Milwaukee Bucks: 3 initial takeaways from opening media day

3 initial takeaways from Milwaukee Bucks media day: No. 2 – Giannis Antetokounmpo steals the show

As you likely could have guessed heading into the day, Giannis Antetokounmpo was in fine form when addressing the media for the first time this season. It began with him sitting down, taking off one of his new signature Zoom Freak 3’s and placing it on the table so the camera could see it and it finished with him holding the shoe up and saying everyone go buy a pair. Obviously, Giannis was joking.

In between that, though, Giannis was once again a perfect mix of insightful and humorous at media day. No, we didn’t get his trademark media day joke for the second season in a row, but the two-time MVP had good reason for it this year!

He had a message for the departed P.J. Tucker, declaring that he is the new shoe king of Milwaukee now that Tucker is gone and he admitted that although he is changing more diapers with the birth of his second child, he’s not a big fan of the task. However, in between all of the laughs and jokes, there was the serious side of Giannis. The one we saw throughout the championship run that would drop nuggets of wisdom in his press conferences and media day was no exception.

"You have to always figure out what kind of person you are and be ok with what kind of person you are. What I’ve realized is that I’m a people pleaser. I like to please the coaching staff, my family, all the fans and all of that. But you got to be able to do it for yourself, figure out what you want. What I want right now is to get better. I don’t care about trophies, MVPs, I don’t care about Defensive Player of the Years. All of those things, I don’t care. I care about getting better because I know if I do that, there’s more things coming."

There were multiple times where Giannis went on one of his tangents that ended up being a really interesting look into how he views the game of basketball and the things surrounding basketball such as legacies, respect from his peers, etc.

He is truly one of the most unique personalities we have in all of sports and it’s really a pleasure to get to hear him speak in long-form settings like this and around people he’s comfortable sharing these insights with. Of course, he’s still goofy and playful at times but it will always come back to him being very insightful.