Are we better than last year?

[HaroldinGMinor]

At the end of the day, Giannis had a 100 ORtg against them. When your highest usage player is -21 on that end of the floor you are going to struggle. Toronto did a great job defending him and no one else really picked up the slack...and he missed a lot of free throws.

[slos]

I love Brogdon, but honestly I always considered him a great 6th for a team that want to win the title. I can't explain it, but I had the feeling that something is wrong with him. Maybe it's because that he is good at everything, but not great at something. Losing him sucks, but...

Giannis' leap = Losing Brogdon
Wes >>> Snell
2020 DDV >>> 2019 DDV
RoLo > Bucks' Mirotic

Then add...

Bud's year 2
No contract years
Playoff experience is there now

Sure we are better. Plus all our East rivals are worse. Toronto lost Kawhi and Green, Philly going from Butler and Redick to Horford and Richardson doesn't look better. Boston, Indy are good teams, but not good enough. There are no excuses this year, this team MUST play the finals. The problem is that the LA teams are better than last year's Durant-less Warriors team. That's why Horst needs to make a move till the deadline to bring some more talent. Bogdan maybe?

[buckboy]

This is rhetorical right?

Been pretty obvious from day 1.

[humanrefutation]

I think our bench is better. But it was never about our performance in the regular season. It's about what happens in the postseason with guys like Middleton and Bledsoe who disappeared when we needed them against the Raps.

[jute2003]

We're shooting unsustainably well right now. RealGM mobile app

LOL no they are not, their luck adjusted 3pt stats skew very heavily to them being unlucky so far. Stop making up **** to further your agenda

So you think career 38% 3 point shooter George Hill will continue to shoot 52 from deep?
Career 36% shooter Sterling Brown will stay at 39?
You think Khris won't have a bad stretch when that's what he's always done going back to Kidd?

Now will Ersan and Brook shoot better at some point? Probably. But I really am unclear as to what you're arguing.

Btw, we still aren't getting champion-level respect from the refs, and that continued last night. Kyrie is Kyrie, but he was prophetic about the level of calls we got against Boston vs. against Toronto last year.

Hill will come back down to Earth. Brown isnt that far out there to believe he cant sustain it. Middleton will likely not remain this engaged and effective all season. Lopez is going to shoot better though.

[MickeyDavis]

We simply can't gauge anything yet given the large amount of cupcake wins, but I think it's pretty clear we're not worse in the regular season.

This one, the Raptor game and the road Rocket game stand out as high water marks

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Poop that. At this point last year, the Bucks had already lost 7 times including games to the Knicks, Suns, Grizzlies, and Hornets (nearly twice).

I don’t think we should be comparing them to “at this point last year.” What matter is if this team is better than the team that couldn't make it out of the ECF.

All we have is "at this point last year". Between now and the playoffs there could be injuries, trades, etc.. So the only accurate comparison is 23 games vs. 23 games

[wallus]

We're shooting unsustainably well right now. RealGM mobile app

LOL no they are not, their luck adjusted 3pt stats skew very heavily to them being unlucky so far. Stop making up **** to further your agenda

So you think career 38% 3 point shooter George Hill will continue to shoot 52 from deep?
Career 36% shooter Sterling Brown will stay at 39?
You think Khris won't have a bad stretch when that's what he's always done going back to Kidd?

Now will Ersan and Brook shoot better at some point? Probably. But I really am unclear as to what you're arguing.

Btw, we still aren't getting champion-level respect from the refs, and that continued last night. Kyrie is Kyrie, but he was prophetic about the level of calls we got against Boston vs. against Toronto last year.

The most significant increase will be when Brook gets it going. That should mostly cancel out George regressing.

[kid idioteque]

At this point of the season? Obviously the answer is yes.

Overall? Hard to say but all signs are incredibly positive. So I voted yes.

[HaroldinGMinor]

So if the Bucks are shooting at an unsustainable level does that mean their opponents are shooting at an unsustainably bad level?

