With the Milwaukee Bucks getting ready for a new NBA season, all eyes are on their point guard Damian Lillard.
After all, this was sort of a mediocre first season with the Bucks considering the hype that originally surrounded it. He still had a tendency to bring his scoring to the team, but everything else-the general impact-didn’t quite meet expectations and weren’t good enough to equate to successful basketball. His shooting efficiency declined across the board, his defense struggled, and the Bucks failed to make it past the first round of the playoffs.
Lillard’s arrival came with high expectations from many who thought he and Giannis Antetokounmpo would be a deadly pick-and-roll tandem. It was anything but seamless between the two superstars. Lillard struggled to find any sort of rhythm on offense while not being quite as precise as a scorer as he was in Portland. The touted Dame-Giannis pick and roll was largely absent.
Defensively, he was exposed. He struggled to contain opposing guards and at times looked lost on that end of the floor. This was one of the biggest concerns for the Bucks – a team that prides themselves on defensive intensity.
This pretty much felt like what it was from Lillard, himself, speaking towards that during his availability at Milwaukee Bucks media day:.
That being said, I just think it was, like I said, it was just such a blur. When the season was happening, I didn’t even realize it as it was happening. I knew I had things going on, hard year, but it took for me to be removed for it and kind of deep into the summer to be like, man, that was just a crazy year, and I just kept pushing through it because that’s naturally what I do in my life, you know, even outside of basketball. But I think just gaining perspective too and just being around some of my mentors and my dad and other father figures too.
After a summer of speculation and anticipation, Lillard’s preseason performance thus far has silenced the doubters and rekindled hopes of a championship run in Milwaukee. While Lillard’s return to form is promising, though, the synergy with his not-so-new teammate in Giannis Antetokounmpo remains a work in progress and remains shaky at best.
Bucks’ Damian Lillard back with a vengeance
But through a few preseason appearances thus far, he has proven that Lillard is more than just a shell of himself. In one game against the Detroit Pistons, he recorded 15 points in 17 minutes, including his signature perimeter shooting on a 4-of-6 clip from beyond the arc.
The performance was a flashback to the brazen scoring that made him a perennial All-Star during his time with the Portland Trail Blazers. In his very first preseason outing for the team, the lion’s share of his points were notched in a fashion that only Lillard himself pulls off-by pulling up for three in transition. For the most part, there were no plays run, no screens or handoffs, just Dame Time doing what he does best: getting buckets one-on-one.
The fact that his first shot was a pull-up jumper told us all we needed to know: the offseason work was real, and he’s ready to remind the league who Damian Lillard is. The way he took the handoff from Pat Connaughton and immediately rose up for three with Jaden Ivey’s hand in his face-to smirk at the camera slightly as he runs back up the court on defense-was a sort of message. He scored 15 points and logged four assists that night in just 17 minutes of action.
The addition of Lillard into the Bucks offense has been consistent with his aggressiveness when shooting. His head coach, Doc Rivers, has allowed him, up until this point, to take advantage of poor matchups and make sure to have optimal spacing for a post where he can get to work. Lillard told reporters:
“I’m in great shape, I can say that. It was a process, I think. After we lost to Indiana, the next day, I went home and then the day after that, I started PT for my achilles and my feet. And then I put my team of people together like my chefs, my trainers, we just got connected, and we put a plan together all the way through the offseason. So, it was all about committing to it, being disciplined, and that’s it.”
If this preseason thus far is any indication, he certainly wasn’t bluffing.
Lillard and Giannis still need to polish off their chemistry
In spite of Lillard’s individual brilliance, many are still skeptical about his on-court chemistry with Giannis. The very next game against the Los Angeles Lakers, he took a bit of a backseat while Antetokounmpo took charge en route to 20 points and yet another Herculean effort.
It’s clear that the two still have quite a bit to figure out on the offensive end. At the same time, both players are elite talents, yet their styles of play vary pretty greatly. Giannis obviously operates mainly in transition and around the rim, while Lillard does much of his damage as a perimeter shooter and playmaker. How to find that happy balance between their strengths is, of course, the challenge.
The symbiosis between Antetokounmpo and Lillard is one storyline that fans are following closely, and for good reason. As a refresher, when asked this summer if the two superstars were able to work out together, Lillard responded in the negative.
“We didn’t do physical workouts together, no. In fact, I was planning to go-I was going to go to Greece. And then they started camp, getting ready for the Olympics, and I didn’t end up going, but that was it. I mean, I definitely feel more on the same page with him now than I did last year, and we didn’t even work out together,” he said.
There have been moments of possible cohesion in their preseason matchups, but it hasn’t yet translated to the court. Sure, they can free each other up off high pick-and-rolls, but at times their timing looked off, with missed opportunities and turnovers.
Against the Chicago Bulls, Lillard hit his first shots, one off a screen from Antetokounmpo. But on the whole, many possessions were where one of the two did not touch the ball. Of course, shared touches aren’t the only indicator of team chemistry – Lillard’s gravity, after all, was one main reason why the floor opened up for Giannis on his drives – but one would hope that the two superstars would be involved in more varied actions together considering the talent level on the floor. Milwaukee’s superstar duo still has time to figure it out.
Fortunately for us, this problem might also have more to do with scheme than synergy. Offensively, the two on the court seemed like another round of “your turn, my turn” basketball, and fans didn’t get to see many reps of the vaunted Dame-Giannis pick-and-roll we’ve been waiting on for quite a while now. That’s strategy – that’s coaching.
Whatever it is-maybe Rivers just doesn’t want to show his hand, maybe they were taking it easy to prioritize health after the past few years they’ve had, or maybe a pick-and-roll would have disrupted the flow of the offense when the two played together in the preseason-the reality is this: For the Bucks to reach their full potential this season, developing an intuitive understanding between Lillard and Giannis will be crucial.
Going forward into the regular season, Milwaukee needs to fix these chemistry issues with urgency and intention. The way things currently stand, both Lillard and Antetokounmpo will be in the starting lineup. Rivers needs to tinker with different lineups and offensive sets to create better collaboration between his stars. The stakes are very high; nothing but a deep playoff run would satisfy fans after such a huge investment in talent.
The resurgence of Lillard is great to see and puts him right back in discussion among the league’s elite guards. Ultimately, the Bucks will only go as far as how well Lillard and Giannis can mesh out on the floor.
If the two styles can blend into one cohesive unit, then this just might become Milwaukee’s season to make a serious championship run. But until then, the one pertinent question would be: Is that rhythm anything they can find before it becomes too late?
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