Why Giannis Isn’t leaving the Milwaukee Bucks | Bomani Jones & Vinnie Goodwill

Why Giannis Isn’t leaving the Milwaukee Bucks | Bomani Jones & Vinnie Goodwill

I don’t think they think that Giannis is leaving. And at this point, I don’t think Giannis is going to want to leave. And I got a couple of reasons behind that. Number one, I remember once I was in a negotiation with a place and had a pretty strong push from another place to get me, but I didn’t want to do that, right? And I remember telling the first place, “Hey, don’t make me do this.” Like I’m I’m telling you right here, this is what I wanted to be, but if you make me do it, I mean, of course they damn near did, but I’m like, don’t make me do this. Okay, that’s where I feel like Giannis has been with Milwaukee, right? Like, look, man, I I really, really, really want to do this, okay? Don’t make it to where don’t make me look stupid, right? Don’t make me feel foolish for being loyal to what’s going on here, right? Like that seems to be the way that he’s going about this. But I think that this CBA and I’m curious your thoughts about this. While we look at all the things that I think are ultimately negative about this CBA and the biggest thing that I hate about it is they’re basically rewarding incompetence or at the very least they are penalizing competence, right? Like they came up with this salary cap way back when and then they had to put the Larry Bird provisions in because they realized, oh [ __ ] we’re making it where the Boston Celtics can’t keep Larry Bird. That’s a terrible idea, right? like just as a principle, that’s a terrible idea. And so they did all these things with the cap to try to make it such that you could keep your own team together without just going and poaching players from other teams. That seemed to be what the provision was. Then it reached a place where they were like, “Yo man, now we can’t get these guys to stay anymore.” Because they decided they wanted to put the max salary provision in there. And that made it such that the difference between the max and what you can get in these other places by and large was not that high. Then they kept doing more, right? They added the idea of the supermax, for example. So that now they make it even more make it easier for the teams to keep the guys, but that still wasn’t really working that well in order to keep guys. Now they set these aprons up, right? And aside from the fact that the aprons, you know, have these punitive tax penalties when you go over the second apron and everything else that comes with it, what it really does that I think is most interesting and quite honestly problematic is that once teams get into these second aprons, it’s what you can’t do to improve your team. It’s the trades and acquisitions that you can’t make in order to get your team just a little bit better. So once you decide to go in Second Apron, hard cap is basically where we are. Except it’s not even just a hard cap. you can’t maneuver. Right. Right. So, it’s one thing to be like, “Yo, you can’t go add more players because then it’s too much.” But now we can’t even make little moves. I say all that to say this.
If you’re Giannis, if a team makes a move to get you, how unlikely or how likely is it that you going to be right back in the same situation in 18 to 24 months looking around like, “What y’all got? What y’all going to be able to do for me?” And now we gonna be doing this same exact thing over and over again. So to me, it feels like the owners have finally gotten what they wanted. To me, at the expense of everything else, but they finally got what they wanted. We going to make these dudes stay. These these guys that we think sell all the tickets. We’re going to make we’re going to make it really hard for them to leave.
Well, it’s funny you you said penalizing competence. I think they’re penalizing excellence, right? And now players, it’s going to be so much more important because I’m going to get to a point. It’s going to be so much more important to your last point about where players are drafted now. Cuz before it would be you could spend seven years somewhere and then once you get into a certain place where you could get 25% of the cap, then you go somewhere, sign a shorter deal, then sign a longer deal, and you’re in the place that you want to be. That no longer exists. And folks, let’s us let us appreciate Bmani having his Samuel L. Jackson and Jungle Fever moment where he says, “Don’t make me beat somebody over the head. I’ll do it.”
That’s all I’m saying. That’s all I’m saying. I’ll do it. I’ll do it. That That was That was That was very much I’ve been there a couple times. One time it worked out the way I wanted. One time it was just like, “All right, cool.” You know, we’ll do this. Cool. You got it.
All right, man. Wesley Snipes. All right, man. Here. Here. Just Just don’t make me beat somebody over the head. No, but I think
that’s right. The CBA amongst other things has landlocked players into deciding either you want the money that you are going to be underpaid for anyway, right? LeBron underpaid, Giannis underpaid. Like the top of the top level guys, they know how much they’re worth to their franchises, so they can’t take a penny less. The union has set it up so that if Giannis takes less, then that sets the president for every other superstar coming down the pike. LeBron has to take the max. He He absolutely cannot afford for the future health of the league and the players in the league not take a dollar less at this stage because of all the discounts or because of the discount he took in Miami. Well, I think I think his first year he was getting $13 million. both. That is mid level exception money now.
