Milwaukee Bucks 2014-15 Season Review: O.J. Mayo

Feb 28, 2015; Salt Lake City, UT, USA; Milwaukee Bucks guard O.J. Mayo (00) shoots the ball over Utah Jazz guard Elijah Millsap (13) during the second quarter at EnergySolutions Arena. Mandatory Credit: Chris Nicoll-USA TODAY Sports

Weaknesses

A shooter’s mentality is an old NBA cliche that justifies 4-15 shooting so long as one of the makes comes late in the fourth quarter on a terrible shot. Shooters never lose confidence. Shooters take big shots. Shooters make big shots. Above all–shooters don’t believe in “bad shots”. That is especially apparent with O.J. Mayo.

Here’s an example of said “bad shot” against the Bulls in game two of the playoffs.

Yikes. Of course, if the shot goes in he’s the hero–but Mayo took far too many of those types of shots over the course of the season and they seldom fell. These so-called “hero shots” are almost as bad as a turnover–especially when they come in transition.

Another area of deficiency with Mayo came on the defensive end of the court.

Of the nine players in Jason Kidd’s rotation, Mayo was the Bucks’ second worst defender (ahead of Ilyasova) with a defensive rating (points per 100 possessions) of 100.2. That’s not to say that Mayo didn’t give maximum effort–he showed significant improvement in terms of defensive energy this season (as opposed to last season).

He suffers from lapses.

Here’s one that came in game two against the Bulls.

Jimmy Butler, who dominated the game with 31 points, was knocking down seemingly every shot he took. Why then, does Mayo decide to go under the Joakim Noah screen and leave Butler wide open on the three point line? It’s inexplicable. That’s considered a lapse. It’s not effort related, but more a result of poor judgment.

Lapses kill.

Here’s another one that came, again, against Jimmy Butler in the same game.

Mayo clearly anticipated the Butler drive (judging from the jump-stop), but in a game where Jimmy Butler is on fire it would have been better to close out the three point line and let Zaza Pachulia meet Butler at the rim. Again, Mayo showed excellent physical effort on the defensive end–there’s no denying that. But mentally Mayo surrenders ground…and that leads to big plays for the bad guys.

Next: The Summer Ahead