[skones]

So you think career 38% 3 point shooter George Hill will continue to shoot 52 from deep?
Career 36% shooter Sterling Brown will stay at 39?
You think Khris won't have a bad stretch when that's what he's always done going back to Kidd?

Now will Ersan and Brook shoot better at some point? Probably. But I really am unclear as to what you're arguing.

Perhaps you're unclear because you made a statement with very little credence to it? When your team is 16th in the league in three point percentage, most would find it a pretty weird in characterizing that as "unsustainable." When you try to support your statement, you go with Hill, and then you double down and start reaching with a percentage within general statistical variance and reasonable improvement, and then go back to your tired, "WELL KHRIS IS BAD!" shtick?

You can't have it both ways. Hill comes back down to earth because of regression to the mean, but others aren't afforded the benefit of the doubt as it pertains to the positive regression that's clearly in store to offset that?

Let me correct you, "One player on this team is shooting unsustainably well."

[DavidDunn21]

So you think career 38% 3 point shooter George Hill will continue to shoot 52 from deep?
Career 36% shooter Sterling Brown will stay at 39?
You think Khris won't have a bad stretch when that's what he's always done going back to Kidd?

Now will Ersan and Brook shoot better at some point? Probably. But I really am unclear as to what you're arguing.

Perhaps you're unclear because you said a dumb thing and made a statement with very little credence to it? When your team is 16th in the league in three point percentage, most would find it a pretty weird in characterizing that as "unsustainable."

You can't have it both ways. Hill comes back down to earth because of regression to the mean, but others aren't afforded the benefit of the doubt as it pertains to the positive regression that's clearly in store to offset that?

Let me correct you, "One player on this team is shooting unsustainably well."

You guys are the best. Never change.

Giannis is first on the team in 3 point attempts with 114. His averages won't go significantly up.
Brook is second with 104. He'd have to shoot better at some point, but he's a career 34% shooter, so....
Eric is fourth with 84 attempts. Eric is gonna Eric.

So we're 16th in the League because some other guys are shooting unsustainably well. That's awesome. Hope George Hill continues to make more than half of his 3s.
The only reason this is a thread is because we smoked the Championship Favorite.

[coolhandluke121]

You can't have it both ways. Hill comes back down to earth because of regression to the mean, but others aren't afforded the benefit of the doubt as it pertains to the positive regression that's clearly in store to offset that?

They're going to continue getting tons of open 3's too. Arguably more than last year, just because Giannis is better at passing it out and they have more guys who really understand the concept of moving off the ball to make things easier for everyone.

Last year, when everyone was healthy (which was very rare), I think you literally could have made two 45-win starting lineups out of the roster, but it didn't translate to greatness in the playoffs. This year, the roster might not look better on paper, but from a holistic perspective, it sure does look better on the court.

[Jez2983]

Our shooting wasn't great from deep half a dozen games ago. As averages dictate this will go up and down.

As AB said in another thread we were winning when we weren't shooting well, so there's that.

[Prez]

During the 14 game winning streak the Bucks are 18th in overall 3PT% and 25th on wide open 3PT%. Unsustainably hot shooting imo

[blazza18]

Hows our 3pt defence been trending? Feel like that's going to be the make or break for us in the playoffs. Will need some luck against the shooting teams.

[MikeIsGood]

I tend to think so, with the information we have now. It's boring to the conjecture, but I agree with those who say it's too soon to say. Regular season is important, no doubt, but it's so much smaller for us now. We'll find out how much better we are in the playoffs.

[HKPackFan]

A lot of great points I agree with :

#1 bud system yr 2.
#2 no contract uncertainty, everyone is now all in for the long haul.
#3 chemistry is off the charts amazing. Imo championship level chemistry. These guys will go to war for each other and love each other. The hustle and fight is more.
#4 second part of 3 is the bench is updated. Patty c and DDV combo is amazing. DDV is making this team better. The bench D is so tenacious the opponent never gets a break.
#5 Giannis internal improvement
#6 Wesley keeping Middleton fresh. Wesley playing D on KL I think kept khris fresh and let him do his thing on O, also keep Kris minutes down is good. I think that was a nice preview if clippers are in the finals on how to better handle KL.

