This week, Giannis Antetokounmpo gave his strongest indication yet that he does not plan to request a trade from the Milwaukee Bucks this offseason. “The Finals are something else,” he said in an interview with a media outlet in Brazil. “I hope to be back soon with the Bucks.”
Antetokounmpo has been adamant in previous interviews that his priority is winning a second championship. While has said frequently that he hopes to remain with the Bucks, he has also made it clear that winning a second championship is the greater goal. It just seems, for the moment, that he is still holding out hope that he can do so in Milwaukee. The Bucks, for what it’s worth, are seen as the betting favorites to keep Giannis through the summer (-190 on DraftKings).
If there was a clear path for him to compete for titles in Milwaukee, well, we probably wouldn’t have spent the past month or so fake trading him to contenders. The state of Milwaukee’s roster, presently, is pitiful. Just consider where the Bucks stand at this moment, aside from Antetokounmpo:
- Non-Antetokounmpo Bucks totaled 343 starts last season. Only 142 of those starts went to players under contract next season (though, in a few cases, player options could boost that total slightly). Of those 142 starts, 58 belonged to Damian Lillard, who is expected to miss next season recovering from a torn Achilles. Essentially, this means that the Bucks may not have most of last season’s starters on next year’s roster.
- Even if the Bucks were to bring back those players… it’s not an especially enticing group. Outside of Antetokounmpo and Lillard, nobody averaged 15 points per game on last year’s Bucks. Brook Lopez, the last remaining pillar of the 2021 championship team aside from Antetokounmpo, is a 37-year-old impending free agent. Deadline addition Kyle Kuzma has been a valuable role player in the past, but was mostly a dud in Milwaukee last season. Bobby Portis can get to free agency through a player option, and he is starting to regress statistically, though only slightly. There are young specialists on the roster (Andre Jackson Jr. as a defender, A.J. Green as a shooter), but nobody that stands out as an obvious, all-around positive.
- Despite this underwhelming roster, the Bucks are still almost $13 million above the projected salary cap for next season if Portis, Pat Connaughton and Kevin Porter Jr. pick up their player options. They could potentially use the non-taxpayer mid-level exception. They could also try to re-sign some of their own free agents. But they have five roster spots to fill out and several starting jobs open. They have a long way to go and not much money to do it with.
- The Bucks do not control their own first-round pick again until 2031. The No. 47 overall pick is the only second-round pick they are guaranteed to control until 2031 as well.
Reporting has suggested that the Bucks are planning a sort of gap year to try to retool this roster, but how much can you really do in a year without the ability to tank in the short-term, the ability to trade picks in the long term and the cap flexibility to fit in new, pricey players? One year from today, assuming the Bucks still have Antetokounmpo, they will still be operating at a significant asset deficit. They will probably still be paying superstar money for a compromised version of Lillard. Even in a very forgiving Eastern Conference, this is not a one-year fix.
No, the reality here is that if the Bucks are ever going to compete for championships again during Antetokounmpo’s prime, this is going to be a complete roster overhaul that takes several years. They are not in the 2026 championship conversation (they have the 17th-best 2026 title odds at this writing at +6000). They are not in the 2027 championship conversation either. This is going to be about retooling the roster in a way that gets the Bucks back into the title picture towards the end of the decade, when Antetokounmpo is likely close to the end of his prime in his early-to-mid-30s, but hopefully still has enough juice left to be the best or second-best player on a championship team.
This is, in short, a teardown. It’s not a total teardown because Antetokounmpo will presumably remain in place. But it’s a teardown of everything else. So let’s try to come up with a plan that sets Milwaukee on a viable course towards high-level contention in the next few years.
What to do in 2025 free agency?
It’s time for Brook Lopez’s tenure in Milwaukee to end. At this stage, he probably doesn’t have too much sign-and-trade value (especially given the strings attached to signing-and-trading), but if he wants to get somewhere that requires a sign-and-trade, it would behoove the Bucks to participate and pick up an asset.
If Portis opts out, It probably makes sense to let him walk as well. He’s now 30, and while the Bucks should obviously tolerate Antetokounmpo’s age, their goal should be to get younger pretty much everywhere else. If he opts in, then a trade makes sense, but signing him to a contract will almost certainly look worse a few years from now, when the theoretical winning window opens, probably doesn’t make sense. For reasons we’ll cover in more depth later, we want to keep the cap sheet somewhat clean.
If Gary Trent Jr. or Taurean Prince can be kept with non-Bird Rights (a 20% raise on their minimum salaries from a year ago), there’s no reason not to do so. They are both viable NBA rotation players. But both joined the Bucks hoping to boost their value on a winner. The Bucks aren’t a winner anymore, so if both are making close to the minimum, well, it makes sense to do it elsewhere.
