The Unretainable Giannis! The Bucks Have Lost Their Sanity and Are Now Burdened with Massive Debt: Missed the Best Time to Step Back

On December 5th Beijing time, the reputable American outlet CBS wrote an article analyzing the Bucks’ situation, believing Giannis is bound to depart the team. They pointed out that the Bucks lost their reason trying to retain Giannis, now burdened with enormous debt and having missed the best chance to stop. Here is CBS’s breakdown —

Giannis has not officially submitted a trade request. According to the latest reports, he and his agent are merely “communicating” with the Bucks, and Milwaukee is still regarded as the most “compatible” option for him.

The term “compatible” always makes me chuckle. Over the past five years, teams have often said Westbrook was “not compatible” here or there, but honestly, they might as well just admit — they simply thought Westbrook wasn’t good enough.

Sorry for suddenly bringing up Westbrook, but the situation between Giannis and the Bucks is very similar: if the Bucks themselves weren’t so weak, they’d naturally be a perfect “fit” for Giannis. But the reality is that the Bucks are currently a struggling team. This is quite normal in competitive sports: teams go through periods of glory, and a lucky few, like the Bucks, managed to seize the moment — taking advantage of most teams being impacted by the pandemic and Durant’s last-second three-pointer being ruled out — to win a championship. But no team can stay at the top forever; as an old saying goes: know when to quit.

For the Bucks, the best time to “quit” should have been this summer.To help Giannis chase a title, the Bucks had already given their all, first acquiring Jrue Holiday via trade, then bringing in Damian Lillard. At that point, they could and should have stopped while ahead, but the team insisted on prolonging the championship bubble, foolishly signing Myles Turner to a four-year, $107 million deal that caught everyone off guard.

To pay for this, the Bucks waived Lillard and spread the remaining $113 million of his contract over the next five years. Yes, you read that right: for the next five years, the Bucks will pay Lillard over $22 million annually without seeing him play a single game. Adding Turner’s contract,this is nearly equivalent to spending close to $250 million on a younger version of Brook Lopez.

Admittedly, the Bucks are obligated to pay Lillard’s salary, but if they had endured the contract until its natural expiration, they could have cleared his salary from their books by 2027, or even tried to trade him as an expiring contract next year. In today’s market where top player salaries are becoming more reasonable, $22 million a year is a huge amount — enough to sign two Davion Mitchells, or a combination of Herbert Jones and Aaron Wiggins, or Alexander Walker plus Mark Williams, or even five Alvarados or Gillespies.

Simply put, the installment payments for Lillard over the next five years, combined with Turner’s $26.75 million annual contract (which he shouldn’t have been part of the Bucks’ plan), mean the Bucks are effectively paying an extra max contract. They were willing to spend this money hoping that such a seemingly bold move could use “hometown loyalty” to keep Giannis.

Calling this an all-in gamble is not hindsight; it doesn’t even capture how reckless it was. Replacing Lillard with Turner in no way makes the Bucks a championship contender, and claiming the “Eastern Conference landscape is open” is utterly laughable. The East is indeed dominated by strong teams, but the Bucks can hardly be counted among them. Look at their roster compared to historically talented teams in the league: Kuzma? Kevin Porter Jr.? AJ Green? Portis? Even Rollins was a surprise emergence that barely kept the Bucks competitive early in the season.

Such an outcome was actually destined a long time ago.Giannis has repeatedly signaled that “I only care about championships,” clearly preparing to leave the team.He has never firmly closed the door, and still hasn’t, since initiating a breakup is always difficult — nobody wants to be the “villain.” So he plays it like poker, already knowing his next move but pretending to hesitate. It’s all just a negotiation,Giannis is essentially in a “pre-departure” state, with only the timing and destination yet to be decided.

This is harsh for the Bucks, as no one can accuse them of neglecting this superstar. To keep Giannis, they bet everything: they never tried a “dual timeline” team-building approach, won’t have unrestricted first-round picks until 2031; they have always made the boldest and often most rushed decisions, even when those choices might backfire.

Having a league top-tier star is a double-edged sword — you could call it a “blessed dilemma.” The team basically has the obligation to bear massive debt and push hard for a title during the peak window, never allowing it to close. As long as a star like Giannis remains, declaring a rebuild is not an option; the team cannot be satisfied with current achievements and must keep investing in him, even if it’s a futile attempt to hold on to fading glory and delay a new dawn.

The Warriors now face a similar dilemma to the Bucks: they don’t want to mortgage the future, yet feel letting a star like Curry fade away in mediocrity is a dereliction of duty — almost “inhumane” in a sporting sense.Giannis may differ from Curry, but his significance to Milwaukee is nearly identical to Curry’s to the Warriors — this homegrown MVP elevated a small-market team to the league’s highest stage, delivering a legendary 50-point performance in the Finals and bringing the franchise its first championship in 50 years.

It’s understandable that the Bucks are desperate to keep such a player — it’s an age-old story, like a man buying unaffordable jewelry to keep a love he fears to lose. But sometimes, you have to let go. The Bucks should have faced reality this summer: Holiday’s trade brought a championship, gambling on Lillard was worth a shot, but that should have been the end. Hiring Rivers was already a last-ditch effort, and signing Turner, effectively committing $220 million, was sheer delusion.

Because from start to finish, the ending was already sealed.If Giannis wants to finish his career in Milwaukee, the precondition is that he’s willing to sacrifice the chance at a second championship for loyalty to “one city, one man,” which definitely won’t change with Turner’s arrival.As expected, Turner will soon become a “high-salary burden” on the Bucks’ rebuilding path.

Even in the best-case scenario, the Turner-Giannis duo cannot bring transformative change to the Bucks, let alone justify the enormous risk of this move. But when a team is tied to a once-in-a-century star like this, they often lose basic judgment. This summer, the Bucks utterly lost their sanity; they neither want nor perhaps dare to face the reality — Giannis will eventually leave, and the massive debt they incurred trying to keep him will never go away.