The Bucks fired first-year coach Adrian Griffin after only 43 games – with a 30-13 record, second best in the league at the time – and it may prove to be the thing that holds them back this season.
The Bucks made the move to fire Griffin citing the team’s regression on defense from the previous year – but that may not be all Griffin’s fault.
When the Bucks made it to the last round of interviews, they included Giannis Antetokounmpo, Khris Middleton and Jrue Holiday. That was the core that Griffin expected to have when he got the job.
Then the Bucks decided to make a splash. They traded for Damian Lillard and sent away Holiday as a part of the deal.
It’s not surprising to see the defense regress when giving up a one of the best defensive-minded guards in Holiday and replacing him with Damian Lillard. The Bucks chose offense over defense.
So when they fired Griffin and cited defensive production, my main question was, “What did you expect?”
The team is currently 19th in the league in defensive rating with 117 according to Basketball Reference. On the other hand, they’re 4th in offensive rating with 120.5. This all lines up with the blockbuster trade they made in the offseason.
Now let’s look at who they got to replace Griffin – Doc Rivers.
Rivers has a good resumé at leading teams with superstars to the playoffs, but not much success in them. Over the last three years as the coach in Philadelphia, the 76ers lost in the second round of the playoffs three straight years.
Every year, the 76ers could not get over the hump and find themselves in even a conference championship.
Now that Rivers has taken over in Milwaukee, the team hasn’t looked any better defensively. In the first five games in his tenure, the team has gone 1-4 and given up at least 110 points in every game.
To be fair, that isn’t much time for a coach to be able to get his systems put in place – especially midseason – but this is what the Bucks chose when they fired Griffin.
They decided to go after a veteran head coach with championship experience, but Rivers’ last and only NBA title was in 2008 and he has only won one conference championship since. All his teams since have been notorious for their playoff struggles.
Now who knows if the actual reason for Griffin’s firing had to do with something in the locker room, but with no confirmation of that, all there is to go off is how the team looked on the court with Griffin as coach.
It’s too early to tell if this is going to be a story like the 1981-82 Los Angeles Lakers or the 2015-16 Cleveland Cavaliers.
This team certainly has the talent to compete for a championship with Giannis, Dame and the rest of their supporting cast but it’s a huge gamble to bring in a coach midseason and Rivers doesn’t exactly have the playoff resumé to inspire confidence that they can overcome this challenge.
Only time will tell if the Bucks can add their name to the teams who win a championship despite firing a coach midseason but firing Griffin might just prove to be what holds them back.
