Was this Bucks season a flop? Giannis and Budenholzer answer
Giannis Antetokounmpo and Mike Bodenholzer were asked if they viewed the Milwaukee Bucks season as a failure. Their answers were emotional and powerful.
Cassidy Hill, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Milwaukee Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo may not be playing at FIBA Basketball World Cup This summer, but he is expected to be fully prepared for the upcoming NBA season.
Athletic’s Shams Charania reported for the first time on Wednesday that the 28-year-old Antetokounmpo underwent a knee cleaning two weeks ago and his status with the Greek national team was uncertain.
The World Cup matches are scheduled to take place from August 25 to September 25. 10 in the Philippines, Japan and Indonesia.
“Yes, he had routine surgery on his left knee and it went well,” Bucks coach Adrian Griffin said later Wednesday. “Everything went as planned and we expect him to be back ready to go to training camp.”
Antetokounmpo suffered several nagging injuries last season, and has faced a lot of pain in his 10-season career. He suffered a lower back contusion in Game 1 of the Bucks’ first-round series with the Miami Heat, causing him to miss the next two games. He returned in Game 4, but Milwaukee’s season ended in a 4-1 defeat.
Antetokounmpo has also been bothered by sore knees, but the Bucks star has missed several games this season due to soreness in his left knee. He sat out three of the four games from November 5 to 11 and did not play in three more games before January 1 due to illness. The pain then caused Antetokounmpo to miss five consecutive matches from January 12 to 21.
The left knee is the one he injured in the 2021 Eastern Conference Finals before returning in the NBA Finals and leading the Bucks to their first championship in 50 years.
Antetokounmpo missed several matches in the 2021-22 season due to soreness in his right knee.
Last season, he also suffered a right wrist injury when he fell into a basket rack in Chicago on February 16. .
Shortly after the Bucks were eliminated, Antetokounmpo and his family returned to Greece, where they spend the majority of the off-season. Griffin traveled there to spend time with Antetokounmpo in early June and teammate MarJon Beauchamp also flew to Greece to work with the star.
Beauchamp has since returned to the United States and will play for the Bucks summer team in Las Vegas starting this week. He noticed nothing wrong with Antetokounmpo during their time together.
“Giannis is Giannis,” Beauchamp said Wednesday. “So, yeah, it’s good.”
Two of Antetokounmpo’s brothers, Thanassis and Kostas, are still expected to play for Greece in the World Cup. Thanassis has been with the Bucks since 2019, but no deal has been reported for next season.
Giannis played for Greece in 2014 and 2019 during the FIBA World Cup, as well as in the 2015 and 2016 EuroBasket Qualifiers. Interestingly, he sat out EuroBasket 2017 with a sore knee. This angered officials in Greece, who felt the move had been orchestrated by the Paks.
Giannis returned with the Greek national team last September to participate in the FIBA European Championship. When he returned to Milwaukee a few weeks later to start training camp with the Bucks, he pitched how playing international basketball helps his game.
“First of all, the game in Europe is much more difficult than the game in the NBA,” Giannis said. “I know talent in the NBA is way above, but space, you have a lot of lanes to drive the ball, a lot of lanes to create.
“There, it’s more intense. People will take you the whole field, double your team, full court area man-to-man until the last five seconds. And double teams, they start from an area and then go man-to-man for the last 10 seconds and then double your team in the post; there are no Driving lanes, it’s more physical.”
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