In today’s NBA, the league is dominated by wings that can seemingly do everything on both ends of the floor. From LeBron James to Kawhi Leonard to Kevin Durant, it feels like if you don’t have one of these guys, you almost have no chance (unless you have Giannis Antetokounmpo, of course). For the Milwaukee Bucks, they’ve had a severe lack of talent at the small forward position over the years.
Aside from the obvious choice for the number one overall player, this was a grind to find a player who played a good amount of minutes at the three, had success in Milwaukee, and was just a generally good player. I had to make some concessions on some of these relatively lenient criteria, that’s how dire it got. I didn’t really realize how bad the position has been for the Bucks. It’s probably because one guy has been taking the majority of the minutes and has been the long-term solution at the position for most of the last 10 seasons.
Regardless, here are the five best small forwards of the last 10 seasons! It’s quite the adventure.
Top 5 Milwaukee Bucks small forwards of the last 10 seasons – No. 5: Tobias Harris
This is what I meant by how dire the situation got for the best small forwards since 2011-12. Tobias Harris‘ best competition for the final spot was Kyle Korver, and he only played 58 games for the Bucks. It’s seriously a very sad (but kind of funny) group of players that the Bucks have cycled through this position in the last 10 or so years.
Granted, Harris didn’t play many more games at only 70 across a season and a half before being traded at the deadline for J.J. Redick (who didn’t crack the top five shooting guards, to no one’s surprise). However, Harris was a rookie with the Bucks back in 2011, being selected 19th overall by the then-Charlotte Bobcats and flipped to Milwaukee.
I won’t dive too heavily into his stats since he only averaged 4.9 points and 2.3 rebounds in 11.5 minutes per game. I mainly put him here since he’s managed to have a long and successful career, and the Bucks were where he started. He’s primarily played at the four since leaving Milwaukee, but it’s cool to think about what could have been if they didn’t make such a quick-trigger move to get rid of a promising young player like Harris was at the time.