It all started back in 1968 for the Milwaukee Bucks, as the team embarked on a half-century worth of NBA seasons with a quiet start.
The season: 1968-69
The record: 27-55
The postseason: N/A
The story:
The Milwaukee Bucks began as a professional franchise in 1968, in time for an expansion draft before the 1968-69 regular season kicked off. The NBA was far smaller then — even with two expansion teams, there were just 14 in that first year.
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Things were different then, too. The Bucks took six-time All-Star Larry Costello in the expansion draft, except he retired and became the franchise’s first head coach. Wayne Embry, who would later serve as Milwaukee’s general manager, was also selected. Sure, why not?
The most meaningful player taken in the expansion draft, as well as the franchise’s first All-Star and the only player from that draft who made it to Milwaukee’s first title, was Jon McGlocklin.
Jonny Mac carried the Bucks in that first season, leading the team in win shares while averaging 19.6 points, 4.3 rebounds, and 3.9 assists per game. Despite being a 6’5″ shooting guard who took a lot of trademark “Rainbow Jumpers”, McGlocklin still shot over 48 percent from the field.
No Buck played more minutes or games than Jonny Mac did that season, although all of his contributions didn’t actually help the team to win that many games. The Bucks went 27-55 in their first season, a fortuitously-timed mini-Process that led to the team getting Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
In addition to McGlocklin’s strong play, the Bucks were buoyed by the early addition of Flynn Robinson, who was acquired from the Chicago Bulls in exchange for two Bobs: Bob Weiss and Bob Love.
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Robinson, known as ‘Electric Eye’, would go on to be a centerpiece in a much more important trade, but in 1968-69 he led the Bucks in scoring with a strong 20.3 point per game clip. Although he played 65 games with Milwaukee, he and Jonny Mac were not enough to make the Bucks a very good team in their first season.
Aside from a one-point win over the Detroit Pistons, the Bucks didn’t win a single game from January 13 until February 4 in 1969. Inexplicably, the team caught fire later on in February, winning six straight games before coming back to Earth with a proceeding five-game losing streak.
In a fitting ode to the upcoming summer, in the very last game of the season the Bucks beat the Phoenix Suns by a final score of 128-118. The league flipped a coin to determine which of those franchises would get the first pick in the 1969 NBA Draft, and thus the rights to Kareem, who then was known as Lew Alcindor.
Next: Milwaukee Bucks: A Look At The First-Ever Bucks Game
Even if the Milwaukee Bucks were unable to win during the 1968-69 regular season, Milwaukee ended up having the best summer of ’69 possible for a one-year-old NBA franchise, adding a man who would go on to be an all-time great and the Association’s all-time leading scorer.