Milwaukee Bucks: 4 lessons learned in face of disappointing playoff exit

4 lessons learned in face of Milwaukee Bucks’ humiliating playoff exit – A decision comes home to roost

Whether Bucks fans want to admit it or not, it’s impossible not to address how the Bucks’ decisions last offseason informed how their season came to a sudden halt Tuesday night.

The obvious move to pick out of that is moving on from Malcolm Brogdon and sending him to the Indiana Pacers in a sign-and-trade deal in exchange for draft compensation. And for as much as that decision is regularly debated as to who the Bucks picked over retaining Brogdon, the simple fact of the matter is that Brogdon, a restricted free agent, could have extended his stay in Milwaukee had ownership been willing to go into the luxury tax to keep their core together from the 2018-19 season.

Brogdon said it best himself upon his Milwaukee homecoming when the Pacers made their first visit of the season back in December of last year as NBA.com’s Steve Aschburner relayed:

"“I would have loved to play for this team,” Brogdon admitted Sunday. “If they wanted me. If they had valued me the way the Pacers valued me. That’s all I’m gonna say.”"

Had the Bucks’ ownership viewed Brogdon as something more than a “luxury,” it’s hard to know whether the Bucks would have reached their championship ceiling this season.

In Brogdon’s place, the Bucks tried to fill the void by valuing shooting and defending on the wing in the backcourt by bringing in the likes of Kyle Korver and Wesley Matthews, along with the rest of the cast of developing wings and off-ball guards. And the sophomore breakout of Bucks guard Donte DiVincenzo certainly paid off in a way that very few Bucks fans saw coming going into the year.

But what the Bucks couldn’t or didn’t address last summer or even throughout the year was the blend of on-ball playmaking and off-ball shooting that Brogdon snugly brought to the Bucks’ foundation while he was in Milwaukee.

And even as it would have been a tall task to replicate his 50-40-90 standard from his last Bucks season, the organization’s struggle to identify that or fully replace Brogdon’s skill set played a part in their early exit from the bubble more than a year after his sudden exit.