Milwaukee’s Roster OVERHAUL Begins as Bucks Fight to Keep Giannis | Who Stays and Who Goes?

Milwaukee’s Roster OVERHAUL Begins as Bucks Fight to Keep Giannis | Who Stays and Who Goes?

Today’s lockdown Bucks. We continue to take a look ahead to the off season for this Bucks team. Uh can they retool and reload? Is the future that bleak? We have some thoughts and some other updates around the Eastern Conference as we continue to observe the playoffs from afar. Camille and I get into that discussion coming up after this on Locked on Bucks. You are Locked on Bucks, your daily Milwaukee Bucks podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Welcome into Locked on Bucks. Thanks for making this your first listen of the day. All part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Hey, I’m Justin Garcia, joined as always by Camille Davis as start to sift through the end of another disappointing postseason for this Bucks team. Today’s episode of Locked OnBucks is brought to you by Monarch Money. Take control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use the code locked on NBA at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. Uh Camille, watching some of those games, the two games last night, it uh as we were talking before we started recording, uh the the relationship between the Bucks and the Pistons is not that that it is Bucks and Pacers. And you can’t help but leave that outcome last night given a Pistons team that hadn’t been in the playoffs since the Bucks steamrolled them in 2019. and our guy Malik Beasley, what he did for them this season that uh it was Bees, the guy that just couldn’t handle the ball in many ways shades of the player who replaced Beasley in Milwaukee and a very very tough end to the season for the Pistons. So, a lot of parallels between those two teams in terms of the Beasley relationship um in the same division. A disappointing end to the postseason, but it brings you to the well, does Detroit have a brighter future? And we know as of this moment, the Bucks have Giannis. This the conversation all throughout the offseason is going to be dominated by Giannis, by what other moves can the Bucks make. We got into some very high level um discussions early after the uh season ended here. We’re still early, but it it’s going to pick up all throughout the summer. We’re hoping early next week we can get Frank’s thoughts on this and then we’ll start to dig into the cap implications. But um I think I know your answer. Let’s just start here. What route do the Bucks take this summer? That’s a good question. I was going to ask you something very similar. It’s like what is the first thing that you you you have to do? And to me, the first thing is obvious, I think, and it’s you sit down, you have a conversation with Giannis about how the season went, uh what your idea is for improving this team, get his input on what you think that he would like to see for this team. And if the two of you can get on the same accord there, then you move forward with the re with the retooling here uh of trying to figure out what this next phase of Bucks basketball looks like around Giannis. So, um, that’s the very first thing you do. And then after that, I think you really have to figure out the coaching situation because, um, Doc Rivers, we heard how much Giannis praised Doc Rivers and his last postgame presser after that Pacers loss. Uh, but it’s also one of those summers here where it’s an interesting coaching market because you had Mike Brown fired in Sacramento. You had Mike Malone fired in Denver. You had Taylor Jenkins fired in Memphis, which is not even to add to some of the other assistants whose names have been talked about for head coaching jobs for a while, but I completely understand that the Bucks have no appetite for another firsttime head coach at this juncture uh in the franchise. But yeah, I think the conversation with Giannis is first and then figuring out what you’re going to do with your head coaching situation. And after that, it’s really figuring out, okay, what is the best course of action around this team given the Damen Lillard injury, uh, playing not to have him, probably not a trade chip if you were looking to go that route at this point with that injury. So, um, kind of setting the ground floor, I think, is what has to happen first. Not to uh be be the doomer here uh because I know this is not going to be received well by this audience and and most Bucks fans but uh and and also it’s a difficult and awkward conversation for me as somebody paid by the team. I don’t see any type of coaching change in the cards. Like the only way I see that happening is if this situation goes nuclear and if we talk about retooling and reloading. If that’s not the case, I think we all know what the nuclear option is. And that’s when you completely rebuild and look at a couple of um who knows how long a very very lean years and at that point then I think you would re-evaluate the type of coach that you have in and um what direction your franchise goes. Outside of that I don’t see it. I know there was some there was some chatter that was out there yesterday. Um, I’ve heard nothing to back that up. And I just hearing Giannis, hearing the other guys, we can and pick apart the X’s and O’s. And it’s not to say that there isn’t anything worth questioning and pushing back on in terms of this team’s offense and what we saw, but uh, it’s a group that’s bought in to Doc Rivers. So, I don’t think we’re going to see a coaching change. So, the big thing is having that, as you mentioned, that conversation with Giannis and just seeing where are we at here? Because