Milwaukee Bucks: Constructing an ideal playoff rotation

Milwaukee Bucks: Constructing an ideal playoff rotation – Methodology

Before getting into the specifics, I’d like to make clear some of the factors that went into my overall decision-making when creating this general rotation framework.

For anyone familiar with a previous article I had written back in November about constructing a rotation after Khris Middleton’s injury, I followed a similar methodology here.

First of all, I’m a big believer in rotations that stagger the minutes of starters and star players so that all-bench units are few and far between. With that said, I made it a priority that at least one of Giannis Antetokounmpo, Khris Middleton, or Brook Lopez were on the court at all times while still seeing enough time together as well.

I considered Eric Bledsoe as well when staggering starters’ minutes, though he is not the offensive focal point the other three have proven to be.

I also operated under the assumption that Bledsoe and George Hill are the only players who should be getting any regular minutes at point guard and staggered their minutes accordingly.

I also looked to increase the minutes of key players from what they normally average in the regular season. I think it is important for these players to get used to playing more minutes so that they can comfortably do so when the games really start to matter in the latter rounds of the playoffs.

Finally, to determine which player combinations work well together when constructing a rotation, I looked at this season’s lineup data from NBA.com/stats. In order to limit the effect of small sample size in the data, I mainly studied two-man lineups since there is a larger sample size of minutes played together than three, four, or five-man units.

For instance, since the Bucks are so deep at the wing position, I looked at the net ratings of two-man combinations of their rotational wings to understand if certain players play better or worse alongside others. I used a similar process to research their big man combinations as well.

I also researched how certain bench players fared alongside each of the starters whose minutes I was staggering. This allowed me to more strategically allocate their minutes alongside starters with whom they shared the most chemistry.

After compiling all of this data, I picked out some key takeaways which ultimately shaped my decision-making in creating the ideal Bucks playoff rotation.