The Milwaukee Bucks, trailing the Indiana Pacers, 3-1, are in danger of losing a first-round playoff series for the third straight season. They are beyond any shadow of a doubt stuck in the NBA’s dreaded middle.
Or worse.
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Damian Lillard, their second-best player, tore his left Achilles’ tendon, an injury that could cost him all of next season, when the Bucks do not own their first-round draft pick.
Which means Giannis Antetokounmpo, their best player, is also stuck in the NBA’s dreaded middle, or worse, and that is no spot for an in-his-prime legend. No superstar wants to commit to the time it will take to climb out of this. Losing takes its toll on a legacy that Antetokounmpo is on deadline to script.
There were always excuses. When the Bucks lost to the Boston Celtics in the 2022 Eastern Conference semifinals, Khris Middleton was injured. Antetokounmpo missed games in their first-round exits of 2023 and 2024. And this time? Lillard returned from a blood-clotting issue for Game 2 against the Pacers, only to suffer an Achilles injury in Game 4. Their absences have masked what has become apparent in the meantime: The Bucks, even when healthy, are no longer a serious contender.
If anything, Lillard’s injury laid bare: All hope is lost. No reinforcements are coming. No internal development, no tweaks around the roster’s fringes can cure what ails Milwaukee. The championship window is closed. The Bucks can neither feel a draft nor pick in one for the foreseeable future.
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Antetokounmpo turned 30 in December. He will finish top five in MVP voting for a seventh consecutive season and make his seventh straight All-NBA first team. His peers in both regards are only all-timers.
And this year will mark four since the Bucks raised their championship banner. Antetokounmpo had his whole prime ahead of him then. He can now, following a series of knee problems, envision the end of it, even if it is years away. He is still finding ways to get better, adding a midrange jump shot to his arsenal.
There is little else but a 3-pointer he can add to his game, and even that would not close the gap on the league’s powerhouses. His healthy Bucks could barely compete with Indiana — a conference finalist — let alone the Celtics, Cleveland Cavaliers or whichever contender emerges from the West. The Bucks neither scored nor defended at an elite level. They required Antetokounmpo’s greatness just to stay competitive.
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And there is no trade to swing Milwaukee’s fortunes. No one is lining up to swap better players for Kyle Kuzma or an injured 35-year-old. Because of their acquisitions of Jrue Holiday in 2020, and then Lillard in 2023, the Bucks do not control a single first-round pick from 2025-30. They cannot sweeten any trade.
Assuming Bobby Portis and Pat Connaughton pick up player options that will pay them a combined $22.9 million next season, the Bucks will owe $153.5 million to a handful of players, including Antetokounmpo ($54.1 million), Lillard ($54.1 million) and Kuzma ($22.4 million). The projected salary cap is $154.6 million. And that is before Milwaukee decides what to do with Brook Lopez, an impending 37-year-old free agent.
Name someone on the Bucks, besides Antetokounmpo, whose two-way performance is on the upswing. Milwaukee has identified two helpful players in the draft since selecting Antetokounmpo 15th overall in 2013 — Malcolm Brogdon and Donte DiVincenzo — and the organization let both leave to save money.
Without the pull to recruit more attractive free agents, the picks to make any upgrade in the draft or on the trade market, and the players to contend as currently constituted, what then should the Bucks do?
They are stuck, and when you are stuck you consider the unimaginable: trading a two-time MVP. It might be any general manager’s worst nightmare, but the Milwaukee brass just granted Jon Horst an extension.
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Why trade Antetokounmpo? This run of success in Milwaukee has run its course. His supporting cast got too old. To repeatedly bang your head against a first-round playoff ceiling is a disservice to everyone who considers championships as the only goal, including Antetokounmpo, who has said as much. Repeatedly.
“I’m trying to win a second ring,” he recently said on his brother’s podcast. “Everybody plays to win, but me not having a second championship? I look back at my career, and everybody can say, ‘He had an incredible career, first-ballot Hall of Famer,’ whatever, but me, my personal goal, if I’m not able to help my team win a second ring, I’m letting down myself. I really want to win a second one. Hopefully I will do it.”
The three-year, $175 million contract extension that Antetokounmpo signed in 2023 begins in July, which means the Bucks could run it back once or twice more — before Antetokounmpo can opt out in 2027. To what end? In another year, Antetokounmpo will only have one guaranteed season left on his deal, and no team wants to trade its entire future for a one-year rental. Delaying a deal merely winnows his trade market. Remember: The Toronto Raptors dealt only one first-round draft pick for Kawhi Leonard in 2018.
Milwaukee will want to maximize its return. This is not the Dallas Mavericks dealing Luka Dončić for cents on the dollar. Give the Bucks every first-round pick you have, plus all your young talent, or else you do not get one of the three best players in the entire NBA — one of the game’s few real difference-makers.
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To maximize its return Milwaukee must trade Antetokounmpo now, before he requests a trade.
And it would not be out of the question for Antetokounmpo to request a trade this summer. Nor is it a stretch to interpret these recent comments from him (in jest) after the Dončić deal — “I want all the Europeans to go to all the big markets to see something incredible” — as more serious than he let on.
Open the bidding to the entire league. Even if Antetokounmpo were to request a trade now, any team might convince itself that, with two years to do so, it can sell Antetokounmpo on its city. Brooklyn would come calling. It has the picks, not the players, to offer, as well as the market. Miami has prepared for this scenario before. It has Tyler Herro or Bam Adebayo or, heck, both to trade, plus plenty of draft capital.
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Think bigger, too. What if the Oklahoma City Thunder were to fall short of their championship goal this season? Or what if the Houston Rockets lose in the first round? No teams are better equipped with draft picks and young talent. Milwaukee might just squeeze a more hopeful future from a fierce bidding war.
With that Antetokounmpo would receive a chance at championship rebirth. He could climb the all-time ladder, closer to the top 10. The possibilities, at least for the next two seasons, so long as he is healthy, are endless. Who would not want that for Antetokounmpo, who has given everything to Milwaukee, where his Stateside journey to global superstardom — and the smoothies that come with it — began.
The Bucks would be sad to see him leave. He elevated them to heights they had not seen in 50 years, since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. It could be another 50 years before they see them again. The return for Antetokounmpo should expedite the process. But that process must begin now. It is time to get unstuck.
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