Milwaukee Bucks Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Bucks Notes: Giannis, Thanasis, Griffin, Ownership

October 24th, 2023 at 10:09pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

Although Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo just inked a lucrative contract extension, Milwaukee is still under pressure to deliver a title soon, writes Eric Nehm of The Athletic.

The All-NBA forward’s fresh three-season extension, which could be worth up to $186.6MM, will keep him under team control through at least the 2026/27 season. Newly-added All-NBA point guard Damian Lillard has a $63.2MM player option for that year. Antetokounmpo, meanwhile, has a player option for 2027/28.

Nehm notes that team president Jon Horst clearly is striving to deliver Antetokounmpo his second title with the Bucks, pointing to the trade for Lillard as proof that the front office is taking an aggressive team-building approach.

There’s more out of Milwaukee:

Giannis Antetokounmpo credits big brother Thanasis Antetokounmpo, a reserve forward on Milwaukee, with helping to convince him to sign an extension this offseason, Nehm adds (Twitter link). “For me, signing is basically, as I said earlier, it wouldn’t make sense for me to sign it, but then I had a conversation with my family, a.k.a. GM TA [Thanasis], that it would make more sense for me to sign because I’d be able to — first of all, you don’t know what tomorrow holds — but that I’d have eligibility to re-sign in 2026,” Giannis said. “So I just kind of trust his thinking.”
First-year Bucks head coach Adrian Griffin recently unpacked his revamped approach to the club’s defense during an interview with Jim Owczarski of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Griffin singles out ball pressure, paint protection with lots of help defense, contesting shots, and defensive rebounding as his key tenets.
New Bucks co-owners Jimmy Haslam and Dee Haslam hope to help give the Bucks enough support to win more championships, Owczarski writes in a separate piece. “That desire to win is not just for us, although we’re incredibly competitive, but we also recognize how important it is for these communities to have a winning team,” Dee said. “That gets us excited to be part of that story.”

Giannis Antetokounmpo Signs Three-Year Max Extension

October 24th, 2023 at 12:42pm CST by Dana Gauruder

OCTOBER 24: The Bucks have officially announced Antetokounmpo’s extension.

“Milwaukee is where I started my career, it’s our home, it’s where we’re raising our family, and it’s where I’m going to continue to work hard every day to make Bucks fans proud,” Giannis said in a statement. “I want to thank Bucks owners Wes (Edens), Jamie (Dinan), Jimmy (Haslam) and Dee (Haslam) for their continuous support of me and my family, and I want to express my appreciation to (general manager) Jon Horst for being a trusted partner who has been with me since the day I arrived in Milwaukee 10 years ago.

“To my teammates and coaches, I will always be grateful to you for inspiring me to be my best every day. Together, we are committed to winning and bringing another championship to our city. And to Bucks fans, let’s get it!”

OCTOBER 23: Giannis Antetokounmpo is signing a three-year, maximum-salary extension with the Bucks, Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN tweets. The contract will include a player option for the 2027/28 season, Wojnarowski adds (Twitter link).

Antetokounmpo was signed through the 2025/26 on his current contract, though he had a $51,935,268 option for the final season of that deal. That ’25/26 option will be eliminated and replaced with the first year of the new contract.

While Wojnarowski pegs the value of the three-year extension at $186MM, that’s just an estimate for now. It’s only possible if the salary cap increases by the maximum amount (10%) in 2024 and 2025. Otherwise, the contract figures would come in a little lower.

Assuming annual 10% increases in each of the next two years, the extension would break down as follows, ESPN’s Bobby Marks tweets: $57,604,893 for the 2025/26 season; $62,213,285 the following season; and a $66,821,676 player option in 2027/28. The total value would be $186,639,853.

The terms of the deal are identical to the three-year extension Anthony Davis signed with the Lakers in August.

Antetokounmpo’s agreement with the Bucks comes as somewhat of a surprise, since he indicated in a New York Times interview this summer that he wouldn’t sign an extension.

