#bucksforest

[bucksforest]

I Got What I Wished For... Should I Have Been Careful?

Entering the offseason, conventional wisdom had it that the Bucks had three Wishes:

1. Re-sign Khris Middleton.

2. Acquire a rim protecting/physical Big man.

3. Draft or acquire a spot-up shooter.

“Noooooooooo,” I said.  “You have it all wrong (again), online Bucks fans and media.”  The Bucks don’t need those things.  Instead, I would Wish for:

1. Interior toughness and rebounding.  (Which is close to what conventional wisdom was saying, but with more of an emphasis on toughness and less of an emphasis on “rim protection”.)

2. A guy who gets buckets.  (Not just a spot-up shooter, but a guy who can score in a variety of ways.)

3. A starting point guard.  (Because I think that Carter-Williams is not an NBA point guard.)

And I didn’t really care about retaining Middleton.  He is a solid NBA player who can score some and give an effort most of the time on defense, but he is not a star.  If he left, I thought that the Bucks would be able to replace him without too much trouble.

My nightmare scenario was as follows: MCW, Middleton, Greek, Jabari & Tyson Chandler as a starting five.  K.Marshall, Henson/Zaza, OJ, Dudley and maybe some rookie catch-and-shooter off the bench.  That is an ugly rotation that would lose at least fifty games.  

For a moment, my nightmare looked like it could come true.  Big Ers was traded in a salary dump, which I thought might lead to the Bucks acquiring Chandler, retaining Middleton and signing a catch-and-shooter.  

Things started to turn around on the night of the Draft.  Instead of standing behind Michael Carter-Williams, the Bucks acquired Grievis Vasquez to compete for his job.  Nice!  My third Wish had come true.  And then later in the Draft the Bucks selected Rashad Vaughn.  He’s a bucket-getter, not a spot up shooter.  (Though with young players it’s always tough to tell how they’ll be used.  Coach Kidd might end up sticking Vaughn in a corner instead of letting him try to get hoops.)  That’s Wish number two!

I was so excited that I gave the Bucks an A grade for the Draft.  (And if you’re looking for Part II of the 2015 #BucksForest NBA Draft Grades, it’s not there yet.  I’ll get to it, though.)

Free agency brought a different set of worries, but those worries were assuaged (and then some) when the Bucks signed Greg Monroe.  Not only did his signing grant my Wish number one, but he is a great passer.  Specifically, he is the type of great passer who should work brilliantly with the Greek Freak.  Giannis and Monroe can both move, pass and finish.  Those two playing as Bigs together is an absolutely delicious prospect.  They have McHale/Walton or Vlade/Webber potential on offense.

So, man, this is great.  Three Wishes for the Bucks’ offseason and all three wishes get granted.  And the end result is a rotation that looks like this: Starters: Monroe, Giannis, Middleton, Jabari and Vazquez.  Bench: MCW, OJ, Henson and Zaza.

That... is... pretty...  Wait a moment.  Is that any good?  It might not be, and if MCW starts over Vasquez it might be downright bad.  Jabari, Greek and Monroe up front is not what you want on defense.  MCW and Middleton do not create enough offense to overcome that lack of defense.  And neither of those men is great on perimeter defense at the point of attack.  Sure, a bench with OJ, Vazquez and Henson on it would look pretty darned good, but this may not be a playoff team, even in the East.

And then I read Yahoo’s report about Monroe choosing the Bucks, where it said that Monroe picked the Bucks because they are “almost assured” of making the Playoffs next season.  Of course I want, hope and think that the Bucks make the Playoffs, but I also like to play Devil’s Advocate.  What if the Bucks struggle?  What if the situation is like it was for the Hornets last season, where big things were expected after a surprise Playoff appearance, a high profile free agent came aboard and when the team struggled early the new signing became a headache for everyone.  Hopefully Greg Monroe in Milwaukee works out a lot better than Lance Stephenson in Charlotte, but these are the unexpected things that sometimes happen in the NBA.

In the end, I’m happy to ride with Monroe.  I think that he and Giannis will play together famously.  I think that Monroe will up his defensive game and toughness.  I think that Coach Kidd will do a great job on two fronts: he will choose Vasquez over MCW and he will keep Middleton’s bloated contract from being a problem in the locker room, as Chandler Parsons’ contract was last season in Dallas.

But I can’t help it.  Until the season gets here, there is going to be a part of me that wonders if getting what I Wished for was a bad thing for the Bucks.

