Bucks Buzz: Monday February 24th

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff.  

Hot Recap Takes

Thursday: Nuggets 101 Bucks 90 -   Pretty much from start to finish, Milwaukee received a beatdown again from Denver. They were outscored in the first quarter and the ball kept rolling downwards from there. Kenneth Faried had his way with Milwaukee defenders going 11/15 from the field and had 26 points taking Ersan Ilyasova's lunch money for the whole game. J.J. Hickson had a double-double with 14 points and 10 assists. Randy Foye had one as well with 12 points and 10 assists. Seven of eight Denver players had a positive PER while Milwaukee had only one player reach a zero PER with John Henson, the rest were in the negatives. Giannis Antetokounmpo filled up the box score nicely with eleven points, four rebounds and assists, three blocks and two steals. A nice game from Henson as well with 12 points and seven rebounds. But overall, a pretty putrid performance from Milwaukee.

Saturday: Pacers 110 Bucks 100 - This is one of those 'atta boy' games for the Bucks. They hung with Indiana for the whole game with an admirable comeback in the end of the game. Basically, their best players beat Milwaukee with Paul George and David West both having 30 plus points with Lance Stephenson adding 24 points. Given their struggles against big men, it was interesting to see Roy Hibbert have a marginal game with only four points going 1/9 from the field. Indiana was just too good for Milwaukee on Y2K night. As for Milwaukee, a game where you get really excited about Brandon Knight. He had 30 points and eight assists with no turnovers. He played great throughout the game and make people wonder just how high his ceiling is with Milwaukee and for his career. Jeff Adrien had a strong debut pulling down eleven rebounds off the bench. Good start to what might be his short career with Milwaukee.

Three Bucks land on Bill Simmons' Worst Contracts List 
This is a yearly column from Simmons and it was not very kind to Milwaukee. O.J. Mayo and Ersan Ilyasova definitely deserves to be there. Mayo is proving to just be a guy that wanted to cash a check and thinks it is a good excuse to be fat. Ersan knows he can mail it in and the owner will not take umbrage with his game. Milwaukee will be better place when he is off the team. Larry Sanders' addition to this is a little harsh. This has just been a bad season for Larry, but he is still worth that contract. Almost every team in the NBA would want Sanders if he was healthy because he is not as much of a problem as people like Simmons and others are making him out to be. Sanders had just started to come on with his season before breaking eye bone. He will be just fine next season. Biggest encouraging thing for Sanders which Simmons missed out on, he became a veteran leader for Giannis. If you want an example on why Mayo belongs on this list, see this Vine from K.L. Chouinard.



Links
Here the stuff on Ersan I referred to the previous paragraph. If this is true, it would be yet another red mark against Herb Kohl as an owner.

If David Kahn becomes involved with the Bucks, they should end the Save Our Bucks movement and start pleading with investors to take this team to Seattle.

For the Y2K night, the Bucks found the 'Light Em Up' video. Tim Thomas lit more up than baskets if you know what I am saying. Also where is the one with Mark Pope. We need that version.

What to watch
Milwaukee plays Philadelphia on Monday night and I feel like that could be social media's finest hour. Will people watch this game just to see how bad the effort will be from both teams? Will one team actually get blown out? Will I become legitimately concerned if the Bucks win?

Upcoming schedule
As I said, they play Philadelphia on Monday and then they play Indiana again on Thursday. Thanks NBA schedulers for two Indiana games in the span of a week, appreciate it.

Charlie.

Tapping The Keg Podcast Episode 74

Tapping The Keg podcast episode 74 gracing the airwaves with Mitch and Charlie (Hi) per usual. We get into with talking about whether Favoring tweets between the opposite sex is flirting along with discussing what a favorite is and a BuzzFeed discussion. Moving from that, we touch on Seattle's Super Bowl win plus Charlie overreacts about the NFC's dominance while both of us fan the flames on dynasty talk for Seattle. We move on to the Milwaukee Bucks where the topics include Ersan Ilyasova wanting out, LARRY SANDERS! and flu talk. Next up is whether Pau Gasol will get traded to Phoenix as well as possibly moving Danny Granger there. We finish up with Joel Embiid talking about staying another year and a recommendation for Vanderpump Rules.

PS: The audio gets a little screwy in the last 10 minutes or so. My computer was acting up. Not too bad, but just a couple random jumps.

Mitch and Charlie.  

Bucks Buzz: February 6 - A Family Reunion

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff. 

