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Multiple sources across the league said the Bucks' asking price was enormous, with an executive from a third team describing the Bucks' process as "gauging the market" and their price as "all our draft picks and good young players." The Golden State Warriors offer included four unprotected first-round picks in pursuit of Antetokounmpo, sources said, but never seemed to gain much momentum on a deal. The players the Bucks did seem interested in were younger building blocks such as VJ Edgecombe of the Philadelphia 76ers or Evan Mobley of the Cleveland Cavaliers, sources said.
The Bucks do not own their first-round pick in 2027 as the last remnant of the Holiday trade, so there is no impetus for the team to “tank” or once again be a bad team next season. So, league sources have told the Journal Sentinel for the better part of a year that should they elect to trade Antetokounmpo, they will try to extract any and all desirable assets from the acquiring team.
So far, the Bucks' play on waiving-and-stretching Lillard in order to sign Turner has backfired. Antetokounmpo has missed 32 games with various injuries, Turner has not been impactful, and the Bucks have struggled to find any consistency. After a season like this, multiple league executives made the case that the Bucks' best strategy would be to trade Antetokounmpo for a haul of draft picks and strong young players rather than doubling down on this season's failed experiment and offering him a massive extension. "He's still a game changer, but he's 31 with a history of leg injuries," a rival executive said. "And now you'd basically be trading for a guy on an expiring deal, so I'm not sure the offers they'll get this summer are going to be better than what they already got."
Those who have done business with the Bucks, including teams that inquired about Antetokounmpo before the trade deadline, told ESPN that Haslam was more involved in decisions than before. One team owner even had direct negotiations with Haslam rather than Edens about a potential deal for Antetokounmpo, multiple sources with knowledge of the discussions told ESPN. "We mostly dealt with [GM Jon] Horst," an executive with one of the teams that heavily engaged with the Bucks told ESPN. "But our impression was that Jimmy was really the one who would decide this."
While hailed for its boldness and potential at the time, not only did it not work out as planned, it diminished the team's assets as the pressure built to win with Antetokounmpo in his prime. To add insult to injury, Holiday ended up winning a title with the Bucks' Eastern Conference rival, the Boston Celtics, the next season. Subsequently, sources told ESPN that Antetokounmpo confided to Holiday how much he and the Bucks missed Holiday's defense and leadership.
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Myles Turner: “We go to the Eastern Conference Finals, and this is so rare, bro. Like, this is the year before the finals. We had a team of like eight or nine guys in contract years. And typically when that happens, like chemistry is messed up. Everybody's worried about what they got to do for themselves. That wasn't the case, bro. We had such an amazing group, bro. And we, you know, we talk about lockers all the time, bro. You win, everybody gets paid. Like, that's the ultimate goal. And that's ultimately what happened. We won and like seven of those guys all got great contracts. Everybody got paid, right? Everybody got what they were supposed to get paid. So, I knew my contrib was the next year, right? So, in my head, I'm thinking, all right, well, you know what? It's my turn. You know what I mean? Like, you know, I'm going to the prime of my career.”
Myles Turner: “So, in my head, I'm thinking, all right, well, you know what? It's my turn. You know what I mean? Like, you know, I'm going to the prime of my career. These are the most, you know, the prime money-making parts of my career, what not. I got to take full advantage where I'm at. So, we get to the finals. Yeah. And I'm thinking, we just superseded what we did the year before and I'm the only one really in the contract year. And, you know, with with Indiana, they're one of the few organizations that have never gone into the luxury tax. And what's being told to me is like pretty much all year is that you know you know we're we're going to lux make sure we take care of you yada yada and then again we lose in the finals whatnot. Hi goes down and then we get to free agency which is like a couple days later basically and they're singing a different tune. So they present their offer to me and you know I know how business works and I thought it was a lowball offer but I thought you know you work up from there right and then I get presented an offer with Milwaukee that's $40 million more. And like of course anybody this is a business at the end of the day, bro. I can't I love Indiana. I love where I was at. We got to the finals, but it's like I got to make a decision that's best for me and my family.
Myles Turner: So, I think in their heads what they was thinking cuz obviously you know the little the thing that happened with Damian Lillard had they waved and stretched out. It created a lot more cap space. And if you look at the cap space for that summertime, I think in their heads they was thinking there was nowhere else for me to go. Which I'm a businessman. I'm like, ‘Okay, cool. I got this asset. There's nowhere else for him to go. I'm off from a low bomb and see what happens.’ So they made that final offer on the table and whatnot and they weren't willing to go up very high, you know, contrary to what's said out there, they wasn't willing to go up and once the news broke, it was like a oh [ __ ] he betrayed us, you know what I mean?”
Myles Turner: “I couldn’t tell Tyrese, Pascal, Obi, TJ, or any of those guys what was really going on at the time because, one, it’s basically a breach when you’re in active negotiations. And two, I couldn’t show my hand. If I told them what was up, then all of a sudden it gets back to the front office like, ‘Oh, Myles, you’ve got this going on,’ and that could mess up my whole free-agency process. And mind you, this was my first time ever being a free agent—an unrestricted free agent. So I had to cherish that opportunity to choose, and I was going to take full advantage of it.”
Myles Turner: “So, and again, like, you know, there was like comments that that I said afterwards that people kind of took and spun for their own narrative, whatnot. You know, I'm saying like I'm in a spot that is going to appreciate me now. And about then I was talking about the front office, but they in the city of Indiana took it on them like, ‘Oh, we appreciate you for years. The [__] are you talking about?’ “And then I got on a podcast just like this and started talking about, you know, Tyrese and like our relationship or whatnot. Talked about him for like what, like, I don't know, maybe like five minutes of everything that we had been through. Then it took like a 5-second clip, but I said something about like, uh, oh, fake tough guy, this, this, and that. Clip farm that and try to make me into like into the enemy and whatnot. Like that's just how it goes, bro. But I mean again I understood game afterwards and you know it was real no no real bad blood but kind of just is what it is cuz it is a rivalry and now I'm forever just going to kind of be that guy. The hardest part was getting booed though. I will say that going back to the arena and then you know you put 10 years of your life and your blood sweat into like you know an organization. I got booed throughout the entire tribute video bro. And again like the what people say is that I deserved it because of like what I said and this and that.”
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Myles Turner: I rock with Rick (Carlisle) too. He’s one of my favorite coaches. But I think he was salty too. You know what I’m saying? With how everything shook out.
Milwaukee Bucks co-owners Wes Edens and Jimmy Haslam told ESPN in a joint 90-minute interview that they will decide the path to take with their two-time MVP together, and the most important factor will be whether Giannis Antetokounmpo signs the four-year, $275 million extension he is eligible to receive on Oct. 1. "Giannis is going into the last year [of his contract]," said Edens, the team's controlling owner until April 2028. "So one of two things will happen: Either he will be extended or he'll be traded." "The likelihood you'll let him just kind of play out the last year, we can't afford that. It's not consistent with what's good for the organization. That's not a Giannis issue. That's any player that's in their last year."
Yet team sources, rival executives and league insiders question whether the situation is that simple. Interviews with more than a dozen people with knowledge of the situation say what's happening in Milwaukee goes beyond a typical NBA franchise's struggle to maintain a winning roster: A unique ownership structure has made it difficult for opposing franchises to identify who is actually running the team. "This has nothing to do with Giannis and whether he asks out," said one source with knowledge of the team's operations. "It's about who's making the decision on whether to trade Giannis, and I don't think anyone knows that. I deal with them all the time and honestly it depends on the day. "They're not even close to being ready to make a decision like that."