Right after the Milwaukee Bucks were eliminated from the NBA Playoffs, fans were promised an “aggressive search” for a new head coach. There is a belief among some observers that with the right coach–that can instill discipline, intensity, consistency of effort, better defense and a desire to rebound in a team lacking all of those things the past few years, that the Bucks could be a threat to win the weak Eastern Conference as early as next year. And after that “aggressive search” what Milwaukee is ending up with is Mike Budenholzer.
I doubt that yesterday’s confirmation of Budenhozer’s hiring sent many fans down to the Bradley Center to sign up for season tickets. I don’t think it led to many high fives between fans or excited text message exchanges. I would imagine the main reaction was “Who?”
Budenholzer may be vaguely familiar to Bucks’ fans. He was head coach of the Atlanta Hawks for five seasons–but how many fans could name the current head coach of the Atlanta Hawks? During that stint, Budenholzer won the Coach of the Year award his second season–getting the Hawks to the Eastern Conference finals with such stars as Joe Johnson and well, I really can’t name any other players on that team. Of course, they were swept by LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Which is the same thing that happened to the Hawks the next season under Budenholzer–except this time, the sweep was in the Conference Semi-finals. So his playoff record against LeBron is 0-8. The good news for the Bucks is that LeBron may be taking his talents to a Western Conference team next year–so that record can’t go to 0-12.
My main beef with hiring Mike Budenholzer is that he is a “Triangle Offense” guy. The Triangle was made famous by Phil Jackson (really his assistant Tex Winter) who won 11 NBA Championships running it. Of course, it should be noted that six of those titles were won with Michael Jordan and Scotty Pippen and the other five with Kobe Bryant who teamed with Shaquille O’Neal on three of those championships in Los Angeles. But other than that, the Triangle hasn’t really won a whole lot. The two best coaches in the NBA right now–Steve Kerr of Golden State and Brad Stevens of Boston–run motion offenses with a lot of ball movement–not a two-man game on one side of the floor. But that is what the Bucks are about to become–with one very good player: Giannis Antentekoumpo and a bunch of guys that can’t shoot worth a darn.
Since no effort was even made to talk to highly-successful college coaches like Jay Wright of Villanova, Shaka Smart at Texas or Mark Few at Gonzaga, I have to question how “aggressive” the search really was. I’d almost prefer that Milwaukee had gone in the direction Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel writer Gary D’Amato called a “social experiment” and hired Spurs’ assistant Becky Hammon. At least that would be more interesting to talk about than Giannis and Khris Middleton playing catch on one side of the floor while everyone else on the team just looks at them–and the team slogs along to a barely-above-.500 record to lose in the first or second round of the playoffs every year.
