Milwaukee Bucks Roundtable: Expectations for the year ahead

Q4. Outside of the Bucks’ star trio, which player do you believe could make a notable or surprising contribution to any potential success for Milwaukee?

TK: The one most likely to make a big difference right away is Brook Lopez. He can stretch the floor for Giannis and Eric and he can box out some big bodies to help team rebounding.

A wild card is Thon if this is the year he becomes a consistent, impactful defender. The moment this happens (if it happens) will be huge but it most likely won’t be this season.

JK: I expect Brook Lopez to have a bounce-back year and establish himself as a fringe All-Star caliber player. My belief is that one of the key missing ingredients from the past few years is a stretch-5. Lopez is just this and comes gift-wrapped at a discounted price. Lopez will be given less attention than he’s ever had before on the defensive side and should thrive as the fourth option.

AM: This will please Jordan Treske to no end, but I really believe in what Pat Connaughton can do in this team and system. He’s never really been the deadeye shooter that he should be capable of being, but I have faith in that changing this year. I’m predicting upwards of 40 percent on a significant volume of attempts from deep.

RK: I’m also going to channel the great Jordan Treske and say that Planet Pat will actually be a solid contributor for the Bucks this season. Tony Snell, Sterling Brown, and the aforementioned Pat Connaughton will all be fighting for minutes on the wing this season, though I believe that Connaughton will start to be favored in Bud’s rotation, and will be because of his (relatively) diverse skill set. All three of Snell, Brown, and Connaughton have shown that they can be relied-upon shooters from beyond the arc, but Planet Pat brings a sort of off-ball presence that Snell and Brown do not possess. Having come from a team in Portland with two ball-dominant players in Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum, Connaughton has made himself useful as a hard cutter and is able to make the right pass. If he can translate both of those into Bud’s system along with being a threat from deep (45 percent from three in the preseason!), Pat Connaughton could be a valuable piece for this Bucks team.

IS: Lopez is a great addition, but since he’s been discussed already I’ll give Ilyasova a shoutout. He was very valuable to the Sixers last year, is a good fit for the Bud system, and should feast on spot-up touches from Giannis.

BP: Here I was thinking I would be original and pick Brook Lopez, but I suppose I will go with the more obvious choice in Malcolm Brogdon. Our pal Eric Nehm has already noted this in the preseason, but between his college years and first two years as a pro, this is going to be the most offensive freedom Malcolm has had in his career. If the preseason is any indicator, he should be getting threes up at a much higher rate than in his first two years, and his knack for cutting toward the basket should work perfectly with teammates that are looking for those passes.

JT: Get on the Planet Pat bandwagon before we set sail for outer space in the summer of 2019, ladies and gentlemen! Rohan and Adam have already punched their tickets and there’s still plenty of space and good rates available for those looking to explore the wonders of our vast universe. We even have tentatively booked Neil DeGrasse Tyson to give a keynote address once we reach our new surroundings.

For a more serious answer here, I will join Isaac in saying Ersan will be a very dependable contributor throughout the year for the Bucks. The general shock and confusion all Bucks fans had towards his signing and more importantly, his deal, has cast a cloud over his return to the organization (though, I do contend some of it was overblown at the time). But his skill set and dare I say, frontcourt versatility is an upgrade on what the Bucks had behind Giannis last year and to expect him to be your sixth or seventh best player falls perfectly in line with what he can bring to the table at this stage in his career.

RG: My pick here is going to be Malcolm Brogdon. He has shown me in the preseason that he is going to be a large piece of their offense this year. I think that he improved on his already good three-point shooting and will find more openings to shoot while playing with the starting lineup. He will also be getting defended by a lesser defender likely as the opposing teams will have to worry more about Giannis, Khris, and Bledsoe.