I can assure you all of the messaging that I’ve gotten early in these two days since the season ended is there is no thought of is this in our best interest to dangle Giannis and get some picks and just go into rebuilding and that’s what we have to do because of our cap or our draft picks. that has not entered the chat for the Milwaukee Bucks. They are focused on we think Giannis wants to be here. We’re going to meet with him. We’re going to have that discussion to go through here’s our plan and here’s some things that we think we can do and then just striking rich on some of those moves that we can make. You made better moves this past off season than you did the season before. So, building upon that and especially now with not assets but more flexibility that they’re going to have. But um but you need that sign off essentially from Giannis to okay, I I see a path with this plan. I like it here. I like Doc Rivers. I like my teammates. And I think that we can start to build something here. Um, but yeah, I mean that’s why I I think it’s really just how do you retool and how do you start to reload here for this Bucks team because it’s it’s an Eastern Conference that all too early. We’ll get to a little bit later. you don’t really know what it’s going to look like and there’s some other teams that are are potentially in store for similar conversations as far as the Bucks go and some of the coaching names that you mentioned. Um I think there’s only one that would really uh tickle my fancy if you will that you mentioned there. But even then, so Taylor Jenkins, the Memphis Grizzlies, even then, if you go back and listen to Lockdown Grizzlies, listen to some other shows that came out of Memphis, it it started to sound a lot like the Bud era in that the bloom was off the rose and there was just a and I I get all the stuff that went on off the court with the assistant changes in the summer, which put Taylor Jenkins in a very unenviable spot. uh how they completely completely reworked their offense that was not met positively, but it just it didn’t seem like a lot of Grizzlies fans were up in arms over Taylor Jenkins no longer being their head coach. Michael Malone is is a name that gets talked about a lot as well. Um, I heard from one person with some pretty good connections, I don’t think Michael Malone is going to be coaching next year. And I I don’t think this was just a total, man, the Nuggets totally screwed him. I think there was more to it with both sides there. And even with Malone, if he is coaching next year, I think it’s a team that is currently in the playoffs. There is one team specifically I have always thought made a lot of sense for Michael Malone with his father’s background and the fact that that’s another one of these teams I don’t want to you know put it out there hoping for a coach to get fired um but another one of those teams in the spot of the Bucks if you fall short coaching change is what do so yeah I just I’m not saying there’s no good coaches out there because there always is as you learn and you see from guys and especially new coaches that bring things you hadn’t seen for, but I’m just not at the phase where I’m I’m even entertaining a coaching change because I just don’t see it happening unless this team comes to the realization retooling is impossible and this is a total rebuild. Yeah, I I get where you’re coming from with that. It’s for me I I’ve mentioned it before. Uh after Mike Benhoer was fired, if you would have told me Doc Rivers is going to be the coach that takes you into the playoffs the following year, I would have been like, “We have that at home. Why are we doing this? What is the point? Right? Um and the credit that’s and not to cut you off, but that’s why you you see some of the chats too like Monty Williams after how he draped himself in glory in Detroit and same conversations around Monty Williams like, “Okay, so we’re just going to VHS copies of the original tape over and over again.” Yeah. And I know we’re doing this live on YouTube right now. Like IO, you be in the chat often. I love interactions. I love the comments. But we literally just saw Monty Williams get a bag and quit halfway through the season for a bag. Um, but when it comes to the Doc situation, like I gave Doc credit for this because I did think that he was the right coach for the Bucks in the sense of the locker room and trying to merge together the two superstars of Dame and Giannis because Doc’s a good people person. He’s good at managing personalities in that way. um critiques I do have about the the adjustments and whatnot and lineups and things of that sort. Uh but that might be the case. Like I have a question for you and maybe we do it after the the ad read here, but just the idea of has the league moved into this place with the player empowerment getting to a place where um I don’t want to say accountability isn’t allowed from coaches uh but it’s not as wellreceived as it might have been in year. wasn’t for Michael Malone at all. That’s what I was thinking about. Yeah. Um, yeah, it’s it’s a good question. Um, I do want to open up that discussion and we started this with retool, reload, if you will. How can the Bucks do that? I know we touched on that very, very high level as soon as the season ended. wasn’t a place or time that we wanted to get into that conversation. But, um, I think the Bucks are in the middle of what you hear out there that most of it is it’s over. It’s there’s no way forward. You have no assets. Giannis is going to ask for a trade. Like, I get that’s the national discourse. You have a lot of um overly optimistic fans that are hope, hey, we got Giannis. Giannis is never going to want to leave here and we can build around him. I think the reality is somewhere in the middle there of what the Bucks can do and how they’re set up here in the offseason. And a lot of that has to do with a trade that is offcriticized this past that shipped out Chris Middleton and brought in Kyle Kousma. So we’ll get into that conversation coming up after the break here on Locked on Bucks. Ever check your bank account and wonder where did all my money go? 