Milwaukee Bucks: Highlights from Bucks Town Hall Q&A session

Checking in with Sterling Brown

Joining both Budenholzer and Horst for the next segment was Sterling Brown, who’s heading into a critical third-year campaign. Looking back on the strides Brown made over the course of his sophomore season, Budenholzer detailed what stood out to him in the 24-year-old’s play:

"“I think, Sterling brings so much to the court. When we first got the job and you talk with Jon about the team, talk about wanting to be really good defensively and having toughness, hold players accountable, things like that. The thing that stands out to me about Sterling is the toughness he brings to the game and sometimes you can’t teach that. We’ll say, it’s just very real with Sterling. So we know when we put him on somebody out there defensively, we know his guy is going to feel him. He’s going to do his work on the defensive boards, he’s going to get through screens. I think we’re always trying to talk about defense first and I just love the physicality, the physical presence he brings to the game. Learning Sterling, him embracing shooting the 3-ball and shooting it with a lot of confidence and adding on and attacking. I think as the season progressed, him understanding passing. I think he made a lot of what we call high-level passes. There’s a lot to work with with Sterling, but I think to me, it always starts with his toughness and that really draws us to him. We feel like he’s got a bright, bright future because he’s got a lot of talent to go with his toughness.”"

Brown subsequently assessed his second season with the Bucks and kept it short and sweet about the progress he made:

"“My growth from the beginning to the end. Learning Coach’s system and how I can implement myself and just getting my teammates better as well as myself. I feel like I made huge strides and I got a lot more to go.”"

Diving a little deeper into one of the biggest areas of improvements for the former Mustang, Brown touched on his playmaking and growing ball skills:

"“I’m definitely better at that. Being able to make the right read or make a play for myself or for others, I enjoy that just as much as putting the ball in the basket. I feel like I’ve grown over the last few years and I definitely got better this summer. it’s going to be a good year.”"

Finally, Horst evaluated the progress Brown has made and how the strides he’s made has matched what he and the front office envisioned when the organization brought him in to the fold three drafts ago:

"“I tell Sterling all the time how proud I am of him. We drafted him out of, I would say like a little unknown, smaller school at SMU and he was a guy we were extremely excited to get in the second round because he shot a ton threes in college, he made them at a high rate. Big time athlete, defender. All of the things that we thought he’d able to do in the NBA, he’s starting to do. He works tremendously hard, he gets better every day. He’s a great young man and just really proud of him and grateful to have him.”"