The Bratwurst – Milwaukee Bucks Blog

• Desmond Mason on the Wikipedia
• Desmond Mason on NBA.com
• Desmond Mason on ESPN.com

It’s only been a few games, but what are last years’ Bucks doing with their new team?

With one notable exception, not much.

You remember how I used to maintain that Royal Ivey wasn’t much of a defensive player, and even if he was, he was so bad offensively that it doesn’t really matter? Well, he has only played 7 minutes per game for a Philly team that is off to a slow start, and they have been outscored by 8 ppg with him on the floor while outscoring their opponents by 3.5 ppg without him. Ivey was the Bucks’ sixth man for long stretches last season … and he is being used much more effectively now. He is shooting 43%, not bad for him.

After shooting 48% for the Bucks last season, Desmond Mason is back up to his old tricks, only shooting 38% in 27 mpg for the Thunder. He’s also turning the ball over more than last year, rebounding worse, and getting fewer assists. At 31 years old, the athleticism is likely starting to wane, and the Bucks were lucky to have gotten as effective a season out of him as they did.

Mo Williams is off to a slow start with the Cavs, only shooting 40% and seeing his numbers fall off in nearly every other category. However, after going into a new situation in Cleveland, an adjustment period is to be expected and with the ball in LeBron’s hands, a decline in Mo’s numbers can only be expected. As the Bucks-Cavs game showed, the team is doing just fine with Mo.

You thought Bobby Simmons was bad last year? Oh man, look at him now! He’s playing 27 minutes a game and shooting 33%. His rebounds are down to 3.5 per 40 minutes and assists are down to 1 per 40 minutes. At least he’s not turning it over much, but the real problem is he isn’t really doing anything on the court. In my post-season recap last year I wrote that Simmons’ averages last year were almost the same as his previous four years, not counting the big 04-05 season that got him his big contract. Well, he’s underperforming those numbers by a lot. He recently made some comments about needing to do more without the ball, but the real problem is what he does with the ball near the basket — he is shooting 45% on jumpers but only 20% close to the hoop.

Don’t look now, but Yi Jianlian is off to a really nice start for the Nets. He is playing 27 minutes a game and has an IPM of 0.83, making him the #20 forward in the league for this young season. He is shooting a little worse (41%) but is actually rebounding this season — averaging 11.9 boards per 40 minutes! He’s doing everything a little better this season — getting more assists, averaging a block per game, and not turning it over. However, his defense probably still has problems — the Nets aren’t really doing any better with him on the floor. And, just to be sure this is Yi Jianlian we are talking about, he is still getting 25% of his shots close to the basket blocked.

That headline was too easy. And dumb.

But, sure enough, the Mo Williams to Cleveland trade has happened. Funny how when Mo was re-signed to all of that fanfare, only one year later he would be shipped out for expiring contracts. But it was the right thing to do.

The Bucks receive Luke Ridnour and Adrian Griffin from OKC and Damon Jones from Cleveland. Heading out is Mo to the Cavs and Desmond Mason to the OK Corrals. Joe Smith also went from Cleveland to OKC.

The NBA mantra is that the team that gets the best player usually wins the trade. In that case, then Cleveland is the big winner here. But it’s a strange deal all around, and it makes some sense for the Bucks.

Mo is probably going into a very good situation for him. All of my studies of defensive statistics indicate that the quality of a point guard’s defense is dependent on the quality of his teammates to a large part. Now Mo will have defensive aces like LeBron James, Anderson Varejao, Ben Wallace and Zydrunas Ilgauskas behind him. He can continue his offensive improvement and his mistakes on defense will not be noticed as much. I’ve often said that Williams’ career has paralleled that of Chauncey Billups for the first several years. Billups was known as a no-defense gunner early in his career, and remarkably that all changed when he arrived in Detroit. We will now see if the same thing happens to Mo Williams.

My feelings about Mo’s tenure in Milwaukee are summed up pretty well with this post from my post-season review (apologies for the formatting – something happened to all of our older posts after a WordPress upgrade).

The Bucks cut about $20 million in long term salary, and as I illustrated in April in this post (once again, sorry about the poor formatting) once Bogut signed an extension, the Bucks would need to make some sort of salary dump trade to avoid the luxury tax in 09/10. This became an even bigger problem when they added Richard Jefferson’s $15 million 10/11 contract.

Look, the Bucks lost a good player and got spare parts in return. But was this team really going anywhere with Mo running the show? As his playing time increased, he got better and better and the team got worse.

Probably 80% of an NBA teams’ record can be attributed to its three best players. A core of Redd/Bogut/Williams wasn’t working. Now it’s time to give Redd/Bogut/Jefferson a shot.

What can we say about the additions and what it means for the rest of the roster?

Luke Ridnour: Smaller than Mo, as bad defensively, injury-prone. Ridnour had a couple of good seasons for Seattle, but knee injuries have cost him chunks of the last couple of seasons. He does an okay job of managing games and has decent instincts. John Hollinger once wrote about him: “You couldn’t draw a better picture of what an average NBA point guard looks like.”

Honestly, as far as point guards go, I don’t really mind Ridnour. He should do a good job of spreading the ball around without throwing it away too much. I just hope his knees will allow him to hang on defensively. He’s paid $6.5 mil/year for two more seasons, and for 3/4 of the money due Mo Wiliams, Ridnour should offer about 3/4 of the production. He wont win any games by himself the way Mo occasionally could, but he shouldn’t cost the team any wins either.

Adrian Griffin: A Scott Skiles guy who plays solid defense at both shooting guard and small forward. Griffin is an energy guy on a par with Desmond Mason (but without the athleticism). Dont be surprised to see him as the sixth man for a long portion of the season. Skiles loves him. Griffin is also known as a quality guy.

Damon Jones: Everything I need to know about the self-proclaimed “best shooter in the NBA” I learned from an episode of MTV Cribs. How often do I get to see an NBA player show off a house that is smaller, less expensive, and not as nice as mine? And his cars — a line of Mercedes-Benz’s that I later read weren’t his. They were all loaners from a dealer with whom Jones had an endorsement contract. It was awesome to see a player clearly living within his means and with an eye toward saving his money for his future. It’s a good thing that Jones is apparently pretty fiscally responsible, because this season should be his last major NBA payday as his shooting has pretty much deserted him and he doesn’t have much in the way of other skills. Apparently he’s a fun guy to have in the locker room and if his appearance on Cribs means anything, he can serve as an example to Andrew Bogut that it’s not true that 80% of former NBA players go broke.