[bucksforest]

Where Are the Bucks?

The Finals are almost here, and the Bucks are nowhere to be seen.  Nobody expected them to be there this year, so I suppose that’s fine.  But where are they, exactly?  

The Bucks are not in the Contenders area.  Those teams are either playing, or almost playing.  The Spurs, Clippers, Bulls and maybe the Grizzlies would qualify.  

The Bucks are not in the Rebuilding area.  They would have had a representative on stage on Tuesday night if they were.

It’s tough to place the Bucks.  The Bucks are not Delusional, like the Mavericks or Wizards, because they don’t think that they’re on the cusp of contender-ship while actually being far away.  The Bucks are not Upstarts, like the Magic or Pelicans, because they’d need a better two-man combo to match Elfrid+Vucevic or Tyreke+Davis.  

The fact that the Bucks aren’t an Upstart is OK.  The Popovic-led Spurs were never an Upstart.  Some Upstarts make it (early double-ohs OKC come to mind) and some don’t (the recent Ricky+Love T-Wolves come to mind).  

At the moment, the Bucks are in the dreaded “Eighth Seed or Bust” (to quote the former long-standing tagline of the Bucksketball blog) area.  Being in the middle of the pack can be OK.  The team can regularly make the playoffs, and if the typical NBA variables (injuries, chemistry, role players) go in their favor, then an Eighth Seed or Bust team can turn into the 2015 Hawks.  

Bucks fans (and through it all, the #BucksForest blog always has been and always will be about Bucks fans) want something more than Eighth Seed or Bust.  They want to support a Contender.  Everyone has ideas about what it will take for the Bucks to become contenders, but nobody knows for sure.  I’ll be writing about some of my ideas as the NBA’s summer season progresses.

[bucksforest]

It’s a Great Day to Be a Bucks Fan

Since the Brandon Knight trade, my trade (vis-a-vis this blog, at least) has been Crapping On the Bucks.  And for good reason!  The Bucks gave away not only a (should-have-been-selected) All-Star for three hunks-a-junk, but did it in the midst of a revival!  Attendance was up!  (now it’s down again; league-worst attendance for a second consecutive season is possible)  Offense was humming!  (Since the trade, the Bucks have displaced the Sixers -- the team that no-so-coincidentally employed Michael Carter-Williams prior to the trade -- as the worst per-possession offensive team in the NBA.)  Defense was suffocating!  (No longer so, with one of the top Point penetration stoppers in the League now plying his trade in Phoenix.)  Considering how well things were going and how badly the trade ruined his season, I think it’s fair to call it The Worst Trade In Bucks History.  (And the case could be made for The Worst Trade In NBA History, but I’m willing to listen to arguments that there have been worse trades, if you want to contact me.)

But you know what’s funny about this piss-poor, season-ruining trade?  It doesn’t matter!  (Long-term, at least.)  Watching the game in New Orleans last night made it clear that the Bucks can fix this.

First the basic details: The Bucks lost to the Pelicans by one point.  They had a chance to win on an open Ersan Ilyasova shot at the buzzer.  It rimmed out.

Now, the important details: The Bucks looked good!  The Greek Freak loafed through the first three minutes as the P-cans built a double-digit lead.  Coach Kidd benched him and MCW (more on him later) after those three loafing minutes.  When Giannis was reinserted, he was a FORCE.  He dominated Anthony Davis.  

It was as if Giannis had read Bill Simmons’ 2015 NBA Trade Value column earlier that day, got pissed off (like when Brandon Knight led the Bucks on that hot pre-All Star run after he got snubbed) and decided to mace the supposed top asset in the NBA on his own home court.  It was awesome!  Greek Freak D’d Davis up, drove past him from the perimeter and kept him away from the glass at key moments.  And I believe that this basketball beating was a big reason that Davis lost his focus and was SOLELY RESPONSIBLE for Ersan having a wide open look to win the game.  (And if you don’t believe that Ersan’s open look was all Anthony Davis’s fault, check out Tyreke Evans’s facial reaction after the final horn sounded.)