“The real question’s not going to be this year — numbers-wise it doesn’t make sense,” Giannis said in August. “But next year, next summer it would make more sense for both parties.”

While Antetokounmpo could have waited until next offseason and theoretically received more money, he ultimately decided to make an early commitment. Certainly, the Bucks’ acquisition of another superstar, Damian Lillard, played into his thinking.

The New York Times interview – in which Antetokounmpo stated he wouldn’t sign long-term with Milwaukee unless he was confident the team is as committed to chasing more titles as he is – sparked widespread speculation that he would eventually ask for a trade or go into the free agent market. However, his decision to sign on Monday should quiet that speculation, at least in the short term.

The two-time Most Valuable Player award winner is coming off a season in which he averaged a career-best 31.1 points, 11.8 rebounds and 5.7 assists per game. Still only 28 years old, he’s entering his 11th NBA season.

Monday was the last day the Bucks superstar could have signed an extension prior to next July, as we outlined earlier today.

Three Players On Exhibit 9 Contracts Make Opening Night Rosters

October 24th, 2023 at 8:04am CST by Luke Adams

As we explain in a glossary entry, Exhibit 9 contracts are generally handed out by NBA teams to players who will only be with the team during training camp and/or the preseason.

The Exhibit 9 clause protects the team in case the player suffers an injury before the season begins. In that scenario, the club wouldn’t have to pay him his full salary until he gets healthy enough to play — it would only have to pay a maximum lump sum of $15K when it waives the player.

While most Exhibit 9 signees were released in advance of the regular season, three NBA veterans who signed Exhibit 9 contracts survived the cut and made their respective teams’ regular season rosters. Here are those three players:

Ryan Arcidiacono (Knicks)
Harry Giles (Nets)
Lamar Stevens (Celtics)

Note: Hornets guard Edmond Sumner was initially included in this list, but Charlotte waived him on Tuesday ahead of its season opener.

These three players will now be on one-year, minimum-salary contracts that will remain non-guaranteed until January 10. In order to secure their full-season salaries, they’ll have to stay under contract beyond January 7 (a player cut on Jan. 8 or 9 wouldn’t clear waivers prior to the league-wide salary guarantee date of Jan. 10).

As our list of non-guaranteed contracts by team shows, Arcidiacono, Giles, and Stevens are three of the 31 players on standard deals whose salaries for the 2023/24 season aren’t fully guaranteed.

Several of these players will receive partial guarantees by remaining on rosters through the start of the regular season, and a few more have November or December trigger dates that will increase their guarantees. However, none of those 31 players will lock in their full salary until Jan. 10.

Here are a few more items of interest about the NBA’s opening night rosters for ’23/24, per ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link):

The Spurs have the NBA’s youngest roster, while the Clippers have the oldest.
Players are earning a combined total salary of $4.8 billion for the 2023/24 season. The Celtics, Nuggets, Warriors, Clippers, Lakers, Heat, Bucks, Pelicans, Sixers, and Suns are the biggest contributors to that pool, as they’re all currently over the luxury tax line.
As our roster counts page shows, there are 12 open spots on standard 15-man rosters around the NBA. Those openings belong to the Celtics, Bulls, Cavaliers, Pistons, Warriors (two), Lakers, Heat, Timberwolves, Pelicans, Trail Blazers, and Kings.
The Nets and the Suns are the only two teams that haven’t filled all three of their two-way slots, as our tracker shows. They’re each carrying a pair of two-way players, meaning 88 of the 90 spots around the league are occupied.

Bucks Notes: Middleton, Payne, Beauchamp, Stotts

October 22nd, 2023 at 8:11pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

Bucks forward Khris Middleton, who recently signed a lucrative new three-year contract to remain in Milwaukee, suited up for his lone game of the preseason against the Grizzlies on Friday. Eric Nehm of The Athletic takes a look at the three-time All-Star’s performance.

The 6’7″ vet played scored five points on 2-of-6 shooting across 12 minutes of play, though he did dish out five dimes.

