Bucks’ big bet is bad news for Raps
East-shaking trades make Giannis less likely to hit free agency. Time for a backup plan
Better start working on Plan B.
Not that Plan A — the idea the Raptors would target back-toback NBA MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo during the offseason of 2021 — ought to be deemed a total writeoff until the documents are signed.
As of this writing Antetokounmpo wasn’t under contract with the Milwaukee Bucks beyond the coming 72-game season. And until pen hits paper on the five-year supermax contract extension he’s being offered by his current team — and he has until the Dec. 21 deadline to accept that deal — there’s always the chance that a 25-year-old superstar stares down the prospect of another half-decade in small-city Wisconsin and reconsiders his options.
Still, give the Bucks credit: Under intense pressure from Antetokounmpo to improve a team that’s reeled off the NBA’s best regular-season record for two straight seasons only to underwhelm in two straight post-seasons, Milwaukee GM Jon Horst made a couple of impressive additions to his roster in the wee hours of Tuesday morning. Not long after the Bucks acquired point guard Jrue Holiday in a trade with the New Orleans Pelicans, they added sharpshooter Bogdan Bogdanovic in a sign-andtrade with the Sacramento Kings.
Both players make the Bucks better. As for whether they’re improved enough to contend for a title, their betting odds to hoist the Larry O’Brien Trophy shortened from 6-1 to 5-1 in some books, making them the second favourite behind the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers.
Not that there aren’t risks to any dice roll. The Bucks gave up a motherlode to get Holiday, sending Eric Bledsoe, the reliable George Hill and three first-round picks the other way. And on the surface, the Bledsoe-for-Holiday swap could be spun as a lateral move, especially on the defensive end. Bledsoe, also a point guard, has twice been named to the league’s all-defensive team, the same number as Holiday.
But anyone who’s watched the Bucks closely understands why they made the move. More than any other Buck, Bledsoe became synonymous with disappearing when it mattered. He was the guy who shot 17 per cent from threepoint range in that Eastern Conference final in which the Raptors beat the Bucks in 2019. He was the guy who shot a dismal 33 per cent from the field in a second-round series loss to the Heat in the Orlando bubble.
Holiday, though he’s only been out of the first round a couple of times during his NBA career, has built a reputation for raising his game in the post-season. And as for Bogdanovic, who was acquired in the sign-and-trade arrangement that sent Donte DiVincenzo, Ersan Ilyasova and D.J. Wilson to Sacramento — though he has never played in the NBA playoffs, he’s a longtime European pro and a volume three-point shooter who’s strung together a career’s worth of big-game performances at the European club and national-team level for his native Serbia.
With all those assets going out the door, and with the Bucks suddenly in salary-cap hell, there are those who’d suggest Milwaukee paid too much for too little. But the bottom line is simple. If Antetokounmpo signs that fiveyear supermax extension in the coming days, the Holiday and Bogdanovic deals are suddenly on the list of the most important transactions of the past handful of NBA seasons. If not — if Giannis declines the extension and sets off for free agency — they’re the ultimate white elephants.
If you’re Horst and you haven’t been consulting Antetokounmpo at every step, you’re not only negligent, you deserve to be fired. Which is to say: Unless Horst has woefully misread the feelings of the back-to-back league MVP, the Greek Freak never looked like more of a lock to re-sign in Milwaukee than he did on Tuesday.
Which brings us back to the Raptors, and precisely where Masai Ujiri might go from here if Antetokounmpo, indeed, is on the precipice of eschewing free agency for a long-term commitment.
Toronto, of course, wasn’t the only franchise eyeing the Greek Freak with hopeful admiration. But Toronto always seemed like a betterthan-average fit. The notion that Ujiri, the NBA’s only Nigerian-raised team president, would woo Antetokounmpo, the son of Nigerian immigrants to Greece, always made some sense. Ujiri, along with running the Raptors, also runs Basketball Without Borders, an initiative built to help African kids prosper through the sport. He’s always spoken with a certain paternalistic ownership about the wealth of talent produced by the continent.
“Excuse me, but Giannis is not Greek. Giannis is Nigerian,” Ujiri said at his post-championship press conference in 2019, this while waxing proud about his belief in Africa’s vast human resources.
Given all that, for the purposes of this particular pipe dream, it seemed irrelevant that Toronto has never been a coveted destination for NBA free agents. The idea that Giannis might make himself an exception wasn’t hurt by the notion that Ujiri has a long history of friendship with the Antetokounmpo family.
“Masai helped me and my family during the years I’ve been in the league,” Giannis said on the eve of the 2019 Eastern final. “He’s an unbelievable guy, a great GM, built a great team. And after the series is over, if he wants to go and golf or do something, we can definitely do that.”
In 2019, of course, it was Antetokounmpo who found himself with plenty of time for golf after the Raptors, down 2-0 in the series, famously walled off the paint and reeled off four straight wins. As for 2021, suddenly Toronto’s Plan A, if it’s not yet lost, looks to be hurtling out of play. And who knows where the Raptors go from here.
The signs are pointing to free-agent Fred VanVleet re-signing with the Raptors, but until the full extent of the demand reveals itself, it’s too early to call it a lock. The future of Serge Ibaka and Marc Gasol remains in limbo. Kyle Lowry’s got a year left on his deal. Pascal Siakam is due for a postseason bounceback. It’s not hard to fathom the Raptors cobbling together a team that causes problems in the Eastern playoffs, even if — with Milwaukee, Miami, Brooklyn and Boston looking formidable — they’ll be nobody’s Eastern favourites.
Still, there’s plenty we don’t know about next year’s Raptors team. We’ll begin to get more answers with Wednesday’s draft and Friday’s opening of free agency. But here’s what we’re clearer on: The idea that next year’s off-season will include an all-out run at Giannis suddenly doesn’t seem as probable.
In other words, better start working on Plan B. Speaking of closely cultivated relationships in the hope of a free-agent jackpot, perhaps it’s time to check back in with Uncle Dennis. A certain 2019 NBA Finals MVP is still slated to be a 2021 free agent. If he doesn’t miss Toronto’s weather, perhaps he misses winning.