So, the Bucks have the Greek Freak.  We knew that.  But what last night made clear is that the Bucks have some other stuff.  They still have Jerryd and Zaza and Henson and Big Ers (all of whom played great) for another year.  They have a coach who benched MCW for all but three minutes of the fourth quarter, thus showing that Coach Kidd isn’t beholden to GM Kidd’s mistakes.  They probably have Khris Middleton for another year, and even if they don’t they’ll be able to replace his production with OJ Mayo or some other decent shooter.  They are one active Big and one penetration-stopping, bucket-getting, help-defending Point away from being a Contender again!  (And B.Knight is a free agent, come July.  And B.Knight has not exactly gelled with Suns’ franchise player Eric Bledsoe, at least thus far.)

I’m back on the bandwagon, baby!  Just as my friend Nickrob predicted I’d be.  

Tonight the Bucks play the Spurs at home.  They may lose.  It’s a tough one.  The Spurs are good and they’re coming off a bad loss.  I think they have a chance, though.  If Jerryd plays like he did yesterday, MCW’s minutes are kept down and Big Ers helps out Henson & Zaza on the glass, I think the Bucks can win!  Let’s see them get this W.  Perhaps more importantly (at this point, at least) let’s see the Bucks continue to coalesce around this veteran core with the promise of help to come in the near future.

[bucksforest]

Perfect Timing!

This couldn’t have worked out better: Bill Simmons’ annual NBA Trade Value column was published today with Anthony Davis ranked on top, and the Bucks play the P-cans on national (if you count being available in just over 50% of U.S. households “national”) television!

This is good for the Bucks, because when a sports entity receives meaningless praise (a Sports Illustrated cover, an ESPN.com feature, etc.) he/it typically turns in a turd next time out.

This is good for me because it allows Bucks fans to see how overrated Anthony Davis is!  (At least, according to me.)

Anthony Davis piles up stats like nobody’s business and he has a lot of things going for him.  He is only 22 years old (most basketball players take leaps at the ages of 20, 24 and 32 [the latter one being a leap of understanding the game, as opposed to the earlier leaps in overall quality]), he runs the floor (theoretically great for a big man, but it has left him worn out in important situations on several occasions) and he understands how to get open and finish for easy buckets (a worthy skill, but one that becomes far less important when games start to mean more).  It is understandable why stats guy who don’t really watch and/or understand NBA basketball love him.  (In fact, it’s even understandable why Bill Simmons, who has a history of watching AND understanding NBA basketball loves him: Because everybody makes mistakes.)  He’s the new, hot piece on the block and he doesn’t play for the stodgy old Lakers or Heat or Thunder.  P-can Power!  Get on board!

For those who tout Anthony Davis (and, I suppose, for the few of you fellow A.Davis skeptics), here are a few things I encourage you to look for.  Basically, this is the list of things that I have noticed and that have caused me to stay true to my initial suspicion that this guy is supremely overrated (assuming that the goal is to win at Basketball, not win at Fantasy Basketball).

Watch the half court sets when Davis is the focal point of the offense.  Are they fluid?  

Watch the half court sets when Alexis Ajinca and Luke Babbitt enter the game as backups.  They will not be the focal point of the offense, but look at how well they contribute to the team concept.

On defense, look at how Davis stays inside once the action occurs.  He wants those blocks and rebounds, even if staying further out would help the team get more stops.

When the guards pick-n-roll with Davis, look at how good he is at getting open against suspect defense.  

If there are possessions where the Bucks defend the pick-n-roll well (which means you’ll probably have to wait until MCW is off the floor), look and see if Davis is able to adjust and still help his team get a good shot. 

Unless it’s a blowout, Davis will rest in the early-to-mid second and fourth quarters.  Check out the teamwork on both ends during those 8-12 minutes of game time.

I was also critical of Kevin Durant at the same stage in his career.  Durant’s third season was 2010, and the Thunder made the Playoffs for the first time.  I thought that Durant was not quick enough to play great team defense, and that his scoring style was not conducive to the type of team offense that wins in the Playoffs.  Durant got a lot better and may still be on track to be one of the greats, but in 2010 nobody was calling him the most valuable asset in the League.  

[bucksforest]

On Khris Middleton

Gery Woelfel, a sportswriter for the Racine Journal Times (who also happens to be the most reliable breaker of Bucks’ news), tweeted today that Khris Middleton will almost certainly re-sign with the Bucks this summer (Middleton is a restricted free agent as of July 1, 2015) for somewhere between $7 million and $8 million per season.  Nice.  I like Khris.  Most Bucks fans do.  He is a way better player than I thought he’d be.

