Milwaukee Bucks: Who would the Bucks protect in an expansion draft?

The NHL had an expansion draft, and the NBA will follow suit when the league finally does expand again. If that happened now, who would the Milwaukee Bucks protect?

Did you, fan of the Milwaukee Bucks (probably), know the NHL added a team called the Golden Knights who will play in Las Vegas next year? To fill out the roster of this new team, the NHL staged an expansion draft where the new Golden Knights got to poach players from current NHL rosters.

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The rub is that the current teams get to protect eight players on their roster. The decision of who to protect is a fascinating one. Blazer’s Edge took the idea and applied it to the Portland Trail Blazers, so I’m stealing that idea and applying it to the Milwaukee Bucks.

Here are the major rules: upcoming free agents are exempt, as are unsigned draft picks. That means Tony Snell, D.J. Wilson and Sterling Brown aren’t included here, because they can’t be picked.

Also, each team can only lose one player at most, which seems fair. The only way to do something like this is by tier, so let’s get rolling.

So obviously protected you almost forget to protect him

Giannis Antetokounmpo – Does this one even need an explanation? Giannis, an All-NBA and All-Defense caliber player, is completely untouchable in all senses. Bill Simmons recently said the Bucks would laugh the New Orleans Pelicans off the line if they offered Anthony Davis for Giannis straight up, and I’m not sure he’s wrong.

Definitely protected, these guys are good/young/both

Khris Middleton, Greg Monroe, Thon Maker, Malcolm Brogdon – Khris Middleton, when healthy, is also a really talented player. He’s more than a three-and-D guy, as discussed at length on this very website, but even if he weren’t he’d be worth protecting here, as would Tony Snell, if he weren’t a free agent.

Greg Monroe is also quite good, and now that he’s opted into the final year of his deal he’s not a free agent next season. The Bucks wouldn’t mind not having his salary, but considering how capped out the team is anyway letting him leave for free probably doesn’t make a ton of sense anyway.

Thon Maker and Malcolm Brogdon are not established yet, but they’re both young and extremely cost-controlled assets, meaning the Bucks aren’t letting them walk.

Complicated but still definitely protected

Jabari Parker – Jabari gets his own tier here because Milwaukee reportedly shopped him before his most recent injury. Still, even if the Bucks would like to unload him and another big contract, they don’t want to give away the second overall pick from 2015 for nothing. Jabari stays.

We’re now at six, so let’s protect two more and then see who gets left out.

Too gritty to resist

Matthew Dellavedova – Delly is a tad expensive, sure, but he’s likable and he might work better as a shooting guard. He’s not the worst contract the Bucks have, and if Milwaukee can only dump one deal the Bucks have to hope it ends up being a different one.

Now, things get complicated. John Henson, Mirza Teletovic, Spencer Hawes, Gary Payton II and Rashad Vaughn are left. Ideally, Milwaukee would want one of the first three to get selected, for salary relief purposes.

Unfortunately, both Payton II and Vaughn are also here, and only one can be protected. Milwaukee can either waive one and protect the other, or simply protect one and hope the other one is not valuable enough to be selected by the expansion team. Here goes nothing…

The eighth man

Gary Payton II – Yes, The Mitten gets protected. He’s got more potential upside than Vaughn, who has shown nothing in two NBA seasons. Plus he’s cheaper, which matters, even if the difference is tiny.

Next: Win In 6: NBA Awards Reaction, Hawes Opts In

That means all of the following players are left available by the Bucks in this potential expansion draft: Teletovic, Henson, Hawes and Vaughn. Milwaukee likely has fingers crossed that the new team takes a swing on Henson or goes with one of the veterans before nabbing Vaughn.