Milwaukee Bucks: Time to re-assess first round performance?

As the Boston Celtics continue their march in the Eastern Conference playoffs, is it time to re-assess the Milwaukee Bucks’ play against them?

The Eastern Conference Finals got underway on Sunday afternoon in the same venue where the Milwaukee Bucks’ season had come to an end just over two weeks prior.

The Boston Celtics routed LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 1, prevailing by a score of 108-83. Considering the ease with which the Cavaliers swept the top-seeded Toronto Raptors in round two, the lop-sided nature of Game 1 was jarring to say the least.

Then again, the Celtics looked equally convincing in despatching of the upstart Philadelphia 76ers in five games in their own Conference Semi-final matchup.

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Essentially, we’ve reached the point where everyone outside of Massachusetts has grown tired of discussing the brilliance of Brad Stevens, and the pluckiness and resilience of a Celtics team missing Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward.

In saying that, there’s another discussion related to the Celtics, but really about the Bucks, that seems inevitable to grow in prominence as the playoffs and then the offseason goes on.

That is, are the Bucks better than everyone thought they were for having pushed the Celtics to seven games?

Adam Himmelsbach of The Boston Globe even went a step further in replacing the question element with a statement in a tweet on Sunday.

Past few weeks have made me realize the Bucks were lowkey pretty good.
— Adam Himmelsbach (@AdamHimmelsbach) May 13, 2018

So, is there any truth to this? The answer is both yes and no. It’s simultaneously simple and complicated.

To start with the simplest element, the narratives surrounding the Bucks and Celtics entering into the first round were strange at best, and likely best characterized as misguided.

The Celtics were vastly underrated. That may seem like something that can be said with the benefit of hindsight, but it was plain to see from the final stretch of the regular season for anyone who was paying attention.

For all that Boston lost when Irving went down through injury, they unlocked some of their most deadly defensive lineups without him and showed signs of being able to do a lot more than survive in his absence. The playoffs may be Terry Rozier‘s true coming out party, but the final stretch of the regular season had offered up plenty of evidence of his readiness for prime time.

Likewise, for all of the signature coaching moments Brad Stevens has produced through the playoffs so far, it’s not a surprise that he’s a good coach. If a coach is a frontrunner for Coach of the Year after 82 games, it shouldn’t be a revelation when he can also make positive decisions and adjustments in the postseason.

Put simply, a team of high IQ and versatile players, capable of finding a groove on both ends of the floor, led by a steady veteran star in Al Horford, and a coach as accomplished as Stevens were always set for success.

I was so convinced of it I even predicted they’d beat the Bucks in just five games.

Which brings us over to the Milwaukee side of the discussion. The Bucks are almost a very good team, but generally find a way to perform at a level that’s just above average.

Coming into the series with Boston, there was no argument as to who the best player in the series was, and with Giannis Antetokounmpo as their focal point, it was certainly a valid case to make for Milwaukee having the more talented roster of the two.

The effects of that played out in the series. The most dominant and exciting wins came from the Bucks, but it was the games they lost that told the difference. Milwaukee came into the series at a distinct disadvantage in terms of coaching, identity and a general understanding of the strengths, weaknesses and shape of their rotation.

From a distance it’s easy to take on a simplified view of any team, and for the most part that seems to have happened for both Boston and Milwaukee heading into the playoffs.

Trying to figure out how good or bad the Bucks are is a sure-fire way to get a headache, and that speaks volumes in its own right. They are a team that’s still learning and figuring out who they are. That’s not an excuse — although it was often used as such by their former head coach, Jason Kidd — but more of an indictment of where the Bucks are, as opposed to where they should be.

If the Bucks hire the right coach and everything clicks in training camp, it’s entirely possibly they can open up next season as one of the East’s best teams. That’s still uncertain, though, and even in that scenario, it won’t be reflective of where they were six months earlier.

Without being mired in every detail of the Bucks’ season, it was never going to be possible for many people to get a sense of who they were. Sure, they could improve significantly with better coaching, but coaching is such a vague term that it doesn’t reveal the myriad of existing weaknesses the Bucks have that can fall under that umbrella.

With a consensus great coach at the helm, Boston didn’t have to worry about those same problems and that proved to be the difference against Milwaukee.

Are the Bucks better than we think they are? The answer is largely irrelevant. It’s a time of much-needed change for the franchise, and they may never be the same team they were in the first round again.

Next: Milwaukee Bucks, Toronto Raptors reportedly competing for Mike Budenholzer’s services

Who the Bucks are in October won’t necessarily be connected to who they were in April, and with their playoff journey having ended in seven games, the reality is we’ll never know how good or bad the Bucks really were in 2017-18. What matters most, and remains a more interesting discussion, is who they’ll be in the future.

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