Ramon Sessions: Looks like the starting job is his to win now. Will that work? I’m not so sure, as Sessions has never played a single meaningful minute in his career. I hope I’m wrong about that, and I’ll be very interested to see if Larry Harris mined a steal with his final pick as Bucks GM. At the least, Sessions should be a capable backup.

Tyronn Lue: Why was he signed in the first place? The Bucks just added two guys who can play the two, meaning that Charlie Bell fits in best at point guard. What does Lue bring that the combination of Ridnour, Sessions and Bell doesn’t?

Power Forward: It would have been nice if the Bucks could have pulled off this deal with Joe Smith coming to the Bucks instead of Jones, but what are you going to do? Apparently John Hammond still believes Joe Alexander can play both forward spots. I hate that idea. Get ready for another season of Andrew Bogut spending 80% of his court time glaring at Charlie V in disgust. This deal gives the Bucks the maximum 15 players under contract so, unless Awvee Storey’s deal is not guaranteed, the Francisco Elson signing will most likely not happen.

Hammond cannot possibly intend to go into the season with only four big men on the roster. I hope that another deal is in the works and he isn’t thinking that Joe Alexander and Adrian Griffin can fill in up front. That just wont work.

Your 2007-08 Milwaukee Bucks:

Luke Ridnour, Ramon Sessions, Tyronn Lue
Michael Redd, Adrian Griffin, Charlie Bell, Damon Jones
Richard Jefferson, Joe Alexander, LR Mbah a Moute, Awvee Storey
Charlie Villanueva, Malik Allen
Andrew Bogut, Dan Gadzuric

Is that good? I guess it is if Bogut blossoms into a 22/11 guy (which might happen — as I love to point out, this season he will be the same age that Patrick Ewing was as a rookie). But I don’t really think I should reserve second round playoff tickets just yet.

And now, the small forward position, home of the Bucks’ undoing. Things were cruising along pretty well this year, but then one injury weakened the whole structure of the roster. Larry Harris and Larry Krystkowiak’s errant roster and rotation management made the position a problem night-in and night-out. After Mr. Offensively-Challenged (Mason) got hurt; Mr. Slump (Simmons), Mr. Out-of-Position (Redd), and Mr. Small (Bell) couldn’t fill the role, while Mr. Defensively-Challenged (Villanueva) never got a chance, while at least he could have kept the other guys in the backcourt or on the bench.

The result was something similar to the end of Reservoir Dogs. Deadly.

Desmond Mason ($5.0M, 0.622 IPM): Mason’s constant energetic play and dirty-work defense , plus his well-known solid character — makes him an endearing guy to watch and to root for. His offensive inefficiency is well known, but he made up for it by not trying to do too much at that end while buckling down on defense.

He was a good signing, too, given a 2 year/$10 million contract that was a nice value for Larry Harris. He got a reasonably priced guy who would be able to start, but if he was sent to the bench he would produce and not complain, while not eating a huge percentage of the salary cap.

The Bucks were quite a bit better with him on the floor, being outscored by 5 points per game with him and 10 without. With all of the high-priced talent around him in the starting lineup, it was surprising that it was an injury to him that sent the team into it’s ¾-season-long tailspin. But I think that says more about how bad the bench was than about how good Mason was.

Despite playing with Chris Paul for two seasons, Mason’s stint with the Hornets featured two of the most pathetic offensive efforts I have ever seen. Mason’s jump shot, always a problem, completely deserted him, as he shot below 30% on jumpers both seasons and had a 2-year FG% around 42%, yet he took 10 shots per game. His IPM for both seasons hovered around 0.50, which made him one of the worst players in the league considering how many minutes he played. And this was playing with one of the best point guards in the league! It’s funny that nobody has credited the Hornets’ surge to the top of the Western Conference to the fact that Desmond Mason is no longer on their team.

This season his jumper was not quite as bad as usual (33.7%) but he shot exceptionally well when close to the basket (59.5%). The result was career high 48% shooting, which made his offense good enough to make him a net-positive player for the Bucks when combined with his energetic defense.

But the reason why he shot a higher percentage is interesting , he seems to have finally figured out that he’s a horrible creator off of the dribble, so he stopped trying it.

This season, Mason was assisted on 69% of his baskets, vs. 54% and 53% his two seasons with the Hornets , when he was playing with Chris Paul! Just letting the game come to him and allowing his teammates to get him good shots worked wonders. Sort of makes you think about the, “Mo Williams isn’t really a point guard” stuff, doesn’t it?

But even with all of that, it’s not as though Desmond Mason was all that great a player. He’s not a bad guy to have around, but not a good guy to have as your starting small forward. But at least he did his job the best he could.

Responsibility for Coach K’s dismissal: Negative 20%

Bobby Simmons ($9.2M, 0.558 IPM): “Simmons=Pippen.” That’s what Jim Boeheim told Simmons’ college coach, Pat Kennedy, after coaching him on a high school all-star team. But it hasn’t quite worked out that way.

Simmons’ contract has been roundly criticized as one of the worst in the league, but that’s not true at all , Dan Gadzuric’s contract is light years worse, because it is longer and has a slightly smaller ending value. Simmons’ at least only has two years remaining on it, and will be worth much more , over $10 million , when it expires, meaning that he will be a useful trade asset down the road, or the source of a nice chunk of cap room. This room will be used to slot in Andrew Bogut’s extension should the Bucks keep Simmons.

The problem with Simmons is that he has now played six out of seven years in the league and has only had one really good season , his Most Improved Player 2004-05 season. This year looked a lot like his first season with the Bucks , a slow start, followed by some sort of problems (his first year he got an ankle injury that lingered most of the season, this year he had a mid-season three-game “personal leave” that then coincided with an incredible mega-slump), and a late-season resurgence that makes it look like he’s going to be good to go the following year. In the No Defense Allowed part of the season (April) he averaged 12.7 ppg on 51% shooting, and regained his form as a money 3-ball shooter.