There are two internal free agents that should probably be re-signed, and they are two of the younger players here with some upside to explore: Ryan Rollins and Jericho Sims. Fortunately, both are restricted free agents, and both should be retainable at pretty low prices. They are upside swings. If the Bucks can sign them for multiple low-risk years with the idea that they’ll have a chance to prove they deserve bigger roles next season, they probably should. It should go without saying that a hopefully healthy Thanasis Antetokounmpo will also get a roster spot next year if he wants one. We’re trying to appease his brother here.
That takes care of the internal business. What about external free agency? Again, the Bucks should have the non-taxpayer mid-level exception available to them. That’s a tool they can use to add a young player or two with a bit of upside. Realistically, they’re not going to be able to get, say, the Nickeil Alexander-Walker class of young free agents at this price point because those types of guys will probably be offered similar money from more appealing teams. However, there are a handful of players that make sense as upside swings.
- He’s a restricted free agent, but it’s worth exploring if Santi Aldama, still only 24 and a very capable shooting big man the Bucks could put next to Antetokounmpo, might be gettable for the full mid-level exception. The Grizzlies can probably clear out the cap space they need to renegotiate and extend Jaren Jackson Jr. without renouncing his cap hold, but Aldama would be an ideal basketball fit.
- Jake LaRavia can’t play center, but he’s a high-IQ 23-year-old that can shoot a bit and still has a lot of room to grow. If Portis is nearing the end of his Bucks tenure, LaRavia could be a replacement as a backup power forward.
- Tre Jones might get crowded out of Chicago’s back court, but he’s been a starting point guard before and the point guard market is so saturated that he could probably be had at a fair price. He’s only 25. His shooting is a question mark on an Antetokounmpo team, but he does a bit of everything else and the Bucks need starting-caliber point guard play somewhere.
- Precious Achiuwa is still only 26, and he’s fairly switchable as reserve bigs go. He’s shown a modicum of shooting ability in the past. Maybe it’s worth giving him a season-long green light and seeing if he can become a confident, low-volume shooter.
- The Bucks have had Sandro Mamukelashvili in the building before. He’s blossomed as a low-minutes offensive backup for the Spurs, and now that he can shoot, he might be playable in short bursts next to Antetokounmpo.
Aldama is the only really exciting player listed here, and he’s likely not available. The others are low-risk, high reward swings. The Bucks could probably get a few of them. The idea here is just to find useful role players with room to grow.
The draft, the trade market, and the 2025-26 season
The Bucks actually do have one pretty valuable asset to trade. Though their first-round picks are owed out through 2030, they do still have an unprotected first-round pick to deal in 2031. If they wait until next summer, they’ll have picks in 2031 and 2033 to dangle. Considering how bleak things look here and how old Antetokounmpo will be by the time those picks come up, they’re going to be pretty valuable.
In a purely prudent process, the Bucks would hold onto their post-2030 picks for dear life. Either they are going to keep Antetokounmpo moving forward and those picks will come when he is old, or they are going to trade him, and every pick they give away is another year further away they are from the ability to tank. Those picks are vital to their post-Antetokounmpo future.
But, frankly, Antetokounmpo is really going out on a limb here by staying with a team that’s already in such a weak position. The Bucks would be doing him a disservice if they hoarded picks they won’t be able to use until after he’s gone. They have to find a way to use those picks in service of his timeline if he’s staying. If they’re not willing to do that, he just has no reason to believe this front office has his best interests at heart.
Let’s focus on the 2031 pick for now as the 2033 pick isn’t accessible yet. Obviously, they could package it with existing salary on their books to trade for a player. I’m going to propose an alternative.
Look at the trade Minnesota made with San Antonio during last year’s draft. The Timberwolves wanted someone they could develop immediately. The Spurs, having already used the No. 4 pick on Stephon Castle, didn’t want to bring in a second rookie, so they sent the Timberwolves the No. 8 pick for their 2031 pick and swap rights in 2030. Essentially, they traded significant future capital for an immediate bite at the lottery apple.
There are a few teams in the lottery this season that might be open to a similar arrangement. The Rockets don’t have minutes for a rookie, for instance, so they might be open to doing this at No. 10. The same goes for the Spurs at No. 14 if they don’t trade that pick for a star. The goal in making such a move would be to bring in young talent now that could develop enough to contribute to high-level winning in a few years, but would still be cheap at that point.