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Take control out of your finances of your finances with MonarchMoney. Use the code locked [email protected] for 50% off your first year. That’s monarchmoney.com code locked onnba to get half off your first year. All right. So, I mentioned I think it’s somewhere in the middle. Mhm. Um the So, let’s just start here. Um the Dame Lillard injury made things even more difficult. Mhm. Because, you know, as we’ve heard all throughout the season, Giannis still believes in that partnership. And Camille, go back to the last 40 seconds of game number five. I would have loved to have that guy to inbound the ball to and just wait to get fouled and go to the free throw line to ice the game. Um, but not only that, it it was potentially a movable asset that you had of, okay, we tried this for two years, it didn’t work. Let’s just do something different. It’s not an option when he has a torn Achilles, and in all likelihood, he’s not going to play in a game again until he’s 36 years old. Uh, and then you don’t know what version of him he’s going going to be. I’m not going to doubt Damen Lillard, but those injuries are tough when you rely on your burst and especially at that advanced age. So, that really threw a wrench into this whole process for the Bucks. But, um, what I do think we’re overlooking quite a bit is as much as Kyle Kosma was not it in the playoffs, uh, you have things you would not have been able to do without that trait. So, let’s say you don’t make that trade and you just say, “We talked about this leading into the playoffs.” Should you have just gone one more year and said, “You know what? I think this will be the year that all three of those guys are healthy. Let’s see what it looks like in the playoffs.” If you do that, then I I you could probably talk me into saying, “Hey, this team’s screwed.” If that dame injury happens and nothing else changes, sure, you could have still done the trade to ship out Marjon and bring in Kevin Porter Jr. You still could have done Jericho Sims for Dylon Wright, but without that trade, it makes it even more difficult because we’ve talked about a taxpayer mid-level at the very least the Bucks are going to have. They are probably going to have the midlevel exception. I know Frank talked about that. Uh Bobby Marks suggested it as well. And that’s not happening if Chris Middleton’s still on the team because you’re still in the second apron. you can’t get out of the second apron until the next league season. So, it’s another draft pick that’s frozen and you’re looking back at we got Dame out for a year, we got free agent questions and all we got is is veteran minimum contracts that we can dole out. So, in that sense, that’s one of the positives to come from this is the move didn’t work out on the floor, but that move saved you quite a bit off the court. Yeah, it did. And I also saw that I believe that trade opened up a trade exemption for the Bucks as well to bring back like $7 million of contracts. So like again this new CBA and we mentioned it a lot last off season of just like how is this going to affect team building going forward like teams are really just starting to figure this out. Um, and although we heard John Horus make mention of the fact that this move was not made to get under the second apron, getting under the second apron in this move is a big benefit of it. Well, and his big thing too was like this wasn’t the the ownership group trying to shed money, which to that point, I want to say this in regards to Hor and the way that the Bucks attack things. like yes, I think that there is some deserved criticism for some of the moves that Horus made because they just didn’t work out. Um, but you cannot say that this Milwaukee Bucks team, this front office has not been aggressive in trying to find ways to keep that championship window open throughout this time. Again, every move did not work out. Uh, and some teams, you can look at Denver, who fans were complaining that they weren’t aggressive enough throughout their time of trying to build around Jokic going forward after the championship. And you could argue for the Bucks, maybe they were too aggressive at times with giving up their assets and going for it. But they were true to their word of trying to make sure that while Giannis is here, this is going to be a team that’s competing for championships and now you’re at a a juncture where you don’t have that many assets left. Uh, but you did make yourself some room to try to maneuver. And I think with that, it makes the idea of bringing back the Gary Trent Juniors, the Kevin Porter Juniors even more important because another thing that this trade did, that this season did, I thought uh would show a pathway of how this team can play going forward if there is no Damen Lillard um and how you focus that offense around Giannis and what type of players you need around him. So, it’s again, the Bucks are not in the best situation. No. And I I don’t want people to think I’m saying that at all. Um, but they could have been in a worse situation had they not made the trade that they did at the