PG: Bucks on the Brink

[Milbucks96]

Just jumped to 5.5 favorites tomorrow..

That number will likely grow. popular opinion is harden will sit and nets will limit KDs minutes and play to win game 7.

No way that happens, makes zero sense

[paulpressey25]

I mean, okay.

But the coach could also install something besides tape boxes around the arc. Three years. No changes. No chemistry. Nothing.

The guy sucks.

Everyone's bitch is correct. Failure has many fathers in this situation.

That said, replace Jrue with Lowry, and I think we're closing out this series tomorrow. And yes I realize Jrue is really good and we'd lose a lot defensively. But a "Lowry" would want the rock, and he'd make more happen.

[paulpressey25]

Can we stop describing the Jrue trade package as "AD level"? We didn't give up all those picks AND a Josh Hart/Lonzo Ball/Brandon Ingram package. It's not even close.

When that Lakers trade was made, Ingram was an Eddy Curry/Bosh heart situation from having to retire. And Hart was a toss in. And Ball was a flawed player that everyone knows was flawed.

It only looks less lopsided now that Ingram and Ball have expanded out their games considerably.

[sidney lanier]

The tragedy of this playoff season is the way other teams are falling like bowling pins and we can't find the pocket. But we aren't rolling gutter balls either.

Maybe it's too soon for Giannis at age 26 to show the kind of championship-level playoff poise that Michael Jordan didn't really acquire until age 28, and after a college apprenticeship Giannis didn't have. Or maybe it never comes.

But at least I think game seven in this series will.

[DingleJerry]

Can we stop describing the Jrue trade package as "AD level"? We didn't give up all those picks AND a Josh Hart/Lonzo Ball/Brandon Ingram package. It's not even close.

When that Lakers trade was made, Ingram was an Eddy Curry/Bosh heart situation from having to retire. And Hart was a toss in. And Ball was a flawed player that everyone knows was flawed.

It only looks less lopsided now that Ingram and Ball have expanded out their games considerably.

True those guys values had dipped. But they were top 3 picks under age 22. We're very unlikely to give up more than one pick above 20, and even that is unlikely barring Giannis injury or trade demand. 3 picks in the 20s and Hill/Bledsoe is whatever, the risk of Jrue/Giannis not signing was the big gamble in all of it. And remember Lakers gave up some 1sts too, don't recall the specifics on the protections though.

Still, don't think Jrue was the all in move we needed. But maybe Giannis/management doesn't see it like me that they need the lead handler/shooter and want to continue to force Giannis into that even though he's not capable.

[Fresh_Prince12]

U you oh can’t tell me the bucks will lay an egg tomorrow. It’s just gonna happen

[MikeIsGood]

The amazing thing is some in the game thread were blaming Middleton for this.

Out of all the incredible surprising things that came out of that game last night, this is by far the least surprising.

Middleton should have took the shot there. I trust him and Jrue to be clutch. Giannis not so much.

Middleton's man was in position and going into the air. Giannis should have had a wide open dunk. Middleton made the right play 11/10 times. Jesus christ.

[truly]

Out of all the incredible surprising things that came out of that game last night, this is by far the least surprising.

Middleton should have took the shot there. I trust him and Jrue to be clutch. Giannis not so much.

Middleton's man was in position and going into the air. Giannis should have had a wide open dunk. Middleton made the right play 11/10 times. Jesus christ.

Yep,the pass was right on his hands too.It's ridiculous to blame Middleton for this.

[Fotis St]

The tragedy of this playoff season is the way other teams are falling like bowling pins and we can't find the pocket. But we aren't rolling gutter balls either.

Maybe it's too soon for Giannis at age 26 to show the kind of championship-level playoff poise that Michael Jordan didn't really acquire until age 28, and after a college apprenticeship Giannis didn't have. Or maybe it never comes.

But at least I think game seven in this series will.

I think Giannis is closest to Dominique Wilkins than the Goat

[BucksRule18]

Giannis is like a hungry beast. If you keep him fed by allowing him to take multiple 3 point shots in a game, or have the ball adjoined to his hip on the offensive end, he will never be hungry enough to do some of the other intangible things that help a championship caliber team win. If the next coach takes the ball out of Giannis's hands every other possession, I guarantee he'll attack the offensive glass to keep himself fed. Heck, he may even finally be forced to improve his free throw shooting so he can average 20+ points a game. This version of Giannis can average 30 points without having to concentrate on some other aspects of his game that someone with less usage would need to.

