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Milwaukee Bucks: If Giannis Antetokounmpo Can Take The Next Step, So Can The Bucks

By Jameson Miller

Mar 14, 2015; Memphis, TN, USA; Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo (34) drives against the Memphis Grizzlies during the second half at FedExForum. Memphis defeated Milwaukee 96-83. Mandatory Credit: Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports
Mar 14, 2015; Memphis, TN, USA; Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo (34) drives against the Memphis Grizzlies during the second half at FedExForum. Memphis defeated Milwaukee 96-83. Mandatory Credit: Nelson Chenault-USA TODAY Sports /
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In many ways, Giannis Antetokounmpo is the perfect archetype for the kind of player the NBA values most in 2015. Positional versatility, freakish athleticism and obscene length—qualities Giannis possesses in spades—have always held immense capital in NBA team building, though perhaps never more so than right now.

Antetokounmpo has seemingly taken several of the NBA’s most treasured assets and combined them all into a 6’11’’ Grecian apogee of athletic prowess.

On a smaller scale, Antetokounmpo is also a perfect distillation of what the Milwaukee Bucks have become since Jason Kidd was, uhh, traded to the team in exchange for two draft picks sent to the Brooklyn Nets (a stark contrast to their typical practice of hemorrhaging future assets whenever possible).

Kidd’s defensive principles require interchangeable pieces capable of switching on pick and rolls, blitzing ball handlers and disrupting passing lanes. Put another way, five Antetokounmpos would be ideal.

The plan on that end certainly worked for much of last year. In addition to a massive improvement in the win column, Antetokounmpo and company hounded opponents with wave after gangly wave, ultimately resulting in Milwaukee ranking second in the entire league in defensive efficiency only one year removed from finishing second-to-last in that area.

Suffice it to say, defense was not the Bucks’ issue last year.

The Achilles heel for Giannis of Troy and the rest of the young Bucks last season was an inability to perform the rather essential function of the scoring.

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The Bucks’ offense only became more anemic as the season wore on—especially after Milwaukee sent Brandon Knight and his 17.8 points per game to Phoenix in a three-team deal just before the deadline.

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To be fair, it would have been difficult to nosedive hard enough to finish with the league’s sixth-worst offensive rating based solely on the 30 games following Knight’s departure, and there are plenty of secondary and tertiary factors that affected Milwaukee’s performance in the second half of the year.

Still, the numbers before and after the All-Star break (only a few days before the trade) are pretty stark.

Prior to the All-Star break, Milwaukee had an offensive rating of 102.1, along with their typically excellent defense and a surprising 30-23 record to show for it.

After the break, the Bucks stumbled out of the gate and took their fair share of lumps as they struggled with injuries and worked to adapt to their new point guard in Michael Carter-Williams, who had yet to prove himself capable of running a high-functioning NBA offense (though, as noted on SB Nation’s Brew Hoop, the numbers shake out to show that the Bucks were actually quite good with MCW on the floor, shooting woes be damned).

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    • The Bucks finished out the second half of their season sporting a moribund offensive rating of 97.5 and a record of 11-18.

    So why the struggles? It’s certainly tempting to chalk the Bucks’ scoring issues up to subpar three-point shooting, but at first glance, they seemingly held their own in that department with a 36.3 percent conversion rate from downtown, just behind the Cleveland Cavaliers and just ahead of the Portland Trail Blazers.

    Milwaukee’s issues last season weren’t necessarily in making three-point baskets, but rather with taking enough of them. Whether by design or not, ranking in the bottom five in three-pointers attempted is not a typical hallmark of an elite NBA offense.

    Antetokounmpo certainly didn’t help in that department. The Greek Freak averaged only 0.5 attempt from beyond the arc last season, and when he did shoot, it wasn’t great, as Giannis converted a stunning 15.9 percent(!) of his long-range attempts. This is where Antetokounmpo falls a bit short of being the perfect archetype of the NBA’s ultramodern age—he can’t really, you know, shoot.

    In spite of a decent conversion rate in the restricted area and an odd proclivity for knocking down long twos from the right elbow and top of the key, Giannis’ shot chart is a sea of reds and yellows:

    ANTE
    ANTE /

    In today’s pace and space era where threes, layups and free throws represent the holy trinity of elite offensive production, falling way short in any one of them can make the jobs of opposing defenses exponentially easier, regardless of an abundance of skills in other areas.

    Ersan Ilyasova‘s exodus—coupled with the addition of your daddy’s favorite player, a.k.a. Greg Monroe, a.k.a. any traditional back-to-the-basket bruiser with so-so defense and questionable efficiency—would seem to only exacerbate the Bucks’ spacing issues from a year ago, making Antetokounmpo’s development doubly important in the Bucks evolution from lower rung Eastern Conference playoff seed to true contender.

    In a recent season preview, Brew Hoop detailed the Buck’s potential weaknesses heading into the season, highlighting Antetokounmpo as one of the rays of hope that might brighten the Bucks’ long range prospects:

    "While Kidd has some shooters on the bench, the departure of Ilyasova and return of Parker means that Milwaukee’s projected starting five has only one guy with proven range from beyond the arc (Khris Middleton). Part of that traces back to Kidd — he had Jabari and Giannis on short leashes in terms of threes last season, a restriction he appears ready to ease this fall. Still, opponents will presumably dare the Bucks’ starters to hurt them from outside, putting major pressure on someone from the Bucks’ young core to prove themselves more capable from behind the arc.Considering Carter-Williams is three years older and has many more NBA bricks already to his name, I’m guessing Parker and Antetokounmpo will be the ones left to pick up the slack."

    Antetokounmpo is long, talented and unique. He can play and guard all five positions. It’s as if he was created in a basketball laboratory to be an amalgamation of almost all of the qualities coveted in the NBA’s contemporary paradigm. Almost. Jabari Parker will come back. MCW is young enough to improve. The Bucks’ bench depth hopefully won’t be bitten quite so hard by the injury bug.

    These are all reasonable, if optimistic expectations for next season, but Giannis Antetokounmpo making the leap to bona fide star status—becoming a reliable three-point shooter along the way—might make none of them matter.

    *All stats per NBA.com

    Next: NBA: Complete Offseason Grades For All 30 Teams

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