On the other hand, what the heck?  Middleton is a nice player, but he’s complimentary.  He scores and he usually gives a good effort on defense.  You cannot, however, expect to win if he’s one of your top guys.  Someone else needs to be the offensive creator or the rim protector or the penetration stopper.  

I hate the term “overpaid” because I’m all about the free market.  And relative to a true free market, way more NBA players are underpaid than overpaid.  (And don’t give me any B.S. about the Salary Cap.  Caps are a construct created by management/owners to trick fans into endorsing artificially (relative to the free market) low salaries for professional athletes.  Meaning: “overpaid” players don’t hurt a team.  Bad players hurt a team.  The only thing “overpaid” players hurt is the owners’ wallet, which is the owners’ problem, not mine.)  But Khris Middleton is replaceable for a lot less than $7 million per season.  And if the Bucks are gonna have thrifty owners who stay under a hard player budget (and thus far all signs point to these new owners being some of the thriftiest in League history), then replaceable players need to make salaries that aren’t 600% higher than the league minimum.  

I hate to write this way about Khris.  He is a much better player not only compared to when he first came over from the Pistons, but compared to the start of this season.  In November, Middleton received at least one DNP-CD (a fate usually reserved for the Miles Plumlees of the world).  From the outside looking in, it appears that the reason was his inattentive defense.  For the most part, that inattentiveness is gone.  And that’s not easy to do.  Focus and attention to detail are talents (no matter what the Try-Hards say); most people born without them can’t develop them to the level Khris has.  It has been great to see and I want to see him rewarded for his progress.

The reason the Bucks value Khris and didn’t value Brandon (at least to the levels that the market is going to value them this summer when they both enter restricted free agency) is because Bucks’ management has a dogma.  They believe that there is one, narrow way to be successful in the NBA, and they are going to follow that belief when building their roster and coaching staff. 

The Bucks’ newfound obedience of NBA dogma is depressing to me.  Part of the reason I enjoy the League is there are infinite ways to build Championship teams.  The mid-double oh’s Suns won with a pick-n-roll heavy Euro style (and, as much as I love Phil Jackson, I don’t buy his assertion that failing to win a single season NBA title is proof that a team is not a Championship team), the 90′s Bulls won with a combination of brilliant improvisation and timeless fundamentals and the modern Spurs are a combination of both.  All three of those success stories share a common thread: they took the talent they had and maximized it.  

It’s not like the people in charge of the dynasty Bulls, Suns or Spurs loved every player from the start.  Greg Popovich thought that Tony Parker dribbled too much in 2003, and he probably still does sometimes.  Pop didn’t try to dream up a schematic and then fit in pieces (catch-n-shooter here, pass-first point there, rim-protector in here...).  He assessed what he had and worked with them.  And it’s not like this concept is unique to the NBA.  It’s universal.  There are minimal similarities between the way the 2014 and the 2004 New England Patriots play.  Bill Belichick doesn’t try to acquire puzzle pieces.

The Bucks’ owners are new and so is the coaching staff.  Hopefully they’ll learn.  It’s not the worst thing in the world to see Khris Middleton get a big payday and there’s still hope that whoever the Bucks’ big summer acquisition is (and it’s become clear that a major effort will be made to make that happen) will be a great player first and a great system fit second.  But as a fan who had so much fun following this team as it came together before the All-Star break, it’s saddening to see Khris chosen over B.Knight.

[bucksforest]

The Arena Delay

Ten months ago, Herb Kohl sold the Bucks.  The new owners said a lot of the right things, but they also said that arena construction needs to start within one year.  Here we are; March, 2015.  Not exactly a year, but also not exactly close to starting arena construction.  There is no site, no price tag and no scope (at least, among information that has been released publicly).  

So... Why?  Why can’t the Bucks’ owners give us (Milwaukeeans, Wisconsinites and Bucks fans) any details?  Are they not getting the price they want on the property they want?  Are they unsure how big or small to build this thing?  Or, as yours truly suspects, is it because the Bucks’ owners are having a hell of a time finding people willing to risk cold, hard cash on downtown Milwaukee?

It sounds great to say that NBA arenas stimulate the immediate area around them, but the evidence is less clear.  Staples Center in Los Angeles is the gold standard.  Prior to 1999, the southern edge of downtown was a ghost town (trust me, I was a student at USC -- another mile and a half further south -- from 1995 to 1999).  Today, not only has the L.A. Live complex sprouted up from parking lots, but for about a mile and half east and northeast of L.A. Live there’s been a boom of nice, high quality restaurants, bars, hotels and condos coming to life.  That’s what the Bucks’ owners (and Milwaukeeans in general) want when the new arena gets built.

