Milwaukee Bucks: 3 key things to watch for against San Antonio Spurs

Can Bobby Portis and Semi Ojeleye find their legs for the Milwaukee Bucks against the San Antonio Spurs?

It was a pair of inauspicious season debuts for both Bobby Portis and Semi Ojeleye against the Minnesota Timberwolves earlier this week. Ojeleye went 0-for-5 from the field, got a few boos from the crowd, and Portis wasn’t his usual self going 3-of-7 from the floor.

I went into detail about Ojeleye’s rough outing, which was to be somewhat expected after not playing in the preseason and missing the first four games of the season. It simply looked like he didn’t have his legs under him yet, especially on his jumpers where all of his misses hit the front rim, suggesting he didn’t quite have enough lift in his first game.

Portis also missed all of his 3-point attempts but managed to go 3-of-4 on his 2-pointers. He also missed the entire preseason after suffering a hamstring injury in the Bucks public intrasquad scrimmage to begin training camp, so it’s no surprise he didn’t have the lift on his shot yet.

Both players should help with the aforementioned rebounding woes as they’re bigger bodies who can ease some of the burden on Antetokounmpo’s shoulders for cleaning up the glass. That being said, Portis (and to some extent Ojeleye) were a step slow on defense and still working their way back into form. They were a combined minus-17 so clearly there are still some kinks to be worked out in finding their way back after such a long layoff.

No one should be overly concerned with either player as it’s their first live-game action against an opponent. It’ll take a bit of time for them to get going and that will start with tonight’s game against the Spurs.