deadline, even if the Kyle Kousma play did not, you know, take off on the court in the way that the Bucks were hoping for when they made the trade. Yeah. So you potentially have that what 144 million for the mid-level exception to use. You don’t have to use that on one guy. You can split it out. And um Kevin Porter Jr. is not getting $15 million a year. Gary Trent Jr. I don’t think is getting $15 million a year. Gary Trent Jr. is probably looking at the ballpark of Malik Beasley. How he went from the vet minimum to what 6 million a year with the Pistons. Um, maybe it’s slightly more because he’s 26 years old and I think he showed you more defensively than Malik Beasley did, but I don’t think Gary Trent Jr.’s in line for the full mid-level exception either. So, in an ideal world, you can split it out between those guys. You have the early bird rights on Jericho Sims or you have bird rights on Jericho Sims, you can retain him. Um, even with Gary Trent Jr., You know, there there is a not to get uh the team in trouble, but there is a potential wink wink nudge nudge of see what we did with Bobby a couple years ago. What if we just give you the 120% raise? Then we have your early bird rights next year and then next year we can give you that massive um pay raise. Bobby Portoris, another name too that I would assume he’s going to opt out, but can you work out an extension with Bobby Portoris as well? So, I think you know how this team is currently situated, what the group you have to focus on and build around is, and we didn’t even mention Ryan Rollins, who you know is assuming he wants to be here, that should be an easier player to retain as well. You know what the group is to build around, but again, it it it hinges to Giannis. And a lot of these moves that you were able to make through the years were because you have Giannis in his prime in Milwaukee where players are willing to come to Milwaukee. Players are willing to take mid-level exceptions or to take veteran minimums and say, “Okay, I’ll play with that guy.” So, if you get that buy in and say, “Look, here’s the things that we have in mind.” Breaking up the mid-level exception. We didn’t even mention the uh what the designated disabled player exception that I believe they’ll have that you can sign a one-year contract. It it it it requires Dame and that side to recognize you’re not playing this year. And we have an independent physician that says now you can’t come back and we’re ruling you out for the year. But that’s something that opens up as well. There’s a lot of chatter about, you know, well, you got your 2031 and you got second round picks later on. Attach those to contracts of guys like the two names that’ll come up the most, Pat Coneton and Kyle Kosma. I I just don’t think given everything we just discussed and how okay you’re starting to come a little bit out of the tunnel here, but you’re still not fully out of it with what little you have. I just don’t think that is a viable option or something you should really lean into and say we’re going to attach our 2031 first round pick to this contract and trade him and then you have nothing that far down the road. when the reality is, you know, we’re talking about a path forward for next year. Um, what do you think the reality is? If I told you all those names that we just mentioned and the guys that started for you in game five and were certainly the most impactful in the playoffs, all of those guys are back and you bring in another, you know, Gary Trent level player with your disabled player exception and then you just round out the rest of the roster with veteran minimum contracts without knowing what the rest of the Eastern Conference does. If that’s your team, realistically, where are the Bucks in the East? probably similar positioning to where they were this year, I would think. Yeah. Where you’re you’re trying to uh make sure you’re staying top six and and that’s the goal of the season. Finish top six where you you avoid the playin. But I think that’s where you have to be because something that you mentioned with, you know, guys coming to Milwaukee taking less than what they can make elsewhere was in large part to play with Giannis. And you look at the landscape of the East and you have Cleveland who I could see free agents being like, I’ll take a little less to play in Cleveland. Uh Boston, New York, even Detroit, like Indiana. like there are some quality teams here that are are building where it’s like it’s not just Milwaukee, Philly, and Boston that you’re looking at the top of the East of like this is the crux of the teams that I’m trying to get to because if I don’t if I go somewhere else, it’s not as strong of a chance. Like we even met Orlando. Like there are some teams in the East that is going to make it difficult. So, I do think that if that is the team that the Bucks would to bring back, it’s you’re trying to make sure you’re staying top six and then get to the playoffs healthy and see what you can do at that point. Yeah, we’re aligned there. I mean, I I I think without knowing anything else that that the Eastern Conference does, if we assume the Bucks have the best type of offseason that they can have, I think you’re probably in the 5 to7 range in the Eastern Conference next season. Um the question is and to me this is a hard yes. Would you rather have that? As as people have already started to chime in of, well, sounds like another first round exit in a mediocre team. Like maybe would you rather have that or would you rather just be mired in the abyss once again? Because you we’ll save this for coming up after the break when we take a look at the