Quick Recap:

Monday vs. New York (W): Bucks 101 Knicks 98 

I say this about every team the Bucks actually beat but how bad are the Knicks? Carmelo Anthony and JR Smith were chucking threes on their way to 36 and 30 points, respectively. The rest of their squad could only muster 32 points? Tim Hardaway was only 2-10 from the field and Raymond Felton was just 1-7. This really doesn't surprise me, it's just that I need to make fun of another team other than the Bucks. 

Speaking of those Bucks, this was easily the best game of the season for them. It was the first game Bucks' rookie Giannis Antetokounmpo got to play in front of his family. The Antetokounmpo's had some visa issues to work out but are now finally Stateside for good and now it seems as though Giannis will finally be able to relax and play ball (or, as Brandon Jennings would say: "just hoop"). Yanni played well in front of Mr. and Mrs. A (highlights below, the last up and under layup is unreal), scoring 15 points on 5-9 shooting and was 5-8 from the line. Further, I feel like he's going to forever be a Knicks killer, which we all should love.

Appropriate YouTube video: Giannis Highlights versus the Knicks. Chills for days.

His little brother Kosta is on the left. He's 16 and is 6'7". What do they feed these kids?

Welcome to Milwaukee, Antetokoumpo's!

Wednesday at Denver (L): Nuggets 110 Bucks 100

The energy was pretty good in this game, once again. They played a solid Nuggets team all the way through and didn't roll over after a bad third quarter. Small victories like this are nice to see when your team is 9-40. Larry Sanders had his best game of the season scoring 25 points (a new career high) and grabbing 15 rebounds in the losing effort. 

LARRY SANDERS! might have earned that stylization back after his recent stretch of games. He's averaging 13.4 points per game (57.7 percent from the floor) and 10.4 rebounds per game over his last five games. He fouled out of the game on Monday but, in typicaly Larry fashion, he got the crowd on their feet before he exited, nearly getting a technical in the process.

If you want him to be traded, you're doing it wrong. Many people will hopefully come back around on the 25 year old big man after this recent stretch.

Links

An article by Charles Gardner of the Journal-Sentinel about Giannis and his family being here for good. You can tell he's so happy now and it sounds like his family will be at every home game. Let's get those roots firmly planted in the 414. And for the love of God, draft his brother, Thanasis, in the 2014 draft to get them all in Milwaukee. (Ed. note: Can we get Kostas to Marquette please? Thanks. - CT) 

Here's a post from Fansided about the Bucks potentially having interest in the Cavaliers' Dion Waiters, who has fallen out of favor in Cleveland. I'm not sure how I feel about him. He doesn't have eye-popping numbers in his short career and is a bit of a head case. However, as long as they don't make a stupid trade to get him, I might be alright with it. He's the kind of guy the Bucks' might want to target. He's only 22 himself and could possibly turn it around in a new situation.

What to watch

One thing I'm going to keep my eye(s) on is the continuing play of LARRY SANDERS! and Khris Middleton. Those guys have been on-fire over the last handful of games. Middleton is shooting 58.3 percent from beyond the arc over his last five and is scoring 16.6 points per game over that stretch.

Sanders just needs to play within himself and keep everything else in check to have a large impact.

What's next?

The Bucks have just one game over the weekend as they'll host the Houston Rockets on Saturday night. This is a somewhat controversial night for Bucks' fans as it's "beard night" and the team is conveniently playing against NBA superstar James Harden, who's known for his beard. Additionally, it's going to be a "red out" night as the Bucks are giving away a red shirt with a beard on it to all fans. 

Think of it what you will.

Tapping The Keg Podcast Episode 71

Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler taped yet another podcast where this week we talk about the density of people using social media, preview both Championship games starting with New England-Denver and then San Francisco-Seattle. We move on to discuss Joel Embiid who is the new 'pop star' of college basketball as Charlie likes to call him. It continues on to a Milwaukee Bucks hypothetical and then a conversation about Larry Sanders which includes why Milwaukeeans need to get behind him. We finish up the podcast talking about the Clayton Kershaw deal which somehow leads us to some quick words on Australian weather. Enjoy!

Charlie.

Bucks Buzz: Monday January 13th

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff.  

Hot Recap Takes
Friday: Bulls 81 Bucks 72 - Could we mark this down as the worst Bucks loss of the year? I mean playing at home in front of a pro-Bulls crowd and they only score 72 points. That's terrible. There is really not much to say about this one. You feel like the Avery Johnson line 'We suck, we're idiots.' If you want one bright spot, it would Miroslav Radulijca had 10 points and five rebounds. He followed it up with a nice day against Oklahoma City and there will be something in the links about it. Radulijca has been a bright spot with this team this season. On the other end of it, Brandon Knight shot 21 times making only six times as well as missing all 3-pointers he shot, six of them. There is much discussion about what kind of guard Knight is, we talked about it last week, but I think he is sealing his fate as a shoot-first point guard which makes people cringe like a naming a shot after Paul Walker (Seriously, people think it is too soon for it, I guess it is in poor taste).  

