It begins.

Monday was the first day NBA teams could openly court free agents, and the courting has begun with some gusto. And not surprisingly, the Milwaukee Bucks haven’t been widely rumored to be involved with much of the bidding.

But Gery Woelfel has a few tidbits about potential Bucks targets. Woelfel interviewed long shot Bucks target, Dallas Mavericks forward and Racine native Caron Butler. Butler did not outright rule out the Bucks as a landing spot:

Milwaukee definitely reached out and, obviously, that’s always a high consideration because it’s home. I’m a hometown guy. I’m a guy who always likes coming back and doing things in the community.

Read more…

Recap/Box Score/Enemy

Finally, the injury bug bit an opponent of the Bucks, and not just the Bucks.

A Dallas team already without Dirk Nowitzki and Shawn Marion saw Caron Butler go down in the first quarter and was unable to ever get over the hump against a competitive Bucks group that was finally making a few shots.  There’s some sort of code in sports where no one is allowed to use injuries as an excuse for failure, even if they are clearly a primary culprit, but on night’s like this one in which they balance out a bit, it’s interesting to see the effects.

Milwaukee was matching up their reserves with Mavericks reserves repeatedly on the evening and that was clear in the play.  Reserves are on the bench for a reason.  Sometimes it’s because they are specialty players, other times it’s because they are unable to be consistent and Dallas trotted both types of players out all night.  Aside from JJ Barea (29 points), Dallas’ reserves and fill-ins offered little.

Steve Novak, for as much as Milwaukee loves him, isn’t exactly striking fear into the hearts and minds of anyone around the league.  Sure, he hit a three, but he also let Milwaukee wings blow by him a couple of times.  Jason Terry made only three of 15 shots and big men Brendan Haywood, Alexis Ajinca and Ian Mahinmi combined for 21 largely useless minutes.

As he’s done a number of times lately, Earl Boykins led the way for the always hurting Bucks.  On a collection of floaters and free throws, the guard provided the Bucks the offensive spark they needed, scoring a season high 26 points.  Combined with another strong effort from John Salmons (21 points, 9-15 FG, 2-4 3FG) Milwaukee’s back court had one of their very best efforts of the season in a game that initially looked like it would be especially challenging. Read more…

It’s hard to tell what was a more desperate scene: the Bucks launching three-point shots as time ticked away on their 109-97 loss to Washington or those in attendance attempting to navigate on the snowy Milwaukee streets after the game.

Neither was pretty, but both made me think about some things.

1. I hate snow.
2. I don’t want to return to 2007

You remember 2007, right?  That was the year Charlie Bell and Michael Redd combined to average 31 shot attempts each and every night.  Mo Williams often paired with these two to form one of the worst defensive backcourts in recent Bucks memory.  Needless to say, the Bucks lost a whole lot more than they won in 2006-07.  But I had been comfortably assuming for most of this year that those days were a distant memory.

Wednesday night served as some kind of horrific flashback though Read more…

Washington Wizards (Flip Saunders) 9-17

(Probable) Inactives: Jaravis Crittenton, Mike James and Mike Miller

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Milwaukee Bucks (Scott Skiles) 12-14

(Probable) Inactives: Joe Alexander, Dan Gadzuric and Roko Ukic

Date: 12/23/2009

Time: 7:00 (CST)

TV: FS Wisconsin

Match-Ups

Point Guard

Brandon Jennings vs. Gilbert Arenas

Lost in the free throw madness Monday was Brandon Jennings’ lone miss.  It was his first miss in 29 attempts, unheard of for this Milwaukee Bucks team.  When it comes to free throw shooting for this team, Jennings is like a rose growing out of cracked cement.  Arenas may finally be coming back on, he’s scored over 30 points in three of his past four games, including 45 against Golden State.  But we know about Golden State’s defense.  Being in company with Gil is not as illustrious as it used to be, but it’s still pretty cool for Jennings.  Of course, Jennings has upped his assists and tried involving teammates more since his fast start, but I’d expect both of these guards to get their shots in tonight.

Advantage: Wizards Read more…

Milwaukee Bucks (Scott Skiles) 9-7

(Likely) Inactives: Joe Alexander, Michael Redd

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Washington Wizards (Flip Saunders) 6-10

(Likely) Inactives: Jarvis Crittenton, Mike James and Mike Miller

Date: 12/2/2009

Game time: 6:00 (CST)

TV: FS Wisconsin

Match-ups

Point Guard

Brandon Jennings vs. Gilbert Arenas

So is it all done then?  The whole Gilbert Arenas is a fun, up-and-coming star who shoots when he wants, makes up crazy names for himself and makes the Wizards a relevant team, is it done?  It sure looks like it.  When I mosey on over to basketball-reference.com to check out a few things about other teams I usually have an idea of what I’m going to see.  But I didn’t have a clue on what I’d see about Gil when I checked him out.  Why didn’t I have a clue?  Because I haven’t heard anything at all about Gil or the Wiz all year.  They’ve been irrelevant, aside from an injury here or an injury there.  I vaguely remember hearing that Arenas supposedly wants to be fun again.  I thought I heard something about him needing one million followers on Twitter before his first tweet.  But no longer are his on-court exploits worth much.  That’s what knee surgery after knee surgery will do to you.  He’s 28, a touch younger than the Bucks own former star robbed of mobility by injuries Michael Redd. To think either of them will be relevant as stars in the league again seems like a stretch.

Advantage: Bucks Read more…