East as well. But um I I don’t know, Camille. I may be proven to be wrong and maybe it’s just the experience that it’s been for these last nine years of watching this team make the playoffs and continually build and especially the midpoint of those nine years, what we saw that culminate in. Um I I’m not ready to leave that, you know, like I I know what the other options are. We experienced that right before this era started. We experienced that all through the 90s. And you just never know. The landscape is different now, but you never know what you can get back to. So, we’ll we’ll open up that can of worms, take a look at the rest of the Eastern Conference, and wrap things up coming up after this on Lockdown Bucks. Yeah, I mean, look, it may be the best long-term play to say it’s time to cut the cord and move on and recoup some assets, but it’s not I think the Bucks are in a different spot than most that reach this point when you think about an era kind of coming to an end is they don’t control their future. So, you can recoup some picks, but let think about it this way. Um, you don’t own your future until what, technically 2030 where you could trade that 2030 pick, I believe. Um, so rebuilding it does you no good because you’re not getting those picks. And not only are you not getting those picks, you’re making teams better if potentially could be the number one pick the New Orleans Pelicans get two years in a row from you with that pick swap and and with the uh additional pick that you owe them after this season. Um you could get your picks back, right? And you could say, uh let’s just work out a three-way deal where we get our picks back from New Orleans, New Orleans gets something from the other team, and Giannis goes to the other team. I don’t know that. To me, that’s a tough sell in that what’d you get for Giannis? We got what we used to have back. Okay, that’s that’s really all you got. You could work out deals with other teams and people are going to kick around the Rockets and Thunder, but the reality is any trade, if you do in fact entertain it, that you make with another team, you are best served to do what the Pelicans did to you and say, “I don’t want your picks in 2026 and 2027. I want your picks in 2030 and further down the road because that’s when I think he may be gone or he’s done. Your team is done and you’re going to be a bad team. So, I want to take advantage of that. Great. It means you’re in no different spot for these next handful of years where you’re going to be in all likelihood a bad team and you don’t have anything to show for it in terms of assets. So, I just think there’s more evidence to point to. You got to try to figure out how do we keep this together best we can. Maybe we’re down from where we expect to be, although that’s coming off of three straight first round exits for a year or two. And then we think we got one last push with Giannis as we keep these young guys and they start to develop and we start to get some other things. That’s where I’m at. And I just don’t see any scenario changing my mind. Yeah. And again, I’m only quote unquote trading Giannis if Giannis cames to me and says I want to be out. Like otherwise, you retool because you laid out the situation beautifully. like the Bucks don’t have the asset their own assets here. So if you are bad you can recoup something on it. Um and I think another thing with it is that when you do make a trade like that when you’re when you’re shipping off a franchise icon when you’re when you’re signaling to your fans, hey it’s time for the rebuild. When you’re doing that, what you’re selling is hope. I mean, that’s all that you’re selling because you have no idea if you’re going to be able to draft somebody who’s going to be as good as the person that you traded to start your new era of basketball. Like, it’s it’s selling hope. I mean, even think when Giannis was young and these bucks were terrible. And the slogan for the team was own the future because you can sell hope. You can sell that. You don’t know if it’s going to come to fruition, but you can sell it because you have picks, you got young players, and when everything is new still, you’re trying to figure out what it is. So, I think for the Bucks at this juncture, of course, this all hinges on what Giannis wants, but if he still wants to be here, I think you continue to build around him. And we’re seeing in the comments, I saw someone said like, “Stop with the old guys.” Maybe they said Gizers in the in the comment here, but um I think you’re seeing that too with this Bucks team. They they are younger. If you’re looking at the guys who were talking about we want this team to retain Gary Tren Jr.’s 25, you know, Kevin Port Junior’s what, 23 somewhere in there. Um AJ Green who we haven’t mentioned 25. So just real quick, not to cut you off in that scenario, like best case scenario where you keep all those guys. Yeah. Giannis is the oldest player on the team. Right. Right. And that’s what fans have been asking for. Hey, why don’t we just get younger, get more athletic? They could lean into that this summer. Again, the results you get though, it it might not be what it is if you had some veteran players, but you you go with the bumps of these young guys learning, getting their licks in, which I think we even saw in this playoffs with Kevin Porter Jr. is a great example of the first two, maybe even three games where you’re like, ah, this isn’t what we were seeing to close the year. But as he got used to the playoffs, getting that first taste of it, he adjusted, had a good game four, was crucial to the Bucks in game five with the minute