So was Simmons slumping only to regain his form at the end of the year, or is he just a fairly poor player who has a knack for looking good late in the season? The evidence is starting to mount that the answer is the latter.

Taking Simmons’ averages of the 2002-03, 2003-04, and 2005-06 seasons (the last 3 he had played before this year, not counting the MIP season), he averaged 13.7 points, 7 rebounds, and 2.5 assists per 40 minutes, while shooting 41.3%. This season he averaged 14 points, 6 rebounds, and 2.1 assists per 40 minutes on 42.1% shooting. His numbers this year coincide almost exactly with his averages for the rest of his career, not counting the one season that he was clearly playing over his head. It’s starting to look like this is how good he really is , a guy who will show flashes of talent, but that’s it.

The news wasn’t all bad , despite such a disappointing offensive season, the Bucks played about the same with him on the floor as off (-7.9 ppg vs. -7.2), indicating that his defense was solid enough as to make his poor offense a wash. His ability to play tough, physical defense was one of the reasons he was brought aboard in the first place

It seems like Simmons and Krystkowiak may not have been on the same page, as his minutes yo-yoed all over the place. Considering that Krystkowiak had been making his “playing time comes from practicing hard”, it sure doesn’t make Simmons look good no matter what the cause really may have been. Most likely there was something to that “personal leave” that never became public.

But the bottom line is that when the Bucks needed Simmons to step in after Mason got hurt, he wasn’t able to answer the bell, which meant that the injury to Desmond Mason was enough to kill the season. And now we enter year four of the Bobby Simmons era in Milwaukee without really knowing what we’ve got.

Responsibility for Coach K’s dismissal: 30%

Up next: The Mo and Michael Show , Will There be a Sequel?

While the fact that the Bucks have gotten blown out ten times so far this season has been a neverending source of frustration, if there was ever a night where it is no big deal it was Wednesday night in Philadelphia.

Of course, losing by over 40 is never acceptable, but once the Bucks were down by 19 at the half, there was no telling how bad it would get.

After seven games in nine days, and missing Redd as well, it was no surprise that this game would be a problem. Philly is a lousy matchup for a Bucks team with a thin backcourt, as their best players — Andre Iguodala, Andre Miller, Louis Williams — would be able to stress the Bucks defenders and Samuel Dalembert is a pretty tough matchup for Andrew Bogut. Also, while the Bucks were playing a back-to-back, the Sixers were coming off of a three-day rest.

I do have two questions, though:

Doesn’t it look like Yi needs some rest? Whether it’s hitting the “rookie wall” or just simply being tired from playing constantly since the NBA Draft, Yi Jianlian is playing horribly right now. Less than two weeks after I wrote that the most impressive thing about him has been his consistency, his game has really fallen apart. He has gone through his worst five-game stretch of the season, and he has fallen off in every way. He hasn’t scored in double digits in 8 games, his rebounding has been below average in five of his last six, and his “Curry Ratio” (defined in this post) has been subpar in 7 straight games. He has been awful offensively (IPM of 0.6 or less in 7 straight — below 0.6 is “you are hurting the team more than helping” territory) and his defense has slipped, only blocking two shots in 8 games.

It really seems like the guy is tired, and maybe after the Houston game, Yi should come off of the bench for a couple of games.

With Redd hurt, why wasn’t Sessions called up? The Bucks only have four guards on the roster anyway, but with Redd out and Bell playing some small forward, they only had two full time guards available. Doesn’t it seem like three games in four nights is a little long to go with such a shorthanded backcourt? It’s not as though it was a cost savings move — while in the NBDL, Sessions still gets his NBA paycheck. At the very least, Sessions could have played the fourth quarter against Philadelphia.

The shorthanded backcourt was also a problem against New Jersey as Kidd-Carter-Jefferson gets a big edge over Williams-Ivey-Bell. Not that it’s likely Sessions would have turned one of those losses into wins, but at least he could have helped spell the starters some.

Other than that, I don’t have many other specific complaints about the Philadelphia game. They were screwed from the beginning. The Bucks’ defense was horriffic, but with Yi playing poorly, then Bogut can only do so much to help the guards when they get blown past. Mo has enough trouble guarding point guards his own size, what is he supposed to do against Vince Carter and Andre Iguodala? With Yi doing badly then my master strategy of moving Villanueva to the 3 isn’t an option, and thus his weak interior defense contributes to the problem. I think the only thing I might have done differently would have been to throw in the towel even earlier than Krystkowiak did, and taken Bogut out for good after Philly pushed their third quarter lead to 24.

It’s still an embarrassing loss, and at some point the team isn’t going to keep brushing off the blowouts. Hopefully they get back on track against Houston, a game that is supposed to mark the return of both Michael Redd and Desmond Mason.

I’ve been looking at recent IPM data (the latest updates of which have been posted), and the analysis shows some ways that the rotations can be changed to help get the Bucks out of this ridiculous slide. There are some things that Coach K can still try.

Here are my thoughts about the Bucks’ players with their IPM’s since December 8th (after the Seattle loss). Remember that an IPM above 1.0 indicates superstar level, above .9 would be about all-star level, .75 indicates a solid starter, .65 is a questionable starter/good reserve and below about .5 is where the player is no longer helping you by being on the floor.

Mo Williams, 0.9536: There isn’t anything bad that can be said about Mo’s play, as he has distributed the ball well along with shooting at a pretty high percentage. The true pessimist might wonder why Mo’s best numbers seem to coincide with him being on a bad team, but from watching him play it doesn’t seem like he’s firing for his own stats at the expense of the team , in the recent spate of blowouts he’s only started gunning away after the games were long lost (you know, mid-first quarter). Mo has been the best player on the team, and according to Charles Gardner, with Redd sidelined, Krystkowiak might be about to move him to shooting guard to give Ivey more time over Bell. I don’t know, this might cause as many defensive problems as it solves, but I guess it’s worth a shot. I’m not going to criticize Krystkowiak for trying something different.

