Milwaukee Bucks: Could Marvin Williams re-sign for the 2020-21 season?

As Marvin Williams‘ stint with the Milwaukee Bucks has essentially been cut short due to the season stoppage, exploring whether he’d re-sign with the team for the 2020-21 season will be a big question.

It wasn’t all that long ago that Marvin Williams was viewed as the Milwaukee Bucks’ big midseason acquisition.

After ending his five-and-a-half year stint with the Charlotte Hornets after being bought out of his $15 million contract, Williams came to Milwaukee and immediately served as the Bucks’ backup reserve forward behind superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo.

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With a few playoff contenders vying for his services, Williams viewed the Bucks as the ideal landing spot to fulfill a role while competing for a potential NBA title. And clearly, the Bucks viewed the 33-year-old as a worthy upgrade ahead of their playoff run.

But now the 2019-20 season has gone over three weeks since being suspended for the coronavirus outbreak and with no end in sight, Williams’ stay in Milwaukee might end up being briefer than we imagined it would when he first arrived in early February.

Limited to 11 appearances with the Bucks, Williams averaged just 4.0 points on 16-of-39 shooting from the field (41 percent) and 8-for-27 shooting from three (29.6 percent), along with 3.5 rebounds and 1.4 assists across 18.5 minutes per contest.

Williams’ offensive output went through a period of adjustment in his new home, as evidenced by his subpar 3-point shooting under that small sample size. Despite that, Williams showed why he was a worthy upgrade on the defensive end, and got the hang of the Bucks’ defensive scheme pretty quickly, thanks to his veteran savvy.

Now, Williams’ work adjusting to the Bucks has been put on pause and it’s hard for us all not to think, let alone Williams, that the next time we see NBA basketball will be kicking off the start of the 2020-21 season. All Bucks fans certainly have their fingers crossed in hopes of that not being the case and seeing their dream season just go down the drain, but the future is very clouded at the moment with everything going on in the world.

The same easily applies for Williams who will enter free agency and even contemplate playing his 16th NBA season.

Even before Williams had come to Milwaukee and sought to realize his championship aspirations, Williams talked to Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer about how retirement had been on his mind at this stage in his career and he has even envisioned a post-playing career in teaching the game of basketball internationally:

"“I’ll be honest with you, I’ve certainly thought about being done,” Williams, the Charlotte Hornets’ power forward, told the Observer on Tuesday.“I feel like that’s where I am right now: I could do it or I could not.”"

That’s certainly not a decision that would be rooted in how much Williams has left in the tank as he has shown that even after accumulating more than 30,000 minutes in the regular season and 1,230 playoff minutes, the former Tar Heel can still hold up and withstand the rigors of an 82-game season and a playoff run. Bucks fans would likely agree with that, even in the handful of appearances we saw before the season was suspended.

It’s clearly too early to tell whether the Bucks would have interest in re-signing Williams this offseason, in the event that he does decide to continue his playing career. With that said, the Bucks do hold advantages and have been especially mindful of the maintenance of their players and certainly veteran players under head coach Mike Budenholzer.

And with questions over the Bucks’ forward depth, considering Ersan Ilyasova‘s $7 million salary for next year is non-guaranteed, they will have minutes to fill from that spot on the depth chart behind the reigning MVP.

This time has obviously forced all players to put things into perspective as they get a sudden and uncomfortable look into what their post-basketball career looks like as they cling to any hopes of the 2019-20 season resuming in some fashion.

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In the case of Williams, the veteran forward will have to weigh a decision that he’s previously considered in the past. Whatever route he decides to take, we will likely know whether the Bucks will have interest in extending his stay in Milwaukee beyond his first 11 games.

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