allocation that he had. AJ Green, his first playoffs last year weren’t fantastic. He came back, he had a stronger year this year and now he’s sitting here like I’m ready to get back there back to it. Um so like that’s the other part of it. If you are going young like you might have some of those lumps along the way with those guys developing, but um again I can see a path forward with Giannis. Now I’m not saying that path forward is Bucks are a top three team in the East and in the in the preseason everybody’s going to be like yeah the contending tier the Bucks are there. they’re probably not going to be in that tier, but uh the brand of basketball that they play could be conducive to winning if they can kind of if guys can take a step and they can figure that out. There’s no there’s going to be no expectations barring something unseen on the Bucks coming into next season. And um yeah, I mean I think that’s the path is you go over the plan with Giannis and I like I can’t stress this enough. Neither you or I are suggesting trading for Giannis or trading Giannis. those scenarios that we we laid out are just look, this is why I don’t think that’s the best move for this team because of what they have in front of them in terms of their assets and and when realistically you should expect to recoup those. Um, so yeah, I I think you just have to have that conversation of look, those guys that you you said yourself, man, this is fun and I like playing with this group. That’s what we’re keeping. You know, we’re going to lean into you as the point power forward, point center guy that just drives everything. Um, you know, the one asset you still have left in terms of a young guy that’s still raw, Tyler Smith. You see, that’s an NBA ready shot. Like, that’s going to be big on him to develop throughout the summer. Just as we said, Andre Jackson Jr. on Ajax and the coaching staff. How do we maximize what we can out of your offense and get that from Andre Jackson Jr. so he can be some form of a two-way player for you? And you just have to lean into your youth and Giannis and let those guys develop and and even the notion of well you’re already starting out as a play on playing team. Number one, a lot of things change in each and every offseason as we’ve seen there’s even more rumblings. Well, yeah. And like there’s and that’s another team nobody’s mentioning, but what if Philly gets the first pick and all of a sudden Joel Embiid is a 40 game a year player, but you got Maxi and you got whatever you got in Paul George and Jared McCain and now you have a Cooper flag. like that’s an interesting team. There’s already rumblings, hey, this might be it for Boston that they’re going to have to start shedding contracts and trading guys this summer. And even teams like the Pistons and Magic, it’s easy to say they’re better off than the Bucks and they’re going to be better than the Bucks. We still need to see Orlando find some offense. We still need to see Detroit put this together for two years and, you know, not outperform expectations because most of the time you take a step back after that happens. So, it’s not a great spot to be in, but I don’t think it’s as bleak as it has been suggested. Now, that could all change with a couple of moves. And if guys, and it’s not just the Giannis piece, if other guys just say, “I don’t think it can be done here. I’m moving on elsewhere.” Then it becomes very, very difficult. And then that’s when you got to reevaluate. But on the surface right now, going into the off season with plenty to be done, I don’t think it’s just total doomsday. At least not yet. Uh, leave your comments, leave your thoughts in the comments about where this team is at and the trajectory that they have, some of the moves they need to make in the offseason. We’ll address those in the coming days here. I mentioned we’re hoping to get uh a show out of the way with Frank to get his thoughts on the end of the season and everything else. And we think that’ll be Monday that that comes your way and then continue to take a look at this postseason and what starts to change for teams in the Eastern Conference. That’ll do it for today’s show for Camille. I’m Justin. We’ll talk with you guys once again next week on Locked on Bucks.

Can the Milwaukee Bucks reclaim their Eastern Conference dominance? With Giannis Antetokounmpo at the helm, the Bucks face a pivotal offseason. The team must navigate salary cap challenges and potential roster changes to remain competitive in the NBA.

Explore the strategic discussions around the Bucks’ offseason moves, including the impact of the Chris Middleton trade and the potential for new signings like Gary Trent Jr. and Kevin Porter Jr. Justin Garcia and Camille Davis analyze the coaching situation, emphasizing the team’s commitment to Doc Rivers. They also assess the Eastern Conference landscape, considering threats from teams like the Boston Celtics and emerging contenders such as the Orlando Magic.

Join us for an in-depth look at the Milwaukee Bucks’ path forward. Discover how they plan to leverage their assets and maintain their championship aspirations.

0:00 Intro: Looking ahead to Bucks offseason
5:21 Coaching change unlikely unless situation goes nuclear
11:10 Damian Lillard injury complicates Bucks’ options
16:45 Front office has been aggressive in keeping championship window open
23:21 Projected 5-7 seed in East next season
28:54 Giannis potentially oldest player on retooled roster
33:14 Outro: Upcoming episode with Frank’s thoughts

#MilwaukeeBucks #Bucks #GiannisAntetokounmpo #DamianLillard #nba

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