Michael Redd, 0.8020: Redd has been playing at a very poor level (for him) ever since Mason got hurt. His shot selection became awful and the all-around play that highlighted the first 15 games of the season disappeared. I’m convinced that the move to small forward has caused this. He has been forced to play more physical players on defense, tiring him out for his offensive responsibilities. The result has been some awful shots (bizarre, flat-footed attempts that would get a high-schooler benched) and a marked decline in his free throw percentage , both signs that he must be too tired to play correctly. Of course, he can’t guard small forwards, anyway, so the position change has ruined all facets of his game. The whole reason the Bucks got Redd late in the second round was because GM’s felt he wasn’t athletic enough to play small forward. He’s proved them all right. Please, Coach K, when he comes back from the thigh bruise, find someone else to play the 3!

Dan Gadzuric, 0.7474: Danny G has only played 5 games in the last 13 and only gotten 8 minutes per, but the numbers suggest that maybe it’s time to start playing him a little more. The trick isn’t when to play him but where , I think he should play alongside Bogut. 10 minutes a game of Danny G at power forward could help everyone. For one thing, it would get the Bucks’ two best rebounders in the game together. It would give Bogut a reprieve from being hammered all night long by the oppositions’ most physical player (since the Bucks’ other power forwards all hang out on the perimeter). Gadzuric wouldn’t have the responsibility of touching the ball on offense (both reducing his turnovers and opening up more shots for everyone else) and he could just crash the boards and , since 10 minutes is the goal for him , hack away at will whenever he gets beat.

Yi Jianlian, 0.7352: The brightest spot from the last month has definitely been the play of Yi. He is adjusting to the physicality of the NBA, as his percentage of his inside-shots that get blocked has slowly started to come down (to a still-way-too-high 32% for the season, vs. 41% a month ago). The question is can he play the 3 , I don’t really think that’s going to work. He still gets the ball slapped out of his hands way too often (23 “ball handling” turnovers this season) and should he be guarded by smaller, more athletic players that will happen even more often. Also, moving him to the 3 takes away his shot-blocking ability. Maybe he can play there in bursts, but long-term, I don’t think his future is anywhere but power forward. Better improve on that rebounding, bud.

Charlie Villanueva, 0.7179: Time for today’s “Brett wants Charlie V to play the 3″ moment. There are two big differences between moving Yi to the 3 vs. V. Villanueva is a much more accomplished ball handler and has the ability to dribble past smaller defenders and get into the lane. Villanueva is also not nearly the shot blocker that Yi is (8 this season? How is that possible? ) and so doesn’t have the value that Yi does being stationed inside. Villanueva at the 3 weakens the teams defense, no question, but brings plenty to the team by allowing Redd to stay in the backcourt and Simmons on the bench.

Andrew Bogut, 0.6944: I was very surprised to see Bogut’s IPM slide so much as I feel he’s actually played fairly well. I’m sure that the problem is he just has too much responsibility to handle every single bit of inside work for his team. It’s got to be exhausting after a while to guard the oppositions best big man, battle the oppositions two biggest players for boards, initiate the offense from the high post, shoot more now that Redd is hurt, and , oh yeah , how about making 55% from the floor while you are at it? No wonder he always looks so pissed on the court. Of course, some blame for his sagging numbers falls squarely on his own shoulders , whatever happed to his free throw form? He was a 70% free throw shooter in college and at one point had a 15-18 foot jump shot, but that is completely gone now. His form has slid to depths of a Shaq-style shotput toss from the free throw line, with the same on-the-way-up release he uses on a jump hook. It’s really ugly. Time to hire a shooting coach.

Desmond Mason, 0.6701: Mason played pretty well in the final 7 games before getting hurt, and with Simmons playing so poorly the Bucks miss him more than they ever thought they would.

Jake Voskuhl, 0.6485: One nice thing about the Gadzuric benching is that it’s pretty clear that Voskuhl can pretty much handle the 11 minute a night job as Bogut’s backup, freeing up Danny G for my master plan of moving him to power forward.

Royal Ivey, 0.5275: I’m not sure that starting him over Bell is much of an improvement, but what else can you do with this screwed up roster that only has four guards? Ivey started for most of the season in Atlanta in 05-06 but only played 13 mpg, compared to 15 now. Oh, by the way, Atlanta went 26-56 in 05-06.

Charlie Bell, 0.5068: You know, take away the putrid shooting (enough said about that) and Bell isn’t really playing all that bad. He gets some steals, has a solid A/TO ratio and rebounds pretty well for his size. However, no matter how well he plays, if he’s starting and playing 20+ minutes for you then you aren’t winning. His defensive effort is great, but that only takes you so far when you are routinely giving up 3-5 inches and 20-40 pounds. He just isn’t big enough to play more than a couple of minutes away from the point guard spot.

Bobby Simmons, 0.3743: He’s putting up Brian Scalabrine-type numbers but playing 20 minutes a game. It’s really getting ugly with Simmons. His shooting and turnover rates have been so poor that he’s hurting the team at both ends of the floor — the Bucks have basically been playing 4-on-6 with him on the court. It’s no coincidence that his only good game in the last month (vs. Miami) was the Bucks’ most recent win , it’s been too much for his teammates to have to overcome his play. I’ve said it so many times but I’ll say it again , something is wrong with him, and he shouldn’t be out there for more than 5-8 minutes a game until he gets it sorted out.

I remember seeing Dallas come into the BC about 4 years ago (when Don Nelson was still their coach). Nowitzki wasn’t at full strength, playing with some nagging injury (ankle, knee, back … something like that). But he was still their best player. Nelson had to get the ball in his hands while still minimizing his effort and keeping him away from contact. So ….

He ran the same damn play about 100 consecutive times. A pick & pop between Jason Terry and Nowitzki. On every single posession. For the entire game. If the Bucks defended it poorly it freed Nowitzki for an open jumper, and when the Bucks defended it well it got Terry into the lane where he could create for everyone else. It was ugly, boring, and quite effective.

Without Redd, the Bucks’ shorthanded offense should do the exact same thing with Williams and Yi. Simplify the offense, get the ball in the hands of their most talented players, and keeps the ball out of the hands of Simmons and Bell.

So there you have it — the rotations and the gameplan that I’d like to see.

I can’t believe I watched the entire Nuggets game. That was painful.

I think that the single most disapointing thing about this Bucks team so far is that they have been blown out by every single good team they have played on the road (unless you count Cleveland and Portland. But it’s debatebale just how “good” Cleveland is and nobody knew Portland was good at the time). Orlando, Houston, San Antonio, Boston, Denver — Those games seem to be over before they start. Why can’t they even stick semi-close to those teams?