[GHOSTofSIKMA]

I mean, okay.

But the coach could also install something besides tape boxes around the arc. Three years. No changes. No chemistry. Nothing.

The guy sucks.

Everyone's bitch is correct. Failure has many fathers in this situation.

That said, replace Jrue with Lowry, and I think we're closing out this series tomorrow. And yes I realize Jrue is really good and we'd lose a lot defensively. But a "Lowry" would want the rock, and he'd make more happen.

imagine lowry telling lebron or durant or kawhi to give up the rock and go be a roleplayer. come pp no way lowry makes any difference whatsoever to this mess.

reality is we play the EXACT way we should play to get a maximum result and its why we do so well in the reg season. there is no way in hell in crunchtime youre going to be able to tell giannis he needs to be a roleplayer when hes been "the mvp" all season long. thats not to mention that taking the ball out of his hands against 80% of this league is a mistake anyway.

bud figured it out. he maximized this roster of perfect complimentary players for what were trying to do with giannis. this IS our ceiling with giannis.......4 years. two coaches. this is the ceiling. i really truly believe it.

[ABucksFan]

I mean, okay.

But the coach could also install something besides tape boxes around the arc. Three years. No changes. No chemistry. Nothing.

The guy sucks.

Everyone's bitch is correct. Failure has many fathers in this situation.

That said, replace Jrue with Lowry, and I think we're closing out this series tomorrow. And yes I realize Jrue is really good and we'd lose a lot defensively. But a "Lowry" would want the rock, and he'd make more happen.

imagine lowry telling lebron or durant or kawhi to give up the rock and go be a roleplayer. come pp no way lowry makes any difference whatsoever to this mess.

reality is we play the EXACT way we should play to get a maximum result and its why we do so well in the reg season. there is no way in hell in crunchtime youre going to be able to tell giannis he needs to be a roleplayer when hes been "the mvp" all season long. thats not to mention that taking the ball out of his hands against 80% of this league is a mistake anyway.

bud figured it out. he maximized this roster of perfect complimentary players for what were trying to do with giannis. this IS our ceiling with giannis.......4 years. two coaches. this is the ceiling. i really truly believe it.

OF COURSE LOWRY would not take the rock from BRON, KLAW, or KD. He WOULD TAKE it from GIANNIS. Giannis is no where close to those other guys level. Lowry would for sure make a difference, you need a coach on the floor ALA CP3, Lowry. These are High IQ guys who can make a difference when the coach is a bozo.

[BucksRule18]

I mean, okay.

But the coach could also install something besides tape boxes around the arc. Three years. No changes. No chemistry. Nothing.

The guy sucks.

Everyone's bitch is correct. Failure has many fathers in this situation.

That said, replace Jrue with Lowry, and I think we're closing out this series tomorrow. And yes I realize Jrue is really good and we'd lose a lot defensively. But a "Lowry" would want the rock, and he'd make more happen.

imagine lowry telling lebron or durant or kawhi to give up the rock and go be a roleplayer. come pp no way lowry makes any difference whatsoever to this mess.

reality is we play the EXACT way we should play to get a maximum result and its why we do so well in the reg season. there is no way in hell in crunchtime youre going to be able to tell giannis he needs to be a roleplayer when hes been "the mvp" all season long. thats not to mention that taking the ball out of his hands against 80% of this league is a mistake anyway.

bud figured it out. he maximized this roster of perfect complimentary players for what were trying to do with giannis. this IS our ceiling with giannis.......4 years. two coaches. this is the ceiling. i really truly believe it.

Unfortunately, the only way this will change is if Giannis realizes he's not winning a chip with us and wants to be traded to a team with an existing superstar like GS. In Milwaukee, Giannis will never play second fiddle even if prime Jordan walked into the building.

[mke_design]

Is this team with Dame and not Giannis a championship team?

[BucksRule18]

Is this team with Dame and not Giannis a championship team?

Only if you factor in injuries to other teams.

[Wooderson]

Giannis deserves much criticism for some of his play, especially the bad decision making and wasted possessions, but the # 2 and 3 options have not been good overall.