“Felt like I was myself out there,” Middleton said. “Now I just gotta get used to different spots on the floor, the rhythm of the offense (and) the defensive side, too, moving my feet a little bit better. All in all, I thought it was a great night.”

There’s more out of Milwaukee:

New Bucks reserve point guard Cameron Payne exited Milwaukee’s preseason finale with a right thigh contusion, the club’s PR team has announced (Twitter link). Payne’s status for the team’s regular season opener is unclear.
Second-year Bucks forward MarJon Beauchamp is getting a rave review from one very important voice, writes Lori Nickel of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Two-time MVP power forward Giannis Antetokounmpo believes that the Yakima Valley College alum flashed plenty of two-way potential with the team. “Giannis just told me, you have to have that aggressive mentality every time,” Beauchamp said. “Especially on a good team like this … my confidence, it’s up and down. But I heard from the big dog now. I got to stay aggressive. I got to keep working.”
Former assistant coach Terry Stotts abruptly departed the Bucks bench just days ahead of the club’s season opener. Steve Bulpett of Heavy.com writes that Stotts, who served as the head coach for the Trail Blazers from 2012-21, was expected to be a major contributor to Milwaukee under first-time head coach Adrian Griffin. “It’s not like Boston dropping [Ime] Udoka last year and putting in [Joe] Mazzulla, but Stotts was supposed to have a big role with [the Bucks’] offense,” a source told Bulpett. “It seemed like he was having trouble adjusting to being an assistant again. He was out for two years, he doesn’t need the money. … Maybe it was just a thing where he just wasn’t feeling it.”

Bucks Convert Marques Bolden To Two-Way Contract

October 21st, 2023 at 3:24pm CST by Luke Adams

3:24pm: Bolden has officially had his deal converted to a two-way contract, per NBA.com’s transaction log.

1:51pm: The Bucks are converting center Marques Bolden‘s Exhibit 10 contract to a two-way deal, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).

Bolden, 25, appeared in seven NBA games for the Cavaliers in 2020 and 2021, but has spent the majority of his professional career in the G League, including the last two seasons with the Salt Lake City Stars. Although he was a regular starter for Utah’s G League affiliate in 2021/22, averaging 11.7 PPG and 8.5 RPG in 21 regular season NBAGL games (30.1 MPG), the former Duke Blue Devil was limited to six total appearances for the Stars last season due to a shoulder injury.

Bolden made just 1-of-7 shots from the field in three preseason appearances for Milwaukee and had nearly as many turnovers (4) as points (5), but it seems the team wants to keep him around to provide additional frontcourt depth.

We speculated earlier today that his move might be coming, since Milwaukee had a two-way slot open, waived its other players on camp deals, and was carrying 16 players on standard contracts: Bolden and 15 whose salaries are fully guaranteed.

Once the conversion is official, the Bucks’ roster will be ready for the regular season, though the club could still make more moves between now and Monday’s deadline.

And-Ones: Zagars, Media Rights, October Deadlines, More

October 21st, 2023 at 8:11am CST by Tristan Tucker

Latvian guard Arturs Zagars is out for at least five months due to a knee injury, Donatas Urbonas of BasketNews reports (Twitter link). As detailed in a piece from Eurohoops, Zagars suffered the injury on October 14 while playing in Lithuania’s top league.

Zagars received NBA interest through the summer following a standout FIBA World Cup performance for Latvia. The 23-year-old guard averaged 12.4 points, 7.4 assists and 2.4 rebounds per game and set a tournament record with 17 assists in his team’s final contest. He ultimately wound up signing a three-year deal with Turkey’s Fenerbahce in September and they loaned him to the BC Wolves of Lithuania, with whom he suffered the injury.

As confirmed by Eurohoops and Urbonas, Zagars suffered an MCL injury and will undergo surgery and continue rehab in Istanbul under Fenerbahce’s medical staff.