In the case of the Denver game, I think the altitude effect cannot be ignored. Since the game was the day after Christmas, you have to assume that the Bucks flew into Denver that day, and so only had a couple of hours to get acclimatized. That’s a significant issue — the Bucks are something like 7-30 all time in Denver for a reason. The altitute and accompanying fatigue is going to affect players in two ways: it kills the big guys’ stamina and the jumpshooters’ lift. It was pretty clear that Redd, Yi and Bogut were all suffering. Redd was missing all of his shots short, Yi was just completely out of sorts, and Bogut was a step slow.

On my honeymoon my wife and I hiked the Inca Trail to Maccu Piccu (I know, how romantic), a trip which spends 3 days between 8000 and 12000 feet. While everyone in our group had varying degrees of trouble from the altitude, one man had it really bad. I woke up one morning to the sound of him vomiting outside of his tent (some honeymoon), one day he trailed the rest of the group by an hour, and he needed supplemental oxygen at one point.

The problem? He was in the best shape of all of us.

Specifically, he was in great shape and very muscular. As I understand it, when you get in shape your lungs become more and more efficient at using a higher percentage of the oxygen you breathe. The more muscle you have, the more oxygen you need. So the people who have a hard time at altitude are those whose lungs are used to converting most of the air they breathe into oxygen — while most of us just need our lungs to work a little harder at altitude, physically fit people actually wont get enough air until their bodies get used to it.

Interestingly enough, the heirarchy of people who have the easiest time handling altitute are: Really skinny, non-muscular endurance athletes (like marathon runners), smokers (because their lungs are aready used to being inefficient), pretty-fit people, unfit people, muscular people. Professional basketball players definitely fit in the final category.

So now that I’ve explained away the loss to Denver, it’s up to the team to forget about it as well. At some point all of the blowout losses to good teams have to start to weigh on a teams’ psyche.

So at least now the Bucks get to play a team with far worse problems than they have.

Wow, was I ever wrong about the Bulls this year. Turns out that all of that depth and energy they had was obscuring that fact that they don’t have any dependable size on their team. The backcourt of Hinrich and Gordon has been exposed as way too small, Deng has been awful compared to the stardom that was being projected for him, Tyrus Thomas has not been ready to handle the job as a starter, and Ben Wallace — the goalie that was supposed to make it all work — has lost his dominance. Joakim Noah has been the Bulls’ best player. Enough said.

As everyone knows, that cost Scott Skiles his job, and now nobody knows what the Bulls will bring to the court on any given night.

The Bucks have actually recovered from the other road blowouts fairly well this year, and now they need to do it again. I’m starting to feel bad for Krystkowiak and his small forward issues, as it’s beginning to look like Bobby Simmons is not ready to contribute much. He was brutal in Denver (with a -0.01 IPM), showing that maybe he really can’t handle more than about 15 minutes. You would much rather have Redd match up against Hinrich or Gordon instead of Deng, so Bell at the “2″ isn’t that great an idea. Maybe it’s time to go for broke — Villanueva at small forward, sink or swim.

The season is probably at a crossroads now — Yi is playing better, injuries are causing a little adversity. How they play the next few games will be an interesting barometer showing if this team can make a run for a playoff spot or will sink deep into the lottery again.

Well, another day, another loss to one of the 5 worst teams in the league. Yet again, the Bucks couldn’t handle a Sacramento team that is missing 2 of its 3 best players.

And according to the Journal-Sentinel, after the game, Coach Krystkowiak was talking lineup changes;

“It’s frustrating,” Krystkowiak said. “All of a sudden, we go the last 17 possessions of the second quarter and they score one field goal. So they were 1 of 17 to finish the half. Maybe we need to get the defenders on the floor to start with. Maybe that’s what it boils down to. Obviously, we haven’t done a great job defensively to start games and it’s probably going to warrant a lineup change.”

Wait … the defenders? Who are the defenders? Do you even know who’s on your roster?

Oh no … don’t tell me you are thinking about starting Royal Ivey over Mo. Atlanta tried that in 2004-05 and while he might be okay defensively he’s such a non-factor offensively that they were outscored by 2 ppg more with him on the floor than off. Playing offense 4-on-5 almost never works, unless you’ve got Ben Wallace (circa 2002).

So who are the rest of the defenders? Not Gadzuric, considering he’s played 12 minutes in 8 games. Not Simmons, considering he only played 15 minutes last night in a game that Mason sat out the second half. Oh, I get it … Charlie Bell must be The Defender — he’s played 87 minutes in the last 4 games and shot 3-21 with no free throws. So it must be his stifling defense that’s keeping him on the floor.

You know the Bucks are second worst in the leage in opposing 3-point shooting percent? A big part of that is probably Bell’s defense, since at 6’3″ he’s not really big enough to close out on most opposing shooting guards.

The thing that seems to have Krystkowiak so steamed is that Sacramento opened the game making 11 of their first 12 shots. However, the Kings are still an NBA team and NBA teams will have hot streaks. It’s not like one defender was getting torched in the first 8 minutes, every King player scored and all of them except Mikki Moore had at least one assist. They played well for 8 minutes, good for them. Through all of that only opened a 10 point lead, and the Bucks got it down to one by the end of the quarter.

The problem wasn’t the Bucks’ defense — they only allowed 102 points, and but for the game ending 17-4 run by Sacramento, they were on pace to allow closer to 95. The problem was the substitution pattern.

Okay, so Mason isn’t available in the second half and Krystowiak hates Simmons (although it’s very possible that Simmons isn’t 100% and can’t go much more than 15 mpg). Krystowiak never uses Storey and Villanueva was not available. Against just about any other team I’d say, okay, now you have no choice but to finish the game with Bell or Ivey at shooting guard and, as much as I hate it, move Redd to small forward.

But this is Sacramento you are playing, and Redd at small forward means that you force Ron Artest to guard him — something you want to try and avoid (or at least, make Sacramento do goofy stuff to get the Redd-Artest matchup).

This was a time for some original thinking, not a time to throw out the usual sub-par lineup and pray that they could shut down the Kings the rest of the way. This was a night where you had one choice — try to outscore them.

The thing to do, with 5 minutes to go and the game tied, was to move Yi to small forward and play Gadzuric at power forward.

