Role players are a huge part of any team's chances of winning a championship. Star players, such as Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo, are the ones who make a roster great, but the role ones can add necessary tweaks and fill the little holes that make a difference between a champion and a contender. In a powerhouse battle, they can be the sneaky weapon nobody counted on.
We all can remember a role player hitting a clutch three, getting into a two-minute heater or making a game-saving defensive play. They are not asked to show up all the time, but there are instances of big games when you're going to need them to be ready. It could be a stretch with a star on the bench, an open shot when another player is getting doubled or even smaller details that become huge in a close game. A team just cannot win without role players stepping up from time to time.
The Milwaukee Bucks and their role players
This puts the Bucks in a weird spot because even if their Big 3 looks more than solid, everything next to it leaves some doubts. Basically, every player on the roster has had some amazing games and some atrocious ones, to the point where it is actually impossible to know which ones can be counted on in the postseason. You know for sure what they can bring; you just can't trust they will bring it.
However, their potential impact is not the same in every case. There are some role players who feel more essential to the team's success, who feel more needed in some way or another. Now, we'll break down who the three most important Bucks role players for the playoffs are and how they could boost the team's chances of winning a new title if they master their role through some key games.
Just for clarification, Brook Lopez won't be considered a role player for the sake of this text. He's not part of the Big 3, but he's an integral part of the roster that cannot be overstated, the same way you wouldn't call Jrue Holiday a role player for the Boston Celtics or Aaron Gordon a role player for the Denver Nuggets. That being said, we can start next.
Malik Beasley: Can he regain his 3-point shot?
As the fifth member of the Bucks starting lineup, it is no secret Malik Beasley is going to be a key part of the team's outcome whether that's for better or worse.
Despite him having an overall pretty solid season, he can feel like a coin flip at times. If he has a hot night and goes 6-for-7 from three, that's classic Beasley right there. However, if he goes 1-of-10, that's classic Beasley, too. At this point, the Milwaukee Bucks are just going to have to live with that.
He's shooting a solid 41.8 percent from three through the season, but since March, he has fallen below 33 percent. His cold nights are starting to feel more frequent. That's a dangerous thing now that the playoffs are getting closer because playing next to Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard, he will get good shots. We've seen he can be a killer, but he can also be a liability.
People talk about the NBA as a 'make or miss' league, and that statement is probably overused, but players like him are the ones bringing some truth to it.
No defense in the world would have Beasley as a priority since Giannis Antetokounmpo, Damian Lillard and even Khris Middleton are too big of threats for any team to focus on. Beasley will get good shots. If he makes them, then the defense will be forced to pay him more attention, and he will open spaces for the other players. If he doesn't, though, he will be even left alone and Giannis and Lillard will have a harder time getting to the rim.
Milwaukee has another sharpshooter on the roster in AJ Green, who could take Beasley's spot when he's having some off nights, but it's unclear how much Doc Rivers will trust him in big games. His presence might be interesting in another way, though; that is how patient Rivers will be with Beasley having a similar player on the bench.
You don't want to bench him after a few misses because he can be lethal if he turns up, but you don't want him to keep missing threes one after another, either. Rivers will need to find balance, giving him the chance to heat up but not letting his bad nights hurt the team too much.
Bobby Portis: Can he find his best self again?
If Beasley is a coin flip, then Bobby Portis has been a roulette this season. We've seen some very high highs, some very low lows, some solid games and some mediocre ones. But despite that unreliability, he's the main bench scorer, and he's going to be needed in some stretches, so the Bucks will need him to be back to his best version.
He's in a weird spot, though, because he has performed the best when Giannis and Middleton were out. One would assume that won't be the case in the playoffs. However, he will be on the court quite often without at least any of them and will likely have a prominent role as a second-unit scorer.
The Bucks' bench ranks 19th in scoring this season, and things would be way worse without his 13.5 points per game. While the starting lineup is one of the most dominant in the league this year, the bench unit has been quite problematic. That's not a terrible place to be since rotations tend to get shorter in the playoffs, but it is still something to worry about.
The team needs a way to survive those bench minutes, and Portis has proven himself as a player who can keep the offense going while the stars are resting.
The Bucks probably won't need him to be outstanding every game, but he can't be as inconsistent as he's been through some parts of the season. Bench players like Jae Crowder, Pat Connaughton or Green can have good scoring nights, but Portis is the only one who can create his own offense and who can make a bucket out of nothing. He's the one who can reduce the huge workload Giannis and Lillard are likely going to take.
Something to spot on is the fact that Portis will probably face quite a few mismatches. Most teams don't really like to play with two bigs, but he frequently shares the court with Giannis (989 minutes) and Lopez (638 minutes), so he will be guarded by a smaller player. We've alredy seen that happen through the regular season. Will he be able to punish those matchups?
If he can, as he's done, he will then condition the opposing team, and the offense will flow better. If he can't, as has been the case, too, the Bucks' offense could get stuck, and the team can end up digging itself in a hole for a few minutes. And against tough playoff rivals, they might not be able to overcome that.
Pat Connaughton: A playoff riser again?
Pat Connaughton is far from having his best year since he got to Milwaukee. He's actually having his second-lowest scoring season, but that's not necessarily a problem as long as he steps up for the occasion when the playoffs start. He's done that before and will have to do it again.
Role players tend to become more inconsistent in the postseason, but Connaughton has been one of the rare exceptions that seems to feel more comfortable in the bigger stages. He wasn't at first, but he's grown into it and has delivered some big-time performances in the last three seasons.
He was quite good in the 2021 Finals, shooting 50 percent from three through Games 1 to 5, even hitting some big ones in the clutch. In 2022, he stepped up once Middleton got hurt and averaged 10.3 points while shooting 42.4 percent from behind the arc in seven games against the Boston Celtics. Last year, he was one of the few players who didn't disappoint against the Heat with 12 points per game while shooting 47.8 percent from three.
This season, many fans have felt disappointed by his game to they point where they asked for him to be traded. However, he's shown he can turn things around. The Bucks will need some backcourt defense and some big-time shots, and he's able to provide that. If he can do it again, the Bucks' chances of making noise in the playoffs will suddenly increase.
That's not the only thing he has going for him, though. The roster doesn't have many players who can drive the ball and attack the rim, and that's mainly lacking in the role players. Shooters like Green, Crowder, or (to a lesser degree) Beasley don't actually have a great way to punish defenses that are too aggressive on the closeout, but Connaughton does, being able to add another dimension to the Bucks' offense.
He's not the strongest rim finisher but can score that way, and he can make some good passes, too, reading how the defense relocates and creating some good shots. He's far from stellar in this kind of plays, but he's probably the best role player for this work and he'll have chances to prove it. If he's able to make a difference on offense, not only by his shooting, the Bucks will be way harder to stop.
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