pick owed (2027) the Pels have traded some of those rights to the Hawks already. So that one is likely not reclaimable either.
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