Let’s do some comparing and contrasting.

Player A averaged 18.3 points two years ago, but has never been within two points of that total for any other entire season of his career.  He came into the league as a point guard but quickly moved over to the wing in his rookie season.  His career assist percentage is 15.5, so he’s seen as a guy who keeps the ball moving on offense.  Solid is the word that most often describes his defense.  He’s not a bad guy to have around and he can occasionally carry a team.

Player B is a serious scoring threat.  Per 36 minutes, he’s averaged 20 points for his career.  A stat-geek’s best friend, his true shooting percentage and PER are always better than league average.  Though he’s traditionally not a strong outside shooter, he’s made better than 36% of his threes this season.  With each new stop, his defensive reputation precedes him and he’s seen as selfish offensively, despite a sterling locker room reputation.

Player A has played at least 30 minutes in all but six games he’s played in this season, while Player B has managed only 13 such games this season, his most recent coming February 11.

By now, you know I’m referring to John Salmons and Corey Maggette. At least you probably know, and you probably knew immediately.  But you’re probably wondering why I’d be comparing these two.  Salmons has spent the majority of his season at the two, while Maggette is more a three.  Whenever Carlos Delfino has been healthy this season, he’s been Maggette’s main competitor for minutes, not Salmons.  But this isn’t about competition.  It’s actually about last season and how sample size affected the Bucks.

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(Head on over to NBAPlaybook for a breakdown of Milwaukee’s last play)

Just like that, the Bucks can now head quietly into the night.  A night filled with meaningless basketball for a half month.

Everyone has spent a great deal of time focusing on Milwaukee’s questionable final 30 seconds of their 89-88 loss to the Indiana Pacers Friday night.  First, Coach Scott Skiles opting not to foul with the Bucks down one with 26.7 seconds left and second, Milwaukee’s final shot, a desperation Drew Gooden three as the buzzer sounded.  If you’ve watched these Bucks under Skiles for some time though, the decision not to foul shouldn’t be a surprise.  So long as there is time to get off a shot, he’s rarely fouled in situations like these during his Bucks career.  That didn’t leave time for anything more than a quick shot, regardless of who was going to take it, but it really isn’t even worth debating.  That’s just how things will be here.

But there were far more damning aspects of Friday evening’s game.

Take the entire second quarter for example.  After an okay start combined with an abysmal one from the Pacers, Milwaukee had an incredible opportunity coming into the second quarter.  An eight point lead and the chance to tack some more on to try and blow this thing open before halftime.  But the Bucks came out bumbling once again, making just six of 25 shots in the quarter while playing ineffective defense.  They dropped the second quarter 32-17 and faced a seven point deficit going into halftime.

After the starters gave up six quick points in the third quarter, Coach Skiles went desperate, bringing in Corey Maggette, Earl Boykins and Gooden to attempt to spark a lifeless club.  Regardless of how you feel about the minutes Maggette has received over the past couple weeks and your general feelings on Boykins, this was a terrible sign.  In a game the Bucks absolutely had to have, Milwaukee resorted to the end of their bench minutes into the third quarter because its starters were so outplayed by an average Pacer team.

In the most important game of the year.

The game the Bucks had been talking up the past few days and had really been on everyone’s mind all week, was apparently no cause for improved play among the Bucks starting five.  The group that had regularly been seeing 40 minutes a game, lost their coaches confidence minutes into the third quarter of this game.

As much as anything, THAT sums up this season.  Not that last unfortunate, erratic Gooden shot or Skiles stubborn decision making with the game on the line.  It was the Bucks never failing ability this season to be inexplicably incapable offensively at any and all times, be it the second game of the year against the T-Wolves or the last important one against the Pacers.

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With Michael Redd and Drew Gooden working their way back onto the Milwaukee Bucks active roster, questions are bound to arise regarding just how minutes will be divvied up if the Bucks soon return to full health, something they haven’t had to deal with at virtually any point during this season.

But until they do, those questions are not of much concern to Scott Skiles.  At least publicly.  While his team battled through injures all season, Skiles has repeatedly refused to speculate on how he would divy up minutes upon the return of various players, from Chris Douglas-Roberts and Carlos Delfino earlier in the year to Redd and Gooden now.  Skiles words to the Journal-Sentinel Tuesday afternoon were in line with the comments he’s made throughout the season: “We’ll see what we do tomorrow night. We’ll see who’s healthy and who can go, and go from there.”

Milwaukee is not taking health for granted and is not looking ahead.  Skiles especially.  Milwaukee’s coach doesn’t seem to be worried about bruised egos or ominous acronyms.  If a player is left with nothing but a DNP-CD next to his name at the end of a game, it isn’t necessarily because that player hasn’t landed in a dog house or did something wrong, especially this season.  Having spent an entire season searching for groups that play well together, Skiles isn’t likely to break up any on court chemistry the Bucks are able to muster up at this point simply to get someone minutes every night.

