Milwaukee Bucks: 3 things to watch for in 2020 NBA All-Star Game

Looking for revenge

Having been named captain for the second straight year, Antetokounmpo has something to prove following last year’s loss to Team LeBron.

Antetokounmpo heard all of the criticism regarding the process of selecting his team and as he talked about during Saturday morning’s All-Star Media Day session, the prospect of picking like-minded players appealed to the 25-year-old as Aris Barkas of Eurohoops relayed:

"“My whole life, I’ve been an underdog. I picked guys similar to me. I want to chase; I don’t want to be with the best, I want to beat the best. People say I’m a bad GM and made the wrong choice. You can’t go wrong when picking out of the 24 best players in the world.”"

Whether the thinking behind Antetokounmpo filling out his team will pay off with a win remains to be seen, as does whether the reigning MVP can provide some show-stopping highlights, like the towering dunk he threw down off a feed from Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry last year.

Knowing Antetokounmpo’s nature, he’s never one to shy away from getting the crowd buzzing with highlight-worthy plays in front of his contemporaries and hopefully he’ll do that at the United Center.

And of course, this will mark Antetokounmpo’s first taste of action since the birth of his newborn son, Liam, almost a week ago. Maybe this is the beginning of a Fred VanVleet-esque bounce.