There are more odds and ends from around the basketball world:

ESPN and TNT are considering signing new media rights deals with the NBA that include fewer games per season, according to The Wall Street Journal (hat tip to RealGM). Such an agreement would allow the league’s two main broadcasting partners to continue working together at an affordable amount. It would also put the NBA in position to explore creating a packge of games for one or more streaming services, with both Amazon and Apple already expressing interest.
The NBA’s extension and roster cut-down deadlines are looming, and ESPN’s Bobby Marks (ESPN+ link) broke down every rookie extension and veteran extension candidate, as well as all remaining roster decisions ahead of the season. Sixers guard Tyrese Maxey, Timberwolves forward Jaden McDaniels and Knicks guard Immanuel Quickley are the major rookie extension candidates to watch, Marks notes, though Maxey likely won’t get a new deal. Many of the veterans facing an October 23 deadline for a contract extension, such as the Bucks‘ Giannis Antetokounmpo, are also unlikely to extend because they can earn more money by waiting until the offseason.
In another piece exploring the NBA’s October deadlines, Danny Leroux of The Athletic further breaks down the upcoming dates to note. Leroux points out the deadline for decisions on third- and fourth-year team options on rookie contracts is also approaching on October 31.
With the tip of the NBA season just days away (October 24), Yossi Gozlan of HoopsHype provided a team-by-team look at which players are the most likely to earn consideration for the league’s end-of-season awards. Raptors forward Scottie Barnes gunning for Most Improved Player and Kings guard Malik Monk in the running for Sixth Man of the Year are among Gozlan’s most intriguing picks. Interestingly, Gozlan believes the Pelicans‘ best chance at earning end-of-season recognition is if Zion Williamson enters the MVP conversation.

Bucks Waive Glenn Robinson III, Two Others

October 21st, 2023 at 8:02am CST by Luke Adams

The Bucks have trimmed their preseason roster in advance of the regular season, waiving forward Glenn Robinson III, swingman Elijah Hughes, and guard Kihei Clark, tweets Keith Smith of Spotrac.

Robinson, who has appeared in over 300 NBA regular season games since making his debut in 2014, signed an Exhibit 10 contract with Milwaukee on Thursday after being out of the league for the last two years. It appears the 29-year-old is on track to join the Wisconsin Herd, the Bucks’ G League affiliate, as he pursues an NBA comeback.

That also figures to be the plan for Hughes and Clark, who also signed non-guaranteed camp deals on Thursday. The Exhibit 10 language in their contracts entitles them to bonuses worth as much as $75K if they spend at least 60 days with the Herd.

Following the cuts, the Bucks now have 18 players under contract — 15 on guaranteed contracts, a pair on two-way pacts, and big man Marques Bolden on an Exhibit 10 deal.

Milwaukee could set its regular season roster by converting Bolden to a two-way contract, though it’s not clear whether that will happen or whether additional moves could be in store before Monday’s regular season roster deadline.

Pacific Notes: Mann, Hyland, Gordon, Wainright

October 20th, 2023 at 1:38pm CST by Luke Adams

Asked on Thursday about the trade rumors surrounding Terance Mann, Clippers head coach Tyronn Lue indicated that he doesn’t want to see the guard go anywhere and expressed confidence that he’ll stay put.

“We love T-Mann, and T-Mann is gonna be here,” Lue said (Twitter link via Joey Linn of SI.com). “So we’re not worried about what they’re saying outside, all the speculations. It’s a good thing to be wanted.”

Of course, the decision on Mann’s future won’t ultimately be made by Lue, but the Clippers have reportedly resisted including him in any offer for James Harden for months.

