“Today was just a great day.  My teammates were looking for me.”

-          Thaddeus Young 3-7-2010

“We’re loaded with guys who know how to put the ball in the basket. We all enjoy sharing the ball.”

-          Jason Kidd 3-6-2010

“We’re not good enough to play 1-on-1.”

-          Mike Miller 3-5-2010

“We found spots and moved the ball and had open shots.”

-          Luol Deng 2-26-2010

It’s not easy to quantify unselfishness.  Yes, we know it’s important, and those quotes I’ve selected from players in postgame interviews all have to do with the idea of unselfishness.  Ad nausea, coaches and players will talk about how unselfish they were in wins and how selfish they were in losses.  But, aside from assists, the NBA doesn’t really have any other statistics that express how one player is creating points for his teammates or how a team is working together.  There are certain units on teams that play well together, do a better job rebounding or defending or shooting, but unselfishness itself is one of those difficult to calibrate traits.  One that’s nearly immeasurable.

So naturally I’m going to try and show you how unselfish the Bucks have been in the last ten games.

It’s actually quite amazing, because, to be honest, unselfishness hasn’t exactly been a hallmark of the Milwaukee Bucks over the years.  In what one could refer to as “The Dead Era” of Bucks basketball 2003-2008, the Bucks were a typically competent offensive team that couldn’t defend and as a result, didn’t win much.  As someone who spent many a day watching and cursing the selfish nature of these teams, I can assure you these teams were only competent offensively because of their relative talent on that side of the ball.  What I’m trying to say, is that Mike Redd could fill it up.  Rarely was there a cohesive team effort at either end though.  When looking back at the numbers of these teams, the assist to turnover ratio reflects on the selfish nature.

In 2003-04, the Bucks ranked 4^th in the league in offensive rating.  The Bucks had a team assist to turnover ratio of 1.68-1 and had a shot at knocking off the Nets in the first round, but Tim Thomas didn’t box out Rodney Rodgers on a free throw and Terry Porter mysteriously refused to play Dan Gadzuric (when he was still good, 17 PER) in the playoffs.  But that’s all a story for another day, what’s important is that these Bucks, spearheaded by a pre-injury T.J. Ford, weren’t selfish.

In the following season, Ford got hurt, Mo Williams became entrenched as the Bucks point guard, Redd began his all angles assault on the basket and eventually the Bucks imploded after many years of selfish, losing basketball.  Each year the Bucks assist to turnover ratio dropped, further and further before cresting around 1.45-1.

There was an uptick in the ratio in Scott Skiles first season at the helm, but things really took off halfway through this current season. Read more…

Scott Skiles had to laugh, probably to keep himself from crying, but maybe to keep himself from running on the court and launching an impromptu tutorial on how to properly shoot a free throw.  After all, we’re talking about a guy who was an 88.9 percent free throw shooter for his career.

So the 0-7 finish the Bucks had at the free throw line Monday night was properly particularly devastating for their coach to watch.

And it’s unfortunate that the once again unacceptable free throw shooting takes away from the positives that this game brought.  Andrew Bogut had the best game of his career, dominating Roy Hibbert and everyone else the Pacers threw at him en route to 31 points and 18 rebounds.  And Bogut was able to cede control of the ending to Brandon Jennings, who had another frigid looking shooting night at 7-19, but hit a three and fall-away jumper in the last two minutes that helped give the Bucks just enough breathing room.

And that’s how everyone envisions the Bucks being successful, ride Andrew Bogut relentlessly all game and then let Jennings handle the ball and make plays in the fourth quarter, it’s the perfect big man/little man set up.  And for one night the Bucks had it going.

And still, Milwaukee almost blew the game.

Sigh. Read more…

Milwaukee Bucks (Scott Skiles) 11-14

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

at

Indiana Pacers (Jim O’Brien) 9-16

(Likely) Inactives: Travis Diener, Jeff Foster and Danny Granger

Date: 12/21/2009

Time: 6:00 (CST)

TV: FS Wisconsin

Match-Ups

Point Guard

Brandon Jennings vs. T.J. Ford

I get that Brandon Jennings can occasionally frustrate Bucks fans.  He’s struggled recently and sometimes puts up a lot of shots.  In the box scores it’s not always so pretty.  So the next time you find yourself complaining about something Brandon Jennings has done, mosey on over to Basketball-Reference.com and look at T.J. Ford’s page.  T.J. Ford is 1-25 on three’s.  His assist percentage is lower and turnover percentage is higher than Jennings’.  And this is just who Ford is as a player.  He isn’t likely getting any better, we now can feel comfortable expecting this out of him.  Ford is one of many great examples of players Brandon Jennings is better than, despite being significantly younger.  So next time you’re in panic mode, just go check him out and realize the Bucks could be in worse shape.

Advantage: Bucks Read more…