To open the season, the Milwaukee Bucks easily defeated Philadelphia’s JV team plus Tyrese Maxey, which was a solid win. Since then, the Bucks have been anything but solid with unimpressive losses to Chicago and Brooklyn — two teams expected to be in the lottery — and while it’s a small sample theater, the Bucks have a -2.9 net rating and bottom-10 defense so far.
Giannis Antetokounmpo is frustrated and his postgame comments Sunday after the loss to Chicago basically threw Doc Rivers under the bus. Via Eric Nehm of The Athletic.
“Right now, we don’t have an identity,” Antetokounmpo said after Sunday’s loss. “How, how are we going to win the game? Are we going to defend for 4 minutes? Are we going to move the ball for 4 minutes? Are we going to attack and play fast for 48 minutes – or 36 minutes and slow down in the last 12? We have to find an identity We don’t have that now.
Antetokounmpo is averaging 28.3 points, 12.3 rebounds and 6.3 assists a game on 66.7% shooting so far this season, but he’s not blameless in his team’s struggles — the Bucks are outscored by 8.3 points per 100 possessions when he’s on on the court this. season but they are outscoring opponents by 8.4 per 100 when he sits. Milwaukee was better without Antetokounmpo on the court. Obviously Milwaukee is no better without the Greek Freak, but he has work to do, like his teammates.
It is worth noting here that Damian Lillard went on The Knuckleheads Podcast this week (Quentin Richardson and Darius Miles show) and said this: “Me and [Antetokounmpo] have to be able to hold each other accountable, and that doesn’t mean yelling at each other all the time. It just means, like, I have to be able to say something to you, and you have to be able to say something to me all the time.”
There are low-hanging fruit that Milwaukee can fix to look better — but the finger points right at Doc Rivers. First is rebounding, Milwaukee has too much size up front to be bottom 10 in the league in rebounding percentage. The Bucks are just getting worked up on the glass. The second is transition defense. Watch the Bucks play, and the first thing that jumps out is that they’ve been terrible at rebounding and getting stops — teams have a 151.1 net rating in transition against Milwaukee this season, second-worst in the league. Teams don’t run on the Bucks much (league average) but thrive when they do, so expect teams to do it more.
It’s only been a week, but Antetokounmpo is right, this team has no identity — that should never be a problem.