The problem is that L.A. is the exception, not the rule.  Portland built and arena and nothing sprouted up.  Same with Indianapolis. Orlando, San Antonio, Denver, Utah, Phoenix, Charlotte and just about every other mid-major market that has paid some--or-all of the cost of a new NBA arena.  What actually tends to happen is: people come to the games, eat and drink inside the arena, get in their cars and go home.  

There are other success stories besides Los Angeles.  Cleveland’s NBA arena has a nice group of bars and restaurants nearby, as does Memphis’s.  Like in Los Angeles, however, one has to ask: is it causality or coincidence?  Meaning, would the area around the arena have grown regardless of whether the local government kicked a few hundred million bucks the NBA’s way, or because the NBA got their money?

For a person looking to invest, B.S. is of little value.  Flowery prose about Oklahoma City’s convention center or Sacramento’s glass-backed arena concourse means squat.  Real success stories of commercial real estate companies striking it rich is what drives decisions.

The Bucks’ owners simply can’t come to Milwaukeeans with an arena all by itself.  It has to be more.  They have to have real, experienced people telling the city, county and state government that this is more than just a present to the NBA.  Otherwise, why bother?  Why give the Bucks’ owners $200 million if they’re not stimulating growth?  Might as well give it to West Allis Heating.

It is unlikely that the Bucks’ owners are still looking for a location or calculating the cost.  They know these things.  They know where they’d like to build and they know about how much it will cost to build the smallest arena in the NBA (by seating capacity, at least).  The delay can only be because they’re having trouble finding investors for the surrounding development.

Should Bucks fans be worried?  Is it possible that the team will move?  Do I like asking rhetorical questions?  Of course.  There very well could be a negative reaction if the Bucks’ owners step up to the podium and announce an arena and a parking lot.  I’d like an arena and a parking lot.  I think that an arena and a parking lot at the old A.O. Smith site on the North Side would be great.  And arena and a parking lot, however, is not what the Bucks have built their case on.

There is also the possibility that the Bucks’ owners know that they’re gone, but they’re not telling yet.  Maybe they’ve struck a deal with the NBA to keep ownership of the Bucks in Las Vegas.  Maybe they’re willing to pay the league an extra $150 million as a relocation fee instead of spending $150 million on a Milwaukee arena.  Maybe they’re just waiting for the season ticket renewal deadline to announce all of this, so that they won’t have an empty(er) arena in 2016.  At the moment, nothing but the words of a couple of hedge fund managers separates this doomsday scenario from the gleaming vision of a new arena adjoining Park East.

In private, movers and shakers in and around Milwaukee have been saying for months that a new arena is a slam dunk.  They think that the fix is in on an infrastructure contribution from the city and that all of the caterwauling in Madison is just politicians being political before they end up doing what needs to be done.  Hope so.  Because it would be a shame if all the task groups and inclusivity fails, when a straight request for an arena and a parking lot could have been successful.

[bucksforest]

Nuggets fire Shaw, name Hunt interim coach

Damn.  A long term, successful NBA gambling angle has been to bet a team in their first game after the coach is fired.  Doesn't mean that the Bucks will lose (they are a 6 point favorite over the Nugs, so the gambling angle could hit even if the Bucks win), because even the most successful betting angles hit less than 60% of the time.  Still, I wish they would've waited another 24 hours to fire Shaw.

[bucksforest]

Mile High Must Win

38 wins probably means a playoff spot in the East.  The Bucks have 31.  So, 7 in twenty-three games.  7-16 -- measly 30% -- should get them in.

The problem is the schedule.  What follows is the complete list of games against teams that are out of playoff contention:

Tuesday at Denver

March 11 vs. Orlando

April 4 at Orlando

April 10 at Knicks

April 13 at Philly

Seventy-two hours ago, this wasn't a problem.  Road games against the struggling Lakers and Jazz were coming up.  The Lakers had recently been chastised for celebrating too hard after a regular season win and the Jazz had lost five of six (including one to the Lakers).  These were two in the bank that got barfed up on the floor.

Of course, the Bucks may beat some Playoff aspirants.  But if they lose against a team that stopped trying a month ago -- losing 11 of 12 -- and was caught counting down the season two games ago, it will be time to start wondering where the next win will come from.