Is the title window closed? What about Giannis’ free throws? Answering Bucks questions from readers

VaselineNovember 1, 2024

3 6 minutes read

Is the title window closed? What about Giannis’ free throws? Answering Bucks questions from readers

MEMPHIS – The Milwaukee Bucks have had an uneven start to the season and we asked for your questions and feelings about what you’ve seen. Dozens of questions came in, and below we selected some of the most urgent ones to answer.

Thanks for reading and submitting your entries!

Let’s get right to it:

Could the Bucks make a trade?

Q: Can the Bucks trade for another all-star, or will they be taken advantage of due to salary and draft picks? –Steve A.

Jim Owczarski: Technically, the Bucks can trade any player on the roster. But due to the limitations of being on the “second apron” of the payroll, they can only trade one player at a time and cannot take in more salary than they take out. Since the team already has three all-stars in Giannis Antetokounmpo, Khris Middleton and Damian Lillard, it would require moving on from one of those three to acquire another. That feels unlikely because the team has already gone through a season full of turmoil in the selection and is still looking for continuity.

Questions about Giannis’ free throw

Q: What is your assessment of his continued inability to shoot free throws, and why is it taking so long for Giannis to shoot free throws? –Marshall and Paul K.

Jim Owczarski: Antetokounmpo shot 66.7% from the free-throw line at the Olympics, but in his first four NBA games he shot just 55% (27-for-49), by far a career low. He is a career 70.1% free throw shooter but has only shot 66.7% since 2020.

Antetokounmpo has maintained his form for a while now, but still flirts with 10-second fouls on a regular basis. He has talked about this over the years and I don’t think he is doing it intentionally. He consistently practices free throws — which always take less than 10 seconds — and has periods where he finds a groove and makes a huddle. But it’s clear that the in-game process is slowing down for whatever reason. This is the sixth season in which that performance percentage has been below 70% and it just might be what it is at this point in his career.

Does the Damian Lillard experiment work?

Q: Why aren’t the Bucks more involved with Dame and Giannis? – Zach
Does Giannis work as a point forward, and can it work with Lillard? – Tim
In retrospect, do the Bucks still make the trade for Lillard? -Pauly

Jim Owczarski: Offensively, the duo hasn’t been a problem for the Bucks early on, as Antetokounmpo averaged 28 points on 60% shooting, while Lillard averaged 28 points on 47% shooting (although he hasn’t found his three-point shot yet). . Beyond the raw numbers, there’s still some ineptitude on offense so far, but their two-man games look better than they did a year ago.

It’s fair to wonder whether taking the ball out of the hands of Antetokounmpo, as the team’s primary ball handler, is a net positive, but I think it is can be effective as long as the team uses both players in offensive actions.

That’s why I initially didn’t mind that the couple didn’t get together for a few days of training this summer, but that would have been a good idea. That said, Khris Middleton’s absence thus far has forced head coach Doc Rivers to spread out the two stars, perhaps causing them to spend too much time apart. Once Middleton returns, it would be good to see Antetokounmpo and Lillard making plays together more often.

Frankly, I don’t think the trade can be judged until Lillard’s time in Milwaukee is over. But yeah, I do think they’ll make that trade again, because the opportunity to acquire one Top 75 player of all time and pair it with another is too rare an opportunity to pass up.

Is the Bucks championship window closed?

Q: Are the Bucks too old to compete for a championship? –Jim S.
Have we already witnessed the championship window closing? – Johannes
Are their best days with Giannis behind them? –Ken
Why wouldn’t the Bucks just blow it now instead of waiting? – Super G

Jim Owczarski: In fact, the Bucks have gotten younger during the offseason. They are 7^e oldest team in the league with an average age of 27.87 years. Last year they were the oldest at 28.21 years.

The players who helped bring that average down were teenage draft picks AJ Johnson and Tyler Smith, and they aren’t going to help this team win a title this year. So the core is older, yes. But it’s important to note that in 2023, Denver was the youngest team to win a title in the last seven years, with an average age of 27.5 years old.

To be honest, it is older, also experienced teams, who usually win.

So no, the championship window is not closed. However, I would say that the NBA has made it harder for a team to win a championship because of the new rules for drafting.

Plus, the last time the top three players played for the Bucks in the playoffs was in 2020 – and we know how that ended. We don’t know what this team could do in a postseason if they are together.

As for “blowing it up,” the NBA is not the NFL. There are no quick turnaround times or renovations. Why would they blow it up? A mediocre team for the next 5-10 years or more? Once teams have generational talent, league history dictates that an organization should continue with it until the contracts expire.

Do the Bucks have a good enough roster?

Q: Mark and Don G. wonder where the bench scoring will come from and, after Antetokounmpo and Lillard, whether there are high-level players on the team.

Jim Owczarski: These are invariably the problems with top-heavy, star-laden rosters: Those players pick up the bulk of the money, so there’s less to distribute down the line. It also affects bench scoring when bench players have to fill in for injured starters.

The simple answer is: Bobby Portis Jr. is the team’s leading bench scorer and remains one of the sixth-best players in the league, and Taurean Prince can provide solid three-point shooting. But Prince is currently starting and playing 30 minutes per game without Middleton. As far as “high level” players go, Brook Lopez is still one of the best rim protectors in the league and when Middleton plays he is still clearly a high level offensive player.

Bucks strategy questions

Q: Fans were curious about the Bucks’ perimeter defense (Tosafish and Deann), Giannis shooting and defending three-pointers (Chuck and Malcolm), Brook Lopez’s three-pointers and Giannis and Khris’ turnovers (CRod).

Jim Owczarski: First, let’s start with Lopez as a three-point shooter. The big man has helped revolutionize what centers can do from deep, but he hasn’t started this season with accuracy. His spacing still matters when playing next to Antetokounmpo, but less so when paired with Lillard. So he may have to be more of a “traditional” big when Antetokounmpo is off the court, but almost every team is looking for a big who can block shots and shoot threes. Teams still respect Lopez’s shot and fear his presence inside.

As for Antetokounmpo and Middleton’s turnovers, it’s simply a function of primary ballhandlers. Players who touch the ball as much as they do (same with Lillard), there will be turnovers. But asking Antetokounmpo not to be aggressive downhill – leading to some trips and charges – or for Middleton to initiate the attack from the elbows is just a recipe for a bad offense and taking away from their strengths.

Mike Budenholzer has only been gone for two seasons, so it’s hard to imagine that Bucks fans have already forgotten how the team built a top-5 defense when Lopez played for him – and that’s by keeping the protect and live paint, to one degree, with a variance of three points.

No, the Bucks don’t have the fastest guards — and the team can fight more disciplined over screens and in their rotations — but they are once again leaning into their size and playing inside out again. That means they’re going to try to limit the easy twos, and there will be nights where a team makes 20 threes against them.