The Bucks are declining their fourth-year team option on wing MarJon Beauchamp, reports Shams Charania of ESPN.
As our tracker shows, October 31 is the deadline for teams to make decisions on 2025/26 rookie scale team options.
The No. 24 overall pick of the 2022 draft, Beauchamp has yet to establish himself as a reliable rotation player over the course of two-plus seasons. Beauchamp, who turned 24 years old earlier this month, will be an unrestricted free agent next summer after Milwaukee declined next season’s option, which was valued at $4,781,276.
In 104 career regular season games, including 12 starts, Beauchamp has averaged 4.7 points and 2.1 rebounds on .431/.353/.716 shooting in 12.7 minutes per contest.
As ESPN’s Bobby Marks tweets, the Bucks still have $170MM in salary committed to their roster next season, and three players — Khris Middleton, Bobby Portis and Pat Connaughton — hold player options for 2025/26. Declining Beauchamp’s option will save money against the luxury tax in ’25/26.
Two reports from Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report — one in February and one a few days before the ’24/25 season began — stated the Bucks were willing to trade Beauchamp, so it’s not a total surprise that his option was declined. Still, it’s certainly a noteworthy development, particularly for a team that has needed athletic wings for a few seasons.
Whichever team Beauchamp finishes this season with will be limited to offering him up to the value of the declined option in free agency. Rival teams could exceed that figure if he has a breakout third season, though that seems fairly unlikely at the moment.
That’s a surprise. He’ll have plenty of suiters.
MarJon has talent but did not find the next level yet with Milwaukee. Depending on how Horst manages the cap next offseason there may still be room for him but he still can’t contribute meaningful minutes especially when the playoffs come.
I don’t get to see many games and I won’t pretend to be well informed otherwise, so my question is has he been given a real chance to improve? I’ve always thought guys need real game action-consistently-to improve. Based on the numbers above, it doesn’t appear to be the case.
AlBundy, you make a good point, but there is so much “win now” pressure on Bucks coaches that they aren’t comfortable giving young players the opportunity to develop.
It’s a never-ending saga in the NBA: late first-round pick on a contending team is out of the league before ever being given a chance. Better to be chosen by a bad team at the beginning of the 2nd round.
To be fair, these players are given a chance every day in the gym, in front of their teammates and coaches. We only see a fraction of the work (or sometimes, lack of work) that goes into a players development.
Cam, agree that there are many aspects to player development, but playing time is essential for so many reasons, and it can’t be replicated.
The process of a young player building a coach’s confidence in him takes time. A coaching change hurts the least experienced and least known players the most because that process begins anew.
MarJon is missing the basketball IQ to utilize all his physical talent. Maybe he can succeed under different coaches and circumstances but he’ll never crack the starting rotation in Milwaukee.
Who’s pretending the coaching carousel gives any player a chance to develop.
Firing Bud sank this team. And it was a total dick move given the situation Bud was dealing with. What’s happening to them now is Karma. This version is done. Doc has been washed up for ten years as a coach. He’s a diva who needs to belittle players to save face, constantly throwing them under the bus for his lack of preparation. Veterans and young players alike have collectively gotten worse. In game strategy is non existent.
He’s a joke & the team is paying the price for his shortcomings. This isn’t hindsight either. This was a bad hire from the start.
Shawnpe , I’m not a Bucks fan, but I watched exactly what you describe with Rivers happen with the Clippers. We’ve seen the same story play out in 3 places — Clippers, Philly, and, now, Milwaukee. Underperformance.
Rivers once had a positive reputation that preceded him. Now he has the opposite problem: players expect an outsized ego and finger pointing.