Then you force Theus to react. He had already gone small (Urdih-Garcia-Salmons-Artest-Miller) but if the Bucks roll out Williams-Redd-Yi-Gadzuric-Bogut then the Kings wouldn’t be able to get a rebound and Artest would have to leave his power forward spot to guard Redd. Theus would probably have to pull Garcia and bring back Moore or Hawes, clearing more perimeter space for Redd to work.

This lineup probably wouldn’t have worked, since Urdih was unconscious from deep late in the game, but it would have given the Bucks a better chance, instead of sending Krystkowiak to the film wondering why his invisible “defenders” couldn’t stop an inferior team yet again.

Now that Larry Harris has been the GM of the Bucks for 4 full seasons, how good of a job has he done? He has built a young team with little future flexibility, as 8 players are under contract for between 3-6 years and nearly all of them should still be at or near their prime for the entire duration of their contracts. To his credit, Harris has not been afraid to make bold moves but one problem with locking up players to long contracts is that you are bound to reach some bad deals — and his bad ones have had major implications for the future of the franchise.

I think that the problem with Harris that he is either way too optimistic for his job or such a huckster salesman that he believes his own spiel too much. One of the most difficult things for a talent evaluator to do is to bring a guy in and then later admit he has made a mistake, which is something that Harris has had a major problem with. Before last season he was telling everyone who would listen that his team wasn’t just ready to make the playoffs, but to win a round; and even after the team had completely fallen apart he was still making moves as if he intended to make a playoff run once the team got healthy (such as by adding Earl Boykins and risking that Boykins would not opt-out of his contract).

However, this seasons results have shown that last years’ team was nowhere near a playoff contender in the first place. Is this young team a contender down the road? As currently composed, I’m not sure it is. It should get better, but there is no more cap flexibility for the foreseeable future so remaking the roster will get more and more difficult. The only way this team leaps into the Eastern Conference elite is if Yi becomes a star, and it’s still very difficult to predict that.

Many people often claim that Harris has no real power, and all the major decisions are actually made by Herb Kohl. While that may be true to a certain extent, any GM has to work within ownerships parameters, and no matter what the owner wants he does take advice from the GM. So I am going to leave Kohl’s influence out of my analysis, and also not discuss the coaching changes, which clearly were a result of past Herb Kohl relationships.

When Larry Harris was named GM on July 1, 2003, he inherited a complete mess. Ernie Grunfeld and George Karl had completely botched the franchise with a series of “lets win now”/”screw it, I’m outta here” moves that left the Bucks with almost no good, young talent except for Michael Redd and the newly drafted TJ Ford. They had nothing to show for Glenn Robinson, Ray Allen, and Sam Cassell except for Toni Kukoc, Joe Smith and Ford (good thing since they threw their own 2003 pick away on Gary Payton).

Much is unfairly made of the Bucks drafting Dirk Nowitzki and trading him, but that’s not fair since it was a pre-arranged draft day trade , if the Bucks hadn’t done that deal then Dallas would have simply taken Nowitzki themselves at #5. But an even worse crime had already been inflicted on the Bucks by Grunfeld and Karl.

In 2001, Grunfeld had traded the Bucks’ 2004 first round pick for nothing in order to clear cap space to sign Anthony Mason. This disastrous signing of an aging, overrated player with a massive attitude problem both tore the team apart and cost them the #17 pick in the 2004 draft, which turned out to be Josh Smith. That’s a bigger crime than the Nowitzki deal. You think the Bucks could use a 6’10″ small forward who is averaging 18 points, 8 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 blocks a game? No? Me neither.

Over the next four days I am going to analyze every major player transaction he has made during his tenure. Today I talk about the okay ones (ranging from “Good” to “Bad, but with an asterisk”. Tomorrow will be the seven “Great” to “Very Good” moves. Then the seven “Bad” to “Horrendous”, and, finally, “The One Move That Cannot Be Labeled”.)

Good Moves:

2005: Drafted Ersan Ilyasova. The young Turk was touted as a lottery pick before an ankle injury and rumors that he was in fact an older Uzbek torpedoed his draft stock. The Bucks have been searching for a big small forward ever since they didn’t get the chance to draft Josh Smith, and for a while it looked like they found one. Ilyasova shone in the NBDL his first year and was MVP of the Under-20 World Championships in the summer of 2006. Of course, the fact that he may have been 23 at the time may have something to do with him shining at that level, and his 2006 NBA campaign made him look like he never was an NBA athlete to begin with. He was still a reasonable risk, and Harris’ track record with European players was pretty good up to that point.

2005: Resigned Michael Redd (6 years/$95 million). I put this signing only in the “good” category because any idiot could have offered Redd the max to stay in Milwuakee and of course Redd’s agent (who gets a commission) would counsel him to take the extra money the Bucks could offer him over Cleveland’s deal. However, Harris’ salesman skills may have really shone in this free agency pursuit. Being second banana on a great team worked out just fine for Scottie Pippen, so I’m sure the opportunity to sign with his hometown team and run as LeBron’s wingman was tempting. I’m sure that Harris leaned on Redd pretty hard to show him that by leaving he’d be completely screwing the team that both gave him his big chance and dismantled its roster for him to shine. I’m sure at the time Redd was excited about the chance to lead his own team, but somehow I think that these days he keeps a pile of $100 bills on his nightstand to smack himself in the face with when he thinks about how he could have been in the finals last year.

2006: Signed Lynn Greer (2 yrs/1.5 million). Another European find, he had been a big scorer in Europe ever since the NBA realized that the best product John Chaney had ever put in the NBA was Mark Macon and took a pass on Greer. Unfortunately, Greer’s stay in Milwaukee was tragic, as his fiancée fell ill and passed away during the season. As a result, Greer missed time and never was used until well after the season was wasted. Greer would have been an able replacement for Charlie Bell this year, but after resigning Bell, Harris did Greer a favor and let him out of the final season of his contract in order to return to a better offer in Europe. It was still a good signing, just one that didn’t work out.

