Milwaukee Bucks: Grades for Brook Lopez’s four-year, $52 million deal

Overall grade

After standing as an integral piece behind the Bucks’ year-over-year turnaround, Lopez was always going to be rewarded after enjoying a career rebirth of sorts and the most successful season by team standards.

Although Lopez had come along to reshaping his game by modern standards over the two previous years, the context with which Lopez thrived under head coach Mike Budenholzer’s guidance became one of the biggest storylines throughout 2018-19 season, considering the Bucks’ regular season dominance.

All of that was only going to drive Lopez’s pay raise that much higher this free agency and the Bucks’ cap situation going into the summer raised questions about whether they would be able to bring him back through the limited cap space they originally had available.

But after a few maneuvers and dealings, the Bucks did the heavy lifting to re-sign the one-time All-Star to a worthwhile deal that doesn’t hamstring the team’s books all that much. That could always change over the length of his contract and that’s definitely the biggest question facing the Bucks as they look to maintain this current window.

Even so, the downside of losing Lopez proved to be far too great from the Bucks’ point of view and both parties will look to improve on what was easily a very successful partnership after one season.

BTBP Final Grade: B+