Middleton: 22/8/4 with a 47.7% TS 38/32/81 splits
Jrue: 18/5/6 with a 46.6% TS 38/32/81 splits

Your 2nd/3rd options can't be throwing up multiple tank jobs shooting the ball. Is some of that Giannis bogging down the offense? Sure, maybe, but the offense has been even more of an unmitigated disaster with Giannis on the bench. Some here like the small sample size on/off. Here it is for this series so far.

Giannis on: 101.3 ORtg, 102.8 DRtg for a -1.5 NetRtg
Giannis off: 88.8 ORtg (by far the worst on the team), 117.0 DRtg for -28.2 NetRtg

And this matches the eye test, they've looked completely helpless at times generating a good offense with Giannis on the bench. Middleton basically lost them game 1 with his performance. If he had even been just "below average" they're in that game.

[FrieAaron]

It's a microcosm of the difficulty in properly evaluating this team over the past 3 years. All the stats and numbers go out the window when you don't know which team is gonna show up every quarter or half, let alone every game. Like, they legitimately played great basketball in the first two quarters, and Jeff Green going prime Ray Allen/Reggie Miller was the only thing that kept it from bein a 20+ point blowout at halftime. But the second the other team goes on any sort of run to close the gap, you can literally see their confidence and composure completely disintegrate.

Which is why I'm really not especially hopeful that a coach will change all that much. How many times have we seen the Bucks over the last few years come out playing great and then just...stop doing what they were doing? And now we're saying call a play every time down the court if you have to? What kind of roster necessitates that in a coach. And even if he did, who here is confident that we would even listen when we have a superstar waving people off to take shots that are outside of his strengths?

That said, I don't think we have much other choice because we've painted ourselves into a corner. As I said in the Khris thread, all we have left are long shots. You're not going to get equal or greater value for Khris or Jrue's contracts without rolling the dice on someone whose value has been lowered for one reason or another and outside of that we have no real assets at all. Prioritize getting a floor general of any kind and then hire one of those coaches in Europe that hammers the super fundamental stuff. Remember those USA Olympic teams coached by Larry Brown and George Karl that were embarrassed because they didn't know what to do against pick and rolls? Get one of those dudes.

[GHOSTofSIKMA]

Everyone's bitch is correct. Failure has many fathers in this situation.

That said, replace Jrue with Lowry, and I think we're closing out this series tomorrow. And yes I realize Jrue is really good and we'd lose a lot defensively. But a "Lowry" would want the rock, and he'd make more happen.

imagine lowry telling lebron or durant or kawhi to give up the rock and go be a roleplayer. come pp no way lowry makes any difference whatsoever to this mess.

reality is we play the EXACT way we should play to get a maximum result and its why we do so well in the reg season. there is no way in hell in crunchtime youre going to be able to tell giannis he needs to be a roleplayer when hes been "the mvp" all season long. thats not to mention that taking the ball out of his hands against 80% of this league is a mistake anyway.

bud figured it out. he maximized this roster of perfect complimentary players for what were trying to do with giannis. this IS our ceiling with giannis.......4 years. two coaches. this is the ceiling. i really truly believe it.

OF COURSE LOWRY would not take the rock from BRON, KLAW, or KD. He WOULD TAKE it from GIANNIS. Giannis is no where close to those other guys level. Lowry would for sure make a difference, you need a coach on the floor ALA CP3, Lowry. These are High IQ guys who can make a difference when the coach is a bozo.

giannis is NOT giving up that rock. there isnt any **** way in hell anybody short of chris paul or steph curry is bumping his ass off that ball. and even if they did it still doesnt change the fact hes a pretty crap off ball player not anywhere even close to being worth a super max contract

[aboveAverage]

So many infuriating things about this team that all add up to the disappointment yesterday. The funny thing is that we still almost won. We just need one of those things to go right in game 6 and 7. Giannis not being a choker, Bud running sets on offense, Jrue playing better. It’s so close but so far away somehow.

[Fotis St]

Is this team with Dame and not Giannis a championship team?

Hell no. I am not even sure it's better than current Portland.
Bucks is the slowest less athletic team in the NBA minus Giannis.
Dame demands a trade mid season while on record 5W / 23L or something
The common Bucks fans but consistent doubters of this team have repeatedly stated the amount of talent we lack on playmaking, athleticism (not named Giannis), overall handles , overall IQ and schemes. A complete disgrace if you considered that the Bucks have traded future multiple assets to form current roster.