2006: Traded Jamaal Magloire for Steve Blake, Brian Skinner and Ha Seung Jin. Credit Harris for realizing that Magloire’s game had turned to crap and he had virtually no value whatsoever. Conventional wisdom would say that Magloire could be traded for a draft pick at the trade deadline, but Harris probably got as much back as he ever would, considering that Portland wasn’t able to move Magloire either. Besides, getting a pick back would probably have required the Bucks to take on some sort of longer salary commitment, which would have hurt them this past offseason.

2006: Traded Steve Blake for Earl Boykins and Julius Hodge. Given the way the Bucks season was going, this was a perfect trade for them. Boykins is the type of player that can sell some tickets, at 5’3″ he’s an inspirational story, and can score a little, but he won’t help you win at all. Because of his height there’s simply no way he can come close to pulling his weight defensively, and his shoot-first mentality leaves his teammates more interested in strangling him than running the offense. Not a bad way to dump games. Fortunately for the Bucks, Boykins opted out of his contract (as expected), saving Milwaukee $3 million and pretty much making it possible to sign Desmond Mason. However, as what must come as a surprise to Boykins, he is still unemployed. Something is wrong with Julius Hodge , you would think that he’d be the perfect guy to have as the backup to Michael Redd for 10 minutes a game (6’7″, can defend a little) but something about him caused the Bucks to release him as quickly as they could.

2007: Resigned Mo Williams (6 years/$52 million). Good move to keep Mo, as he is still only 24 years old and will be a part of the team as he reaches his prime and despite Mo being the only reasonable option for the Bucks, Harris kept the contract offer from getting out of hand. Williams has built himself up into one of the better point guards in the league, and his career trajectory to this point actually looks a lot like Chauncey Billups’. For that to continue, Mo will have to develop two major skills that he currently does not have , namely, becoming a lockdown defender and a foul-drawing machine. However, those were both knocks on Billups as well (as was the “point guard who does nothing but shoot” label), and point guards have a history of peaking later in their careers than other players. Mo is smaller than Billups, so he will probably never reach those All-Star heights, but still this contract should provide fair value with a 5-10% chance of being a real bargain by the time it ends.

2007: Signed Desmond Mason (2 years/$10 million). My feelings about Mason’s game are well documented (way too inefficient offensively to help, overrated defensively, good hustle guy who should get 10-15 minutes a game) but this was a good signing, especially since it has become apparent that Bobby Simmons is not and may never again be the same player he once was. Harris got a great insurance policy at small forward in Mason , a great character guy who won’t complain should he not play much, but if he does, at least he never gives less than maximum effort. There weren’t really any better options available in free agency for that role, and while $5 million a year is a bit much that doesn’t bother me since the contract is only for two years.

2007: Drafted Ramon Sessions. He sure has played well in the NBDL.

Bad Moves (but with an asterisk)

2005: Signed Bobby Simmons (5 years/$47 million). Because of Simmons’ injury problems this deal hasn’t worked out, and it’s starting to look like Simmons might not be the same player any more after surgery on his feet. That’s a tough injury for a basketball player to recover from, and it’s a shame. In 2004 Simmons was the NBA’s most improved player, an award that historically hasn’t meant much, but the 4 previous winners were Zach Randolph, Tracy McGrady, Jermaine O’Neal and Gilbert Arenas. Heady stuff. There’s no doubt that the Bucks overpaid for Simmons from the get-go, but Harris was under a lot of time pressure to get the deal done. They signed Simmons in the period between reaching an oral agreement with Michael Redd and actually signing him, so they technically used their cap space to get Simmons and then went over the cap to sign their own guy (Redd). Obviously it’s easy to look back now and say they should have offered Simmons’ contract to Gerald Wallace, but they didn’t have the time to sign the RFA Wallace and wait to see if Charlotte would match, and if they did then the Simmons opportunity might have been gone. Also, Harris could have done much, much worse as the rest of the free agent class of 2005 wound up being a complete disaster. It’s too bad that the Simmons signing will probably wind up being a bust, because it was the right move at the time.

2006: Traded TJ Ford for Charlie Villanueva. This is a hard trade to categorize as good or bad. It hasn’t worked out, but that’s not really anybody’s fault. Ford was a long way from being a good player after 3 seasons with the Bucks, but he only had played 1 ½ years due to injury. Mo was cheaper and an equally good player, so it only made sense to trade him, right? But it often takes point guards a long time to reach their potential, and while Ford busted out last season, it seemed to me that the improvement came more from being in a better situation for his game than actually improving. But then this year he definitely improved , and suddenly everybody holds their breath as the neck problem crops up. Clearly Ford will have to change his game to take less contact, but will he be as effective once he does? Charlie Villanueva is even more difficult to figure out. Such a tantalizing talent, but does he play physically enough to be a starting power forward? Is his head in the game consistently enough to be effective off the bench? I’m convinced that TJ has become a better player than he would have in the Bucks system (especially now that Krystkowiak has slowed the game down so much this season) and that ultimately, Charlie V will probably be playing somewhere else. What the Bucks get in that deal will be the final determinant of the quality of this trade.

You know, I was watching the Sacramento game, all set to write something positive about Krystkowiak’s coaching, because I really liked the cross-match of having Yi guard Brad Miller and Bogut take the smaller, more active Mikki Moore. Good move, since Moore operates closer to the basket and Yi’s wingspan might help bother Miler’s passing.

But then the fourth quarter started, and apparently Krystkowiak hasn’t learned anything from this losing streak. He’s still starting quarters with pathetic all-bench lineups and just sitting there, watching them get smoked.

Last night the culprit lineup was Ivey/Bell/Villanueva/Voshkul, rounded out — for varietys sake, I guess — with mister corkscrew jump hook himself, Desmond Mason! Bingo, instant 12-0 Sacramento run in only two minutes and the Bucks biggest lead of the night is gone.

Okay, so a similar lineup (Ivey/Bell/Mason/Villanueva/Bogut) had run off a 7-0 run to finish the third, but there is a big difference here. For one, this lineup includes Bogut, the Bucks’ best rebounder. Also, Charlie Bell was a fluke 3-3 from the floor during the last 3 minutes of the third quarter.

The idiocy of the fourth quarter lineup simply astounds me. Mason’s shot selection is consistently horrible, and whenever he creates you can only thing you can depend on is that the ball will come off the rim just as hard as he threw it there. Ivey is in the league solely for his defense, and whenever Voshkul does something well he gets this incredulous “I can’t believe that worked” look on his face. Despite the hot 3rd quarter, Bell is shooting under 30% this year. Is it really fair to expect Charlie V to carry the team as the only offensive option out there?