Saturday: Thunder 101 Bucks 85 - GIANNIS. WHO CARES THE BUCKS LOST BY 16...
GIANNNNNISSSSS!! He had 13 points, eleven rebounds and five assists. Huge stat line for Anteokounmpo whom was playing against his idol Kevin Durant. Speaking of him, he is on complete fire still going for 33 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists. Giannis played great throughout the game. Larry Sanders did not have a good weekend getting a technical in Friday's game and getting kicked out of Saturday's game. People are starting to get turned off by Larry's antics, but he is an emotional player meaning Sanders will not be a church mouse. People will get mad him like they do with Jermichael Finley as he has the same sort of supposed 'antics'. Luke Rindour had a nice night off the bench with 16 points, did not shoot much and had five assists. He should remain on the bench. It is okay for him to contribute as a bench player.

Giannis DOY - Every dunker gets a right of passage of dunking on Kendrick Perkins and now Antekokounmpo.  



Giannis block of Durant along with other highlights - This had to be the highlight of his career thus far being able to block KD in the two games they have played against Oklahoma City.  Nothing like blocking the guy you look up to, kinda like Allen Iverson crossing up Michael Jordan



Links
This blog post is more Giannis filled than most of them as he did another blog that was beautifully translated on Brew Hoop. Seriously, one of the best things ever. Sanders' line about Gucci shoes cracked me up.

Giannis also did a video with True Hoop which was also awesome and includes him enjoying ice cream.

This is from last week as well, but the SportUV numbers really love Miroslav which might suggest he needs more playing time and I might be slowly develop into a man crush Monday situation here.

What to watch
I am curious to know what the attendance numbers will be on Wednesday when they are giving away Giannis posters. I am mildly to very interested in going to the game to acquire a poster. I feel like many casual fans might attend this one in a game where both teams could score 70.

Upcoming schedule
They play on the road in Toronto before taking on Memphis at home on Wednesday night. Milwaukee currently has five straight losses, and they have fallen in their 13 of 15 games.

Charlie.

Bucks Buzz: January 9 - Free K-Midd

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff.  

Quick Recap:

Tuesday vs. Golden State: Warriors 101 Bucks 80

Another night, another double-digit loss. The Bucks are now 7-27 on the season and after reports of a fight/shouting match going on between Larry Sanders and Gary Neal happening on Saturday night after their loss in Phoenix, the Bucks have ostensibly hit rock bottom. I'm going to withhold judgement on whether I think it's "rock bottom" or not because I think it can definitely get worse than it already is. 

Gary Neal is apparently being shopped now for any taker. Thank you, John Hammond and Herb Kohl. Some of us were worried that the Bucks would see all this bad PR from Larry Sanders and try to make him the scapegoat and move him. I applaud Larry trying to be a leader and beaking a veteran "leader" for being a chucker and just looking for his shot. Unfortunately, the Bucks are losing night in and night out so this looks really bad. Again, the timing for Sanders is bad as well so people are going to pile on him some more. I think he just wants the team to play cohesively and that hasn't happened hardly at all this year. 

As far as the game, it was your typical Bucks game this season. They hung around for the most part into the third quarter but before you know it, they're down by 15-20 points in the fourth quarter and it's suddenly game over. David Lee had a big night offensively but again showed me why that call him "Avid Lee" (no D) while trying to defend Ersan Ilyasova. 'Sova is anything but athletic and he was getting around Lee and getting to the basket. It was fairly entertaining. Ironically, watching Illy defend Lee was also a nightmare and probably set the game of basketball back a few days. Our boy Giannis had a nice night dishing the ball (five assists) but there's some concern that he's a little too passive when it comes to getting/taking shots. I wouldn't worry as he's young and still figuring things out but it's something to watch I suppose.

The Dubs had a really balanced effort overall and Steph Curry put on his show for the Milwaukee faithful. He makes some incredibly tough shots and really leaves you nearly speechless at times. Good to see the Warriors get back to playing good basketball, though. They were hanging back around the nine seed in the West before this epic road trip that the Warriors went on. They lost last night in Brooklyn, forfeiting their chance to be the first team to achieve a 7-0 road trip in NBA history. Now, after a 6-1 road trip, they're comfortably back in that six seed in the Western conference. 