That might not be Milwaukee’s only path to a lottery pick in the near future. No, the Bucks don’t control their 2026 first-round pick. However, they don’t owe it outright. It is instead owed to the New Orleans Pelicans via swap rights. The Pelicans probably aren’t going to be good next year either. Therefore, if Milwaukee is .500 or worse, it can pretty reliably expect to wind up with at least a decent pick even if they wind up dropping a few spots.
Now, the Bucks obviously can’t tank outright. They have Antetokounmpo and they’re in the Eastern Conference. But given the sheer weakness of the existing supporting cast, falling into the Play-In Tournament was likely anyway. Getting a pick in the 10-15 range feels pretty doable. That’s not an obvious star. It’s a chance at a cost-controlled asset with some upside.
That’s really how the Bucks should be spending the next year or two: cleaning the books and betting on whatever young players they can. Hopefully, a couple of them pop. But the real move comes two years from now.
The long-term play: 2027 free agency
As of this moment, the Bucks owe guaranteed money to only one player in the 2027-28 season: Antetokounmpo, and it’s through a player option. By the summer of 2027, Lillard expires, Kuzma expires, and all of the veterans clogging up the current books can be gone. Now, ideally, there will be a few younger players under contract with some promise by then, but given how clean the books are at this moment, generating significant cap space would be pretty doable.
You’re probably expecting me to suggest that the Bucks clear out a max slot for a star 2027 free agent, and yes, there will be a few available. Nikola Jokić, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Donovan Mitchell and a handful of other stars could technically be on the market that summer. But most of them will extend well before that, and even if they don’t, to be frank, they probably aren’t choosing to play in Milwaukee. This isn’t Los Angeles. If a star wants to come? Great, sign him.
In the likelier event that they don’t, the Bucks could spread that cap space across several players who fit next to Antetokounmpo. It’s too early to predict who that could be, but there are plenty of interesting sub-star-level free agents that might be available in 2027. Brandon Ingram. Michael Porter Jr. Jalen Green. Lu Dort. Not stars, but good players who make sense next to the centerpiece.
If this sounds underwhelming to you, well, it probably should. That’s how deep the hole the Bucks have dug for themselves is. There is no obvious path for them to add a long-term star-level player next to Antetokounmpo. They don’t have the picks to draft or trade for one and they don’t play in a market equipped to recruit one. They are just operating at too deep a talent deficit to build that way. That deficit means that they’re going to have to look for talent in ways that don’t carry an asset cost, hence, cap space for 2027 free agency. In the meantime, they need to accumulate and develop whatever cheap youth they can in the hopes that enough of it develops that, alongside Antetokounmpo and any free agent additions, they can have a talented and cohesive team.
This isn’t a path to a superteam. It’s a path to a prudently built roster that could hopefully be greater than the sum of its parts. Barring something truly unexpected, that won’t ever be enough to be a championship favorite. If everything goes right, it’s still probably only a fringe contender. And that raises the most important question of them all here.
So… is this going to be enough to keep Giannis happy?
The Antetokounmpo rumor mill has genuinely heated up twice before now: in 2020 and 2023. In 2020, he was one year away from free agency. In 2023, he was two years away. But on both occasions, he was eligible for a contract extension. On both occasions, the Bucks made a blockbuster trade, for Jrue Holiday in 2020 and Damian Lillard in 2023, and then, on both occasions, Antetokounmpo re-signed immediately afterward.
Well, that can’t happen this time around. Even if Antetokounmpo loves everything the Bucks do this summer, he is not eligible to re-sign until next offseason. Therefore, no decision Antetokounmpo makes about his future this offseason is necessarily binding. He might be open to giving the Bucks time to rebuild around him here and now, in June, 2025. But if he plays out a disappointing 2025-26 season in Milwaukee, he might change his mind in the summer of 2026. We don’t know.
Those Lillard and Holiday trades were telling. The last two times the Bucks have hoped to get Antetokounmpo’s signature on a new deal, they’ve done so by acquiring a star. But for the reasons we’ve covered here, it’s unlikely that they can do that again. If they could, it would probably be a big risk on an older star, or one with injury or off-court concerns. They probably can’t pull another Lillard out of their hat. The trick they’ve used to keep Antetokounmpo happy in the past isn’t possible anymore. They’re going to have to sell him on the sort of slower rebuild we’ve outlined above.
That might be the right path. There’s no guarantee if it’s one Antetokounmpo will be willing to endure. He’s 30. He’s ready to win right now. He might be willing to sacrifice one year out of his contention window. But if a year passes and it doesn’t look like the Bucks are heading in the right direction, then he might grow impatient and change his mind. It looks at this moment as though Antetokounmpo is going to stay in Milwaukee for next season, but that’s all we can say for now. His future afterward is anyone’s guess.