Yo, and that that’s the reason why he ain’t taking a dime less ever again. I tell you, he did it once and y’all ain’t give him no credit for it.
Not not never. So with Giannis and I’m with you on the point that not only makes players stay and you wind up being in the exact same situation. For me, it’s twofold. If I’m in a if I’m a rival team and I’m looking at the NBA moving so much faster, like we never would have thought Luca Donis would have gotten traded. We never honed like all the minations and things that have changed over the NBA just in the last 24 months, right? I’m still operating under the guise that maybe this don’t work and I’m going to keep my power to dry and I’m going to hold my war chest just in case Giannis says you know what I’ve had enough. That’s why if I’m the Houston Rockets, yeah, I will give you but so much Phoenix Suns Kevin Durant but I’m keeping my Jabari Smiths. I’m keeping my Cam Whit Moores. I’m keeping Reed Shepard. I’m keeping a man Thompson who was never going anywhere anywhere anyway. I’m keeping all of my young players just in case Giannis decides I’ve had enough. Because you can go from saying I’m a Milwaukee buck for life to saying, man, in a weak Eastern Conference we couldn’t get it done in 2026 to saying get me up out of here. If I’m Giannis and there is no clear-cut place besides Houston, I’m saying let let’s play this out for at least a year because then he has one more year left after next year and then he goes into an option year. Not saying that cuz nobody goes into free agency anymore, right? The Stars don’t go into free agency anymore. You get traded and you get your extension. That’s how it goes. But I’m y if I’m honest, I’m playing this out for at least one year so that all these other teams that maybe want to make a run for me, they get your draft picks in order, you get your house in order, and then you go from there.
All right, but let me throw something else out here. And I feel bad for Giannis cuz I can often feel like this in my own life and it doesn’t feel good. But um if I’m Milwaukee say Giannis come upstairs and say I want a trade. Duly noted we gonna work on finding you a trade. You telling me Yiannis ain’t going to come out here and play hard, bro? You telling me a
It’s what he does. It’s what he does. It’s what he does. Like this is not
James Harden says he wants to trade. You need to go trade James Harden right now. Okay. before somebody got to whoop his ass in the locker room. You need to go trade James Harden, right? Because that’s in Houston. That’s what it almost came down to. They look it was a bunch of what was it? Demarcus Cousins. Uh John Wall PJ Tucker was on that team. Mhm.
Like James Harden. Hey brother, myself person. And I believe the word that I saw used by at least one of them was disrespect. They felt as though James Harden was behaving in a disrespectful manner. And this is post Achilles boogie, which is correct. He he had zero of the Fs to give him.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, man. No, man. They had to get James Hard out of there. But Yiannis, Giannis going to show up. Look, remember when Kevin Durant asked for a trade from the Nets and they was like, “Yeah, gotcha.” Okay. Right. Like like like like Kevin Yeah. They Kevin Durant they treated that they treated that Kevin Durant trade proposal like it is with Trump when they bring him the daily briefing. You’re like ah cools that [ __ ] over his shoulder like ain’t nobody like like nothing ain’t even happened. Like what I need to know what that what I need that for? Like you got to be kidding me. Right. And so I think in part that’s kind of where if I’m the because here’s if I’m the Bucks and we’ve all talked about the Rockets. And I think if you are a Milwaukee fan, you absolutely say we have to get Amen Thompson in such a trade. If you are a Rockets fan, you’re saying we’re not giving Amen Thompson up in that trade. If I am Milwaukee, I am very clear with Yiannis. Look, if you want to go to Houston, that’s cool. But I’m telling you right now, if they don’t give us Thompson, we’re not doing it right. And for what it’s worth, if I’m the Rockets, I’d probably do it.
You have to. You hold your nose and you do it because if you’re if you’re getting Giannis at age, okay, Giannis is 30 now. He’ll be 31 in December. And you look at the years of excellence that Giannis has had, these elite years. Let’s just go back to let’s say 2018, right? Let’s say 2018 is the first year where Giannis has turned into a absolute superhero. And then 2019 was his first MVP. He’s been a superhero for 7 years at 6’11, 240 lbs with the beating on his body and let’s just say the lack of outside development from three-point shooting. So his game is predicated on power and strength and speed and all these things that diminish over time unless you are LeBron James by and large.
Right. If you if you’re going to acquire him, what I’m saying is if you’re going to acquire him, you can only play for two years at a time, right? You gonna get two rings out of it, but you going to play for those two years with him and KD, and you’re going to be okay with it.

On today’s episode, Vinnie Goodwill of Yahoo Sports joins Bomani Jones to discuss how it most likely won’t help keep Giannis in Milwaukee. Continuing with the Giannis topic, Bo and Vinnie say why the Bucks would want Amen Thompson from the Rockets in return.

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