Bobby Fischer invented Fischer random chess. He considered the chess world ossified, hardened into its institutional knowledge and fat and happy without new inventions. (Imagine what he would think about what computers have done to the game since the 1990s.) At the time (and even more so today), chess openings were so specific and known that the first dozen or more moves of all master-level games were simply memorization contests. Oh, you made a tiny inaccuracy in your opening? A book told me that this move will punish you. So Fischer added castling and opposite-coloured bishops to shuffle chess -- meaning that all non-pawn pieces are shuffled across the back rows of the board -- to eliminate the role of memorization in the game and instead force players to be creative, unique, and dynamic. He had apparently practiced with Fischer Random chess for years to force those qualities into his game. In other words, he sacrificed his own floor, in the safety net provided by the massive history of theoretical knowledge, to raise his ceiling.
The Milwaukee Bucks tried to do the same this year. They started switching on defense. They made their offense more dynamic. They forced their team to add flexibility and dynamism to both sides of the ball. The cost, of course, was deemphasizing the massive institutional knowledge they had built in winning 116 games over the previous two seasons. The Bucks had gameplans so distinct that their players could perform them in their sleep. They tore up those opening databases this season, hoping that the house built on top of the ashes would be more flexible, better able to withstand storms. They hoped that they could do what Fischer did in 1972 when he became Chess World Champion. And they’ve done well! They’re in the Finals for the first time since 1974, when Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s Bucks lost to John Havlicek’s Boston Celtics.
But like much architecture built atop of ruins, the Bucks remain a house divided. They don’t fit smoothly into the modern NBA. Giannis Antetokounmpo, who looks like a god playing against mortals, forces himself at times to endure the eternal punishments doled out by the real (?) Greek gods. For being an annual threat to join the 50-40-90 club, which means to signal excellence and consistency, Khris Middleton has oscillated between wildly different impacts from game to game. And Jrue Holiday helps solidify their strengths, but he doesn’t solve their weaknesses.
The NBA prioritizes pull-up shooting, skill, and speed. It’s a wing scorer’s league, and the Bucks’ best player is a big masquerading as a point guard -- the only skills he doesn’t possess are those of the wing scorer. The Bucks, much like Fischer was in the chess world, don’t fit. But they smash their way in, making space for themselves regardless.
This week in Minute Basketball, square peg in a round hole.
Folk - A very special square peg
Square pegs, round holes - there are workarounds okay? It can work! Be it the Dutch settlers in America who quite literally pounded square pegs into round holes (a factoid I’m aware of because of incredibly strange small town museums, the one in Sturgis is mostly pitchforks from different eras and a train Caboose!), or when everything went sideways in Apollo 13 and their method of survival actually included MacGyver-ing carbon dioxide scrubbers (they absorb carbon dioxide, which is important in space it seems) that were square (!) into a cylindrical interface - the fix included cardboard, a sock, and duct tape (among other things), which maybe applies to Milwaukee’s team building. I’m not sure that’s up to you. The peg just has to be important enough to work with! For the Dutch? Uhhh, maybe? Erm, probably could’ve just found another way. For the crew in Apollo 13, it would seem the square peg (CO2 scrubbers) was incredibly important - so yes, Giannis.
Giannis Antetokounmpo is one of the most impressive physical specimens that the human race has ever been able to create. Sometimes I like to think about it that way, because maybe there’s a version of him that popped out in 640 AD who, instead of playing basketball, was instead crowned as a god king. A near immortal man who grew above all others. Nearby towns and cities would revere him. He would be the glorious square peg that an era was built on. But in the NBA he has to fit into the existing superstructure, and one that desperately wants to devalue him. So, this unprecedented mix of size, balance, and explosion is being bonked on the head repeatedly as everyone attempts to squeeze him into the round hole that is the NBA.
We saw Devin Booker slither and shake his way to 42 points on blistering efficiency. The sheer amount of counters a talented shotmaker has in the NBA is a lot to behold. And credit to Booker for having the immense talent to access each and every one of them. Antetokounmpo’s fit in the NBA, and halfcourt offense in particular is tricky because all of the things that make him incredibly special on a basketball court require proximity to the basket. It might sound absurd, but Antetokounmpo’s skillset is genuinely more unique for his size than Booker’s is for his - one is just more expansive. The road to guarding a perimeter talent in the NBA is a minefield, where one wrong step explodes in your face. Whereas the paint is more of a cage match. And with the Bucks shooting less than league average (34%) from downtown, Antetokounmpo is seeing more and more opponents in the cage with him.
The good news for Antetokounmpo is he is the god king of the cage match on the other end. Playing the brash and forceful brand of help-side defense that saw him awarded Defensive Player of the Year, he controls everything from the backline. For all of the people who clamour for Antetokounmpo to pull his shorts up on his thighs and pound the hardwood in isolation defense above the break, now is the time to acknowledge that he’s at his best covering ground from sideline to sideline and stonewalling players in help-side. Antetokounmpo’s brand of generational talent is as imperfect a fit as it comes in the NBA, but it is generational - and the Bucks continue trying to make it work.
Zatzman - Jrue Holiday
Milwaukee’s acquisition of Jrue Holiday carried the price tag of a bonafide superstar. Holiday’s credentials were of course spotless. He is one of the best isolation defenders at the guard position in the league, so his acquisition allowed the Bucks to lean into switching defenses. He is a great self-creating scorer. But the Bucks already had an elite defense. They already had an elite self-creating scorer. The Bucks bet, like Fischer, that if they raised their ceiling yet higher and ignored their floor, they would reap the rewards.
In 2018-19, Milwaukee’s offensive points per 100 possessions in the halfcourt sunk from 114.9 in the regular season to 107.4 in the playoffs against the Toronto Raptors. In 2019-20, It sunk from 113.1 in the regular season to 106.9 in the playoffs against the Miami Heat. The Bucks couldn’t score in the halfcourt in playoff losses. Antetokounmpo ran into walls when he put his head down. Middleton couldn’t score more in isolation than opposing teams’ entire offensive systems. The machine broke down. It was too stringent, too structured.
Some observers, myself included, might have thought that the Bucks needed a halfcourt orchestrator to redeem those minutes when the Bucks were forced to play slow. Instead of adding a player with an offensive skillset similar to Middleton’s, they might have considered a player who created easy baskets for teammates. And though the Bucks ended up trading for Holiday, another, more traditional, point guard in Chris Paul was equally available on the trade market.
The Bucks chose to raise their ceiling.
It worked for Milwaukee. Their points per 100 regular season possessions this year were 117.5, better than any mark an Antetokounmpo-led offense has reached. They haven’t played a series yet that saw their halfcourt offense solved.
In only the final minute of the Bucks’ Game 4 win, Holiday collected a contested offensive rebound, a steal, an assist, a defensive rebound, and a pair of free throws. He’s shot horrifically from the field through four games, a putrid 23 for 69, or 33.3 percent. He’s been even worse from deep. But he’s averaged 8 assists per game (more than he’s ever reached over a full playoffs or regular season in his career).
Holiday has filled in the cracks. He’s fit around his stars when they’re hot, helping the team’s bigs find the easy baskets that no one else on the team creates for them. He’s penetrated to the rim, strong as a hammer, smashing his way through defenders and preconceived notions of team structure alike. More comfortable at the rim than behind the arc, more of a scorer than a passer, Holiday doesn’t perfectly fit the mold of what a point guard looks like in the league today. He doesn’t perfectly fit the mold of what the Bucks ideally require. But like the Bucks themselves, he’s created his own space, by force as much as by creativity. And the Bucks are now two wins away from a championship.
Minute Basketball: Square Peg in a Round Hole