1. The Bucks Have Been Awful Since Brandon Knight Left
The Milwaukee Bucks have gone just 3-7 since trading away Brandon Knight. The only teams they’ve beaten are the Denver Nuggets (which have a 23-41 record), the Philadelphia 76ers (14-49), and Washington Wizards (an ongoing dumpster fire).
Meanwhile, they’ve lost to the Lakers, Jazz, and the aforementioned Nuggets.
They are struggling to beat even bad teams. Since the All-Star break, they are scoring a league-worst 90 points per game, committing a league-worst 17.6 turnovers per game, and getting outscored by 4.6 points per 100 possessions.
They miss Brandon Knight.
Badly.
And there isn’t a lot of evidence that they are still a good team. They played well last night against the Pelicans and The Greek Freak scored a career high. But Anthony Davis ripped their heart out with some clutch hoops, and they could only muster 19 points in the fourth quarter — including ZERO in the final two minutes.
They simply cannot score anymore. And it’s hard to win basketball games that way.
The Bucks were a great story early in the season, and they looked like a lock to win 45 games. Now, they will need to go 8-11 over their final 19 games just to finish the season at .500 — and it no longer looks likely to happen.
Next: Head to Head Opportunities