Appropriate YouTube video: "Warrior Mentality"

This video isn't necessarily pertinent to the game itself but it's one of my all-time YouTube faves. These guys name off all the obscure Warriors' players that were on the team between playoff appearances. If you're a fan of randon trivia, it gets good. Trust me.

Links 

Here's a link to a story about the above mentioned argument between Sanders and Neal.

There's a SaveOurBucks.com t-shirt handout at Loaded Slate before the game on Friday against the Chicago Bulls. These are typically home games for the Bulls but maybe if word gets out about these free t-shirts, we can take back the Bradley Center from the FIBs and "Bulls fans". Just scroll down and read the OP's post for details. 

From Bucksketball: An article about OJ Mayo possibly going a little heavy on the mayo since he's been in Milwaukee. I recently questioned OJ's heart on twitter and the fact that he's plumped up a bit basically confirms my questioning. He was publicly called out by Rick Carlisle last year so this shouldn't surprise anyone.

What to watch

Obviously, be on the lookout for a Gary Neal trade sooner rather than later (good riddance) and as I touched on above, keep an on Giannis perhaps being more aggressive offensively. 

Also, can we get Khris Middleton back in the starting lineup? Jesus Martha. This guy clearly should be starting for the Bucks but Larry Drew has been starting Luke Ridnour instead. We've got nothing to lose at this point. He's been reduced to playing with the bench mob that typically consists of the likes of Mayo and Caron Butler. Yikes.

This isn't directly related to the Bucks but keep an eye on whether or not Jabari Parker, who is Mormon, goes on a two-year LDS mission trip after being drafted. I'd be on suicide watch if the Bucks took him and then he went on a mission. Who's a Mormon anyway?

What's next?

The Bucks take on the Bulls at the BC on Friday, get out there and show you're SaveOurBucks support. The Bulls will, once again, be trying to out-tank us so expect to see Joakim Noah and any other impact players sitting out this one.

Then, they'll travel to Oklahoma City on Saturday to get destroyed by Kevin Durant and the Thunder. I needn't say much else. The tank rolls on.

-Big Money

Bucks Buzz: Monday January 6th

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff.  

Hot Recap Takes
Thursday: Jazz 96 Bucks 87 - BATTLE OF THE TANK. I had no idea how bad Milwaukee has been in Utah in the last 24 years as the Bucks have only won three of their last 24 games in Salt Lake City. It did not get any better last Thursday as Bucks fall rather easily to Utah. Once again, Milwaukee gave up a big stat line to a big man with Derrick Favors having a double-double with 22 points and eleven rebounds. Gordan Hayward had a big day as well going for 22 and on an efficient 8/16 shooting. He has really turned into a good player for the Jazz. On Milwaukee's side of things, the good was Larry Sanders having his first big game since coming back from injury with 16 points, eight rebounds and going seven for seven from the field. The bad was Brandon Knight going 3 for 12 with only eight points. These games are evidence when people call Knight a 'shoot-first' point guard.

Saturday: Suns 116 Bucks 100 - Phoenix was without Eric Bledsoe, but that did not matter in this one as they rolled Milwaukee on Saturday night. Milwaukee had a season-high 26 turnovers, and to think with how bad the season has been, I am surprised they have not hit 30 this season. Gerald Green of all people had a great day against the Bucks going for 24 points and five steals. I know I bang on this point consistently, but another big man enjoyed a nice day with Channing Frye with 22 points and seven rebounds. Milwaukee did have some good performances out there with Knight having 25 points on 8/12 shooting and O.J. Mayo had his first good night from the bench going for 20 points with 7/11 shooting. Negative side of things we saw a rookie game from Giannis Anetokounmpo. An with him being shutout in a game for the first time since his DNP against Washington in late November. Hopefully this does not deter Larry Drew from starting him.

BEEF WATCH: Sanders vs. Neal
What's been surprising is Milwaukee really has yet to have any team issues with their bad record. Usually by this time, someone would be in trouble for punching a teammate. After a bad outing by Sanders, Gary Neal made a comment about 'earning his money.' This is an absurd thing to Neal to say to Sanders. He earns bench contract sure, but it is not like he is scorching the earth right now. I mean this is not like Neal is the team leader here. There is really no basis to call out Sanders. Personally, I think Larry knows he needs to step up and be a leader of this team. I really do not believe he needs any reminders. To me, it sounds like jealousy from Neal.