[Plossum]

It’s hard to say till we hit the Playoffs. Certainly at this stage we’re a better reg season team but we’ll have to see if we can get over the hump in the Playoffs. Slightly worrying that two of our losses are against other top four East teams with strong coaches.

[skones]

You guys are the best. Never change.

Giannis is first on the team in 3 point attempts with 114. His averages won't go significantly up.
Brook is second with 104. He'd have to shoot better at some point, but he's a career 34% shooter, so....
Eric is fourth with 84 attempts. Eric is gonna Eric.

So we're 16th in the League because some other guys are shooting unsustainably well. That's awesome. Hope George Hill continues to make more than half of his 3s.
The only reason this is a thread is because we smoked the Championship Favorite.

George Hill is the ONLY player hitting anything at an unsustainable rate yet you choose to commit to "guys." Your insistence that this unsustainable shooting is a plurality on our roster is hilarious.

Let's do some simple math here to illustrate how much you're reaching.

Let's imagine George Hill is hitting threes at this career average rate of 38%. He's shooting 3 threes a contest. If he's hitting 38% of those looks he's hitting 1.14 threes per contest (3.42 points) instead of his 1.54 9 (4.62 points). Career rate = -1.2 points

Now let's go with Brook Lopez. Currently shooting 5 threes per contest. Career rate suggests 1.7 threes made (5.1 points). Currently hitting 1.395 threes (4.185 points). Career rate = +.915 points

Ersan Ilyasova. Career 36% shooter. Taking 2.5 threes per contest. Expected success is .9 makes per contest (2.7 points). Currently hitting on .7 (2.1 points). Career rate = +.6 points

Total expected = +1.515 points.
Let me remind you that Hill is -1.2 points

Now I'm not the big math boi shouting "UNSUSTAINABLE!" like you are. The way this works out though, well it makes the idea that we're somehow benefiting from some widespread unsustainable marks from distance flatly ridiculous.

[DavidDunn21]

You guys are the best. Never change.

Giannis is first on the team in 3 point attempts with 114. His averages won't go significantly up.
Brook is second with 104. He'd have to shoot better at some point, but he's a career 34% shooter, so....
Eric is fourth with 84 attempts. Eric is gonna Eric.

So we're 16th in the League because some other guys are shooting unsustainably well. That's awesome. Hope George Hill continues to make more than half of his 3s.
The only reason this is a thread is because we smoked the Championship Favorite.

George Hill is the ONLY player hitting anything at an unsustainable rate yet you choose to commit to "guys." Your insistence that this unsustainable shooting is a plurality on our roster is hilarious.

Let's do some simple math here to illustrate how much you're reaching.

Let's imagine George Hill is hitting threes at this career average rate of 38%. He's shooting 3 threes a contest. If he's hitting 38% of those looks he's hitting 1.14 threes per contest (3.42 points) instead of his 1.54 9 (4.62 points). Career rate = -1.2 points

Now let's go with Brook Lopez. Currently shooting 5 threes per contest. Career rate suggests 1.7 threes made (5.1 points). Currently hitting 1.395 threes (4.185 points). Career rate = +.915 points

Ersan Ilyasova. Career 36% shooter. Taking 2.5 threes per contest. Expected success is .9 makes per contest (2.7 points). Currently hitting on .7 (2.1 points). Career rate = +.6 points

Total expected = +1.515 points.
Let me remind you that Hill is -1.2 points

Now I'm not the big math boi shouting "UNSUSTAINABLE!" like you are, but, I think that means this team is actually due for some positive regression rather than the negative regression you're championing.

So when I'm right do me a favor and spare us the "rooting against your own team" garbage.

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