And then they'll pawn it off on player empowerment and the league having a problem with players demanding trades or leaving small markets.
The Dame stuff has always been gross, but at least people could point to the Blazers not winning anything or building realistic contenders around him to mask their bullshit. Milwaukee won a title two years ago, was among the title favorites the last two seasons and potentially could have won either year if it weren't for bad luck with health. There is no argument that Milwaukee hasn't tried or hasn't "done right" by Giannis at every turn. But the second they get too old the NBA media wants to get it out there that he needs to leave because they don't want elite players in cities like Milwaukee.
And the part I don’t understand about it all is that why does it matter to the media. Hardly any of them are going, the games are broadcasted, so it’s not like we don’t see them. Why do they care?
Havent followed it that closely but doesn’t this all stem from Giannis’s comments about wanting to pick the spot that gives him the best chance to win, not from rumor mongering?
Nothing wrong with putting a little public pressure on your organization if they arent giving you the best shot to win. I dont expect giannis to actually leave
Milwaukee pays Giannis’ jag brothers for years and because Middleton gets hurt the media is gonna understand the assignment. Gross
Some of this is obviously me projecting what I think is going to happen, but there have always been rumblings about this kind of stuff with him dating back years before Milwaukee won the title.
This is the kind of stuff that gets teams to overpay old people like Lopez and Middleton out of fear of making the superstar mad, and then when he's a FA the talking point becomes "the team did a bad job of signing a bunch of old guys and trading away picks so he needs to leave". That happened with LeBron and Cleveland twice and with him and Miami once.
and let's remember, all Giannis has said so far is he's a Buck and will continue to be a Buck until the team can no longer provide him their best efforts to field a championship caliber team.
Exactly Making short term decisions with a salary cap and guaranteed contracts is hard to make work long term.
But it’s clearly setting himself up to leave because the bucks are getting old and it will take work to get back to being young/competitive since they have to overpay the vets.
Its the cost of doing business in the league. Lebron in particular hangs banners everywhere hes been. If youre an elite organization like GSW or Miami and can simply attract another star in a couple years, feel free to put your foot down. What leverage does milwaukee have against giannis?
Part of this is just the natural consequences of being a contending team. You have a mandate to give yourself the best possible chance to win a championship right now. That will almost certainly have to include things like trading future assets and signing guys to deals that will look bad at the back end. Ideally from the orgs perspective the star will understand this and give them a chance to pivot into a new window but that doesn't seem to really ever happen.
It has no leverage. But your post said "nothing wrong with putting a little public pressure on your organization...". I'm telling you where that strategy goes wrong for the team. For Milwaukee, they're trying to keep this thing together with the pieces they have (with old guys on small deals around them) because that's what Giannis probably wants. But 2 years from now when those guys are 2 years older and worse and Giannis is a FA, how is that going to play out if he says "we're no longer a contender because all my guys are old/hurt and we have no assets to improve"? Probably not well.
I think this is all fine and good but the narrative shouldn’t be the Bucks are failing him. It should be about how they did everything they could with him under the cap rules and did a good job.
what you don’t like Stephen A. going on espn for like a year yelling into a camera Dame has to demand a trade?
A year? I'm pretty sure the morning Lillard asked for a trade SAS went on ESPN and bragged that he's been "publicly and privately begging him" to demand a trade for 6-7 years and that he's "proud of him" for doing so now.
“I've been arguing with this guy for about six years to get the hell up out of Portland, to demand a trade out of Portland,” Smith said. “They're on a fast track to nowhere, I understand they're accumulating young talent, I'm not trying to throw any shade on the organization whatsoever. I understand what they're capable of, but at this particular moment in time, they just don't have the talent to be considered a championship contender.”
“They're on a fast track to nowhere” Immediately followed by “I'm not trying to throw any shade on the organization “ Ok SAS maybe space these two sentences apart a little more
I feel like the same argument has been happening for like 3 months now. It's in Dame's best interest to leave because that team is like a 7 seed at best. Also the Blazers have no incentive to trade him for anything less than a massive deal, which doesn't really exist
I agree my complaint was there are media members openly campaigning and advising players to leave locations. Seems unethical to their business
They have but they also have a responsibility to their current players - specifically Giannis - to continue doing so.
What’s the alternative for the Bucks? Not going all in and being a contender to the point Giannis wants to leave in two years anyways?
Which is where it get tough the longer the core pieces stay together because you have to continue taking care of guys like Middleton too and that gets expensive. They did a solid job in adding Portis. But you can’t fall into the situation Portland was in…Olshey by and large kept the core mostly intact but he wasn’t aggressive enough. Making roster additions like Hezonja, Evan Turner, and broken Festus Ezeli ain’t surrounding Dame with “talent”
I'm not saying they would have done anything different because they're kind of stuck right now. But when you're a market like Milwaukee or Cleveland or Portland and your superstar is essentially telling you that you have to go all in every single year, eventually that's going to lead to situations where the roster around you is no longer capable of competing for championships every single year because those bills come due at some point. So I guess my point is what game do the Bucks and Giannis ultimately want to play here? Do they want to try to squeeze every ounce out of this core trying to win another ring in the next 2 years and then ultimately be running a nursing home when Giannis is a FA and either leaves or resigns? Or do you want to try to maximize 7 years of Giannis through another deal? Because if Giannis wants to stay there long term, these decisions to win now at all costs will ultimately make it harder for him on his next deal.
Gonna be a must follow account. Same people are the go-to source for anything salary cap related for the NHL.
My first thought reading that is that it seems weird to me that we're at the point of the calendar that someone being re-evaluated in 6 weeks means they're going to miss the start of the regular season.
Old quote from Andre Iguodala I had never heard before that was brought up on his pod with Redick... "I don't know anyone who can stay in front of Lou Williams... so it confuses me as to why Lou Williams can't keep anybody in front of him."