So while Redd and Gooden would surely love to jump back in and pour in 30 productive minutes for the Bucks every night, don’t expect such a dramatic overhaul to happen over night.  Simply look at the case of Corey Maggette.

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Recap/Box Score/Enemy

Over the years, the NBA trade deadline has been blamed for a lot of bad basketball.  A great example of this phenomenon came roughly a year ago, right here in Milwaukee.

At that point, the Bucks hadn’t started that second half surge that birthed the Fear the Dear mantra.  They wouldn’t acquire John Salmons until later that night.  It was actually his rumored deal that seemed to have some players on edge. With rumors swirling about, Milwaukee had one of their worst performances of the season when they lost to the Houston Rockets 127-99.  After the game the talk was of the possible Salmons trade — who would be heading out, which draft picks would exchange hands — not the loss that seemed out of place after a strong run of games by the Bucks.

NBA players are human beings, susceptible to the same lapses in focus that any of us are.  That was the explanation on trade deadline eve last season, and it seemed more than reasonable.  Especially after the Bucks played so well for the remainder of the season.

Fast forward a year (and five days).  With very little trade talk surrounding the team, there was no indication that any key players for the Bucks were too concerned about being shipped out, though you wouldn’t know that from the Bucks performance.  The same problem that has plagued the team like a bad virus all season followed the Bucks back to Milwaukee after the All-Star break.  This time it invaded during a win though, so face was largely saved.  But for the 24 time this season, Milwaukee failed to shoot better than 40% in a 94-88 win over the T-Wolves Tuesday night.

This is more than likely the team that will be in Milwaukee the rest of the season, bar a minor move.  Honestly, the plan appears to be to hope that problems this same team has dealt with all season take care of themselves.  For the last few weeks the lines in the locker room have been the same: “we need to make a run”, “it’s time to turn it on”, “now is our opportunity to gain some ground”, all that good stuff.  Coach Scott Skiles said them again before Tuesday’s game:

“We’ve got a chance to go out and start playing well and prove that we’re the team that people thought we were going to be in the beginning of the season.”

The chance has always been there, but the Bucks have yet to seize it.  It was business as usual Tuesday night, a lackadaisical win over an opponent that walked on the court with a 13-43 record.  But the Bucks entered the fourth quarter tied.  That’s hardly the statement about the kind of team they are that Skiles was looking for.   At this point a win may be a win, and surely the Bucks need every one of them they can get if they intend to stay in the race for the final playoff spot, but this team that played Tuesday night won’t be one that scares anybody in the league come April.

The Bucks are betting that this team isn’t the one that will show up in April.  Same faces, sure, but different performance.  Right now, the odds aren’t looking good on that bet.

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Recap/Box Score/Enemy

For the Bucks to score consistently and be a good offensive team in general, someone different has to step up every game.  That was the line on the Bucks earlier this season.  Since then, things have kind of went awry and rather than having someone step up every night, more often than not, no one has.

That’s the drawback to the Bucks model.  Players that aren’t stars won’t be as consistent about getting it done every night.  But with so many options, the theory went, everyone wouldn’t be off every night and that would balance out the inconsistencies.  But there has been no balance.  Just a lot of missed shots all season.

But Wednesday night?  Wednesday night was a little bit more like the Bucks expected this season.  It seemed to be the exception to a season long funk.  But then reality set in.  At about the same time it always does for the Bucks.  Late in the fourth quarter.

With 4:22 remaining, Milwaukee scored points 85 and 86 on a John Salmons jumper.  That would be their final field goal.  Only one Andrew Bogut free throw down the stretch prevented the Bucks from going scoreless, as they blew a lead that was as large as five points in the fourth quarter in a 94-87 loss to the Denver Nuggets Wednesday night.

Milwaukee missed its final 10 shots as the Nuggets slowly pulled away.  The Bucks saw their shooting percentage plummet from 44.3% to their final total of 38.8%.  It was a scene all too familiar to Bucks fans, even though the rest of the game seemed to be a revolution.

Brandon Jennings and Bogut were unable to find their form early, at halftime, late or ever, but players around them rose to the challenge.  Salmons in particular seemed to seize the ESPN spotlight before Milwaukee melted down. Salmons finished with his highest scoring total as a member of the Bucks, 33 points.

At about the same time he seems to do so annually, Salmons has begun to look like the guy the Bucks traded for last February.  Against the Nuggets, all those shots that had been rimming out earlier this season found the bottom of the net.  The more they did, the more confident Salmons looked.  There was no hesitation by the fourth quarter.  He attacked the hoop not worrying about anyone on the Nuggets impeding his progress and, most importantly, he finished.  At least until the finish.

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