Milwaukee Bucks: Grades and reactions for the Eric Bledsoe trade

What the Bucks traded away (Part Two)

This is where things get really interesting.

In swapping out Bledsoe for Monroe, the Bucks also rid themselves of the opportunity to have some meaningful cap space to make decisions with heading into the summer. With a new deal for Jabari Parker also potentially on the horizon, any obvious avenue of creating cap space is now well and truly gone.

In that situation, the draft represents the most obvious path to adding further talent due to the low cost, but when exactly Milwaukee will have picks is now somewhat uncertain.

Originally reported as Greg Monroe and a first round pick, the deal was eventually detailed as also including a second round pick by ESPN.

A further wrinkle came from Matt Velazquez of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel who explained that both picks would include protections.

As our own Jordan Treske pointed out, the top-47 protection may help to appease a section of the fanbase who are still upset about prior mistakes.

In all seriousness, that protection does also give the Bucks a chance of keeping the second round pick, though. The Bucks picked 48th last season as the East’s sixth seed, and with an improved Western Conference, even an improved record could see Milwaukee pick in similar range this year.

As for the first round pick, the news of the unique protection coming out of Phoenix suggests the Bucks have a very good chance of avoiding giving up the pick until 2020.

First round picks are incredibly valuable in today’s NBA and even more so for teams with minimal flexibility. Still, considering the Bucks already have a player of Giannis Antetokounmpo‘s ability, it’s a more than palatable price to pay for high-caliber help, particularly as it means the likes of Malcolm Brogdon and Thon Maker remain in Milwaukee too.

Even with that, Jon Horst and company did an exceptional job of negotiating protections that will serve the team’s best interests in terms of their picks going forward.