How do the Bucks slow Jimmy Butler? They may need to try anything — and everything

MILWAUKEE — With their Game 4 loss to the Heat on Monday in Miami, the Bucks are now facing a 3-1 deficit in a best-of-seven series.

It is a place no team wants to be, but also a spot where a comeback is still possible. In NBA history, 13 teams have clawed back and won a series after trailing a best-of-seven series, 3-1. The team to do it most recently outside of the bubble, where the Nuggets did it twice in 2020, was the LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers, who won the franchise’s first NBA championship in 2016 by coming back from a 3-1 deficit against the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals.

“You have to that mindset of one at a time because that’s the way it works,” Bucks center Brook Lopez said. “You can’t go out there and win three at once. That’s the way it is. It’s a simple observation, but we’re forced to approach it that way because that’s the way it works.”

The Bucks cannot spend any of their time thinking about this, but here is another simple observation: every game in which the Bucks could be eliminated from the playoffs is potentially the final game with their championship core.

Around a team, those things tend to go unsaid because everyone is focused on keeping the run going and spending any amount of time thinking about life after this playoff run is time not spent trying to figure out how to keep this run alive.

So, while nobody wants to think about the end of their run together or anyone potentially leaving after the season, the end of this run is a reality for the Bucks this postseason. That’s because the future of two of the four players behind one of the most successful five-year runs in franchise history is in question as soon as this season ends.

Three-time All-Star Khris Middleton has a $40.4 million player option for next season. The 31-year-old forward may opt-in on that contract or sign a new contract (extension