The only justification for leaving Mason in is that you wanted him to guard Ron Artest, but Artest sat down at the beginning of the fourth quarter, so that’s no excuse.

I tried to look back and see where Krystkowiak got the idea that he doesn’t need starters any more, and while he tried a version of this lineup a couple of times against Portland and it worked well, he did it with either Williams or Redd in at all times. That makes a lot more sense. With Bell this awful and Ivey such a non-factor offensively, you have got to have a backcourt scorer in at all times. It’s that simple.

He didn’t do it against Seattle, but against Golden State a 5 point deficit at the end of the first quarter became 16 with Bell/Ivey/Simmons/Villanueva/Gadzuric on the floor, although to be fair Golden State went on a 12-2 run when the starters came back in that game. It really didn’t matter what Krystkowiak did against the Warriors.

He did not come close to an all-bench lineup against the Clippers and — hey look at that! — the Bucks actually won that one.

Instead of experimenting with lineups composed of your worst players (too bad Damir Markota isn’t on the team any more. He’d probably be starting every 4th quarter under Coach K) I think that the science project du jour should be figuring out how to play Yi and Charlie V together.

There are two ways to do this — either a big lineup of Bogut-Yi-V, or Yi in the middle and Villanueva at power forward.

While Villanueva has had major defensive problems at small forward before, the tantalizing matchup problems that this creates for the opposition are very interesting. Since Yi hangs out on the perimeter so much and Bogut either works in the high post or under the basket on the weak side, a big frontcourt should allow Charlie V plenty of space for good scoring opportunities. This would also be a very good rebounding frontcourt, as while Villanueva and Yi are only average to below average rebounders for power forwards, V is a great rebounder for a small forward. This lineup would hurt their defense if the opposition has the wrong personnel (namely, a high-scoring small forward) but this team can’t stop anybody anyway.

Yi in the middle would be an upgrade over Voshkul (and the demoted Gadzuric) while allowing Villanueva to operate from his more normal position. This frontcourt would be too weak a rebounding group to play well for extended stretches (and would probably have to have Bobby Simmons at the “3″ in order to rebound at all), but at least it would be quick and athletic enough to have the chance to start some transition opportunities for the offense.

The bottom line is that Krystkowiak’s bungling of the second/fourth quarter rotations can be directly attributed as The Main Reason We Lost in three games now — Sacramento, Atlanta, and New York — and they haven’t helped out at all in a couple of other losses. Something has to change immediately, or this season will be as lost as last year, but without the injury excuses.

Oh, one more note regarding Yi and touches in the post — on the Bucks’ final two posessions of the first half Yi had his man sealed on the left block, called for the ball, and the man with the ball on the perimeter (first Williams, then Mason) completely ignored him. What is this? Some sort of freeze-out?

I have put the latest IPM player stats and NBA Power Rankings online, available through the links on the right side of the webpage. Buoyed by their fantastic 3-0 week, the Bucks moved up a couple of spots, and they now rate as the fifth best team in the East (#13 overall). I show them as the 8th best offense in the league, but only the #21 defense. Well, I guess that committment to defense thing still needs some work.

A few comments about the players:

Michael Redd (1.03 IPM, #21 overall, #12 guard): Still rebounding and getting assists at an unprecedented rate for him, the shots finally started falling for him this week. This just may have been the finest 3 game stretch of Redd’s career. He played LeBron James even (34/7/6 to LeBron’s 34/7/7) and — in what was unquestionably a first for Redd — outplayed Kobe Bryant. He then sealed the win against the Mavs on Saturday from the free throw line. Redd is up to 46% shooting for the season, and is off to his best start ever.

Andrew Bogut (0.899 IPM, #49 overall, #8 center): Boy, what a difference when you don’t have to face Howard, Okafor, Yao or Duncan every night. I hate to look at a 5 game stretch and say that a guy has turned the corner on his career, but Bogut just may …. be rounding into a much more solid player. He has been defending the rim agressively over the past 5 games, racking up 16 blocked shots, and has gotten his FG% back up to 50%. It appears that Bogut is rounding into a solid “fill in the gaps” type of player — not an everyday 20-10 type of guy, but a player who can give you what you need when you need it. Whether this level of production can continue is a good question, but I think he can solidly stay in this area as one of the “best-of-the-rest, not quite an all-star” centers. Raising that free throw percentage would be a nice plus, though.

Mo Williams (0.807 IPM, #79 overall, #37 guard): Good to have you back. Mo’s production has taken a major leap in the last week, and he’s suddenly averaging 8.3 assists per 40 minutes. 50 assists to 18 turnovers in the last 5 games is closer to what the Bucks need from him, and his shooting has remained pretty strong. And he’s even getting to the line a little! After a seriously slow start, Mo has gotten his production back in line with what it was last year.

Yi Jianlian (0.716 IPM, #138 overall, #61 forward): A little early to hit the rookie wall, isn’t it? Yi kind of disappeared for a while, seemingly taking several games off before showing up for some defense and rebounding against Dirk Nowitzki. His shooting is down to 42% and it appears that he’s gotten a little passive. I suppose that some inconsistency is to be expected from a rookie, hopefully the team’s hot streak continues and nobody notices the missing 7-footer.

Charlie Villanueva (0.678 IPM, #171 overall, #75 forward): Fortunately, Charlie V picked up the slack for Yi, posting 4 very strong games in the winning streak and playing well against Dallas as well. Seemed like he got his hands on a lot of balls against Dallas, and I was shocked to see that he finished with one point and 3 rebounds. Maybe he can motivate himself to 25 minutes a game behind Yi.

Desmond Mason (0.626 IPM, #216 overall, #92 forward): Alright, I admit it — I’m becoming somewhat enamored with Mason’s above-the-rim style. But his shooting has cooled off — 5-18 in the last 3 games — and he only managed 7 rebounds and 3 assists for the week. It seems like he manages to make a lot of positive stuff happen on the court — things that don’t show up in the box score, and his on court/off court differential is something else. But I still can’t shake the feeling that Mason is playing over his head, and at some point the Bucks will be better off giving more time to Simmons.