Here’s more from around the Pacific:

Bones Hyland‘s big night against his former team came to an abrupt end on Thursday when the Clippers guard sprained his left ankle in the third quarter vs. Denver. However, Andrew Greif of The Los Angeles Times hears that there’s some “initial optimism” that the injury may not force Hyland – who had scored 25 points in 24 minutes – to miss any regular season games. He’ll be reevaluated in a few days, the Clippers announced today.
Speaking to Mark Medina of Sportskeeda, veteran guard Eric Gordon named the Rockets, Warriors, and Bucks as some of the other options he had in free agency before he chose to sign with the Suns. “I felt Phoenix was onto something special,” Gordon said. “It was a tough decision, but I really think we have everything going on here from ownership, to coaches and to players. It’s hard to beat.”
The Suns are hoping that their release of Ish Wainright is “more of a logistical thing” rather than the end of their relationship with him, according to head coach Frank Vogel. As Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic observes, Phoenix has a two-way slot open and Wainright would be eligible to sign a two-way deal with the club if he clears waivers.
Within their season preview for the Pacific Division, Jovan Buha, Law Murray, and Anthony Slater of The Athletic agree that the best move of the offseason by a Pacific team was the Suns‘ trade for Bradley Beal. The Athletic’s trio cites Phoenix’s trade of Deandre Ayton, the Warriors‘ acquisition of Chris Paul, and the Clippers‘ unwillingness to increase their trade offer for Harden as the moves with the biggest potential to backfire.

Middleton Ready To Return

October 19th, 2023 at 10:14pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Khris Middleton hasn’t played in the preseason but that appears likely to change on Friday. The Bucks swingman, who has been working his way back from right knee surgery, says he’s good to go for the preseason finale, according to Jim Owczarski of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “As of right now, I definitely feel like I’ll be out there playing tomorrow,” Middleton said. “Don’t know how long, how many minutes, but I do expect to be playing, which is exciting for me.”

Central Notes: Stotts, Griffin, Cunningham, Bates, Allen, Nembhard

October 19th, 2023 at 6:47pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Terry Stotts isn’t retiring, even though the 65-year-old coach is exiting Adrian Griffin’s staff with the Bucks, Jim Owczarski of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Stotts wasn’t comfortable with his fit on Milwaukee’s staff. Griffin claimed they got along just fine.

“It caught all of us off guard, of course, but again, you just support him,” Griffin said. “He was a terrific guy. I learned a lot from him in a very short time. He was really good at what he does. He made a decision – a personal decision – and we just have to respect that.”

However, The Athletic’s Eric Nehm and Shams Charania report that Stotts and Griffin had a tenuous relationship. That included a shootaround incident in which Griffin yelled for Stotts to join the coaches’ huddle when Stotts was about to have a conversation with the team’s star players. That highlighted the potential difficulty of Stotts adapting to an assistant role under rookie head coach Griffin. Conversely, it also spoke about the treatment and level of respect that Griffin needed to show Stotts, considering his lengthy coaching career.

We have more from the Central Division:

The Pistons paid Monty Williams a lot of money to coach their team, and their star player, Cade Cunningham, has bought in to Williams’ hard-driving style, Keith Langlois of Pistons.com writes. “I love the way he pushes us,” Cunningham said. “He calls things the way he sees them. I think that honesty and that bluntness towards us, that’s huge. Especially for a young team. The systems that he’s put in, the way that he’s made it around our abilities and the personnel we have has been great for us. It’ll continue to get better as he learns us and we learn him.”
Rookie second-round pick Emoni Bates has led the Cavaliers in scoring during the preseason. Coach J.B. Bickerstaff told Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com that he’s thrilled Bates dropped to the No. 49 overall pick. “I believe if Emoni had gone in the lottery he’d have been the type of player who’d have been in the Rookie of the Year conversation,” Bickerstaff said. “We are extremely fortunate that he’s here with us and we look forward to working with him.”
Cavaliers center Jarrett Allen is showing progress from the right ankle injury that has sidelined him during much of training camp. On Thursday afternoon, he went through post-practice shooting drills and then went through an individual workout, according to Fedor. He is set for re-evaluation this weekend and there’s hope he can return for Cleveland’s regular-season opener on Wednesday night.
Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard went through a full practice this week and is on track to play in the team’s preseason finale on Friday, Scott Agness of Fieldhouse Files tweets. Nembhard is working his way back from an ankle injury.