Links

Great post from K.L. Chounaird about Giannis and his nicknames. I agree about 'Greek Freak' being an offensive nickname, same goes with The Alphabet. K.L. includes a cool story about his Nigerian name. (Bucksetball) 

What to Watch
I would watch Knight's shooting selection. There are rumblings among Bucks faithful that he is shooting too much with the basketball as a point guard. I am not sure if I am in that camp yet. As it has been noted here before, he is only 22 years young. Still lots of time to figure it out.  

What's Next for Milwaukee

Welp they play Golden State at home on Tuesday which will probably be billed as the return of Andrew Bogut. Milwaukee might give up 140 points in regulation.

Charlie.

Bucks Buzz: January 2nd - Young Core Emerging

Every week Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler talk about the Milwaukee Bucks. Charlie handles the weekend games while Mitch handles the games during the week.  We are both members of the tank.

Quick Recap: Tuesday at Los Angeles Lakers (W 94-79)

Let me preface this by saying that while I watched as much as I could, I don't necessarily remember any of it. Let's just say that I had consumed a few sodas by the time tip-off (9:30 PM Central) rolled around and it only got worse by the time the game ended. Shout out to Horny Goat Hideaway for NYE festivities.

As much as I want to give credit to the Bucks for playing arguably their best game of the season, we have to consider how bad the Lakers are. Granted, I'm not afraid to say that the Lakers may be better without the legendary Kobe Bryant in the lineup. At the very least, they have better chemistry without him in the lineup at this moment. The Lakers have done a good job of building a tank roster while Kobe is out but these guys are playing above their heads. Nick "Swaggy P" Young is scoring at a nice rate for his hometown team and guys like Xavier Henry and Kendall Marshall are getting pretty heavy minutes for Mike D'antoni. Those are the kinds of players you add if you're not looking to win. You take a flyer on young(er) guys who haven't panned out for their first team or two and see what they have. It's really a win-win situation.

Now, over to the Bucks. Brandon Knight had a great game scoring but continues to show that he's not a starting caliber point guard in the NBA. I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing and I don't want him off the team or anything, it's just that he's possibly the biggest tank driver right now not named Caron Butler, Gary Neal or OJ Mayo. He's simply playing the wrong role if you plan on winning with him on your team. He's probably best suited in a Jamal Crawford/Jason Terry role. That is, he'd be best off to come in off the bench as a sixth or seventh man as a combo guard and put up some points for you. He has a little too much tunnel vision to be an effective NBA point guard.

Easily the most puzzling/concerning thing about this game is that Khris Middleton was removed from the starting lineup and only played 17 minutes. Sure, the Bucks won the game but that's not the main purpose for the Bucks this season. Middleton is a guy that's emerging as a key part of this young core that continues to show flashes. His playing time is pretty crucial. He's not a flashy player but fans really like how he lets the game come to him. Going forward, I'd love to see him as the sixth man/3 and D guy that holds the team together. Here's to hoping Middleton plays more tonight in Utah.

Appropriate YouTube video: Giannis with the putback

I couldn't not mention Giannis Antetokounmpo. He continues to impact games (at least a little) every night. He had 11 rebounds Tuesday night. Here's one of them. And it's actually not offensive interference, sir.

Links

Here's a link to an article on Bleacher Report on why the Bucks should take Jabari Parker if they land the #1 pick. Knock on wood but I totally agree.

This is a piece from HoopsRumors.com that cites Fox Sports Ohio's Sam Amico as a source saying the Bucks are open to trading defensive anchor Larry Sanders.While there might be some truth to this (I don't think he's untouchable for the right offer), Amico is not exactly Adrian Wojnarowski when it comes to credibility and mutual respect among his peers. Take what he "reports" with a grain of salt. I really don't want to see Sanders get traded but if the right offer came along, I'd at least listen if I were John Hammond.

What to watch

Luke Ridnour was inserted into the starting lineup against the Lakers and we'll see what happens with him going forward. I'm hoping his sudden increase in playing time is to showcase him for a potential trade. Again, playing the youth needs to be a priority at this point. Middleton needs to play more than 17 minutes.

Here's the young core I'd like to keep going foward:

Knight, Antetokounmpo, Middleton, Henson, and Sanders. Everyone else is expendable at this point.

What's next?

The Bucks are in Salt Lake City tonight to take on the Jazz as two of the largest tanks in the NBA will square off. The Bucks will be without John Henson yet again as he's expected to miss two weeks with a high ankle sprain. They then will be in the Valley of the Sun to take on Phoenix on Saturday night. The Suns are the surprise story of the year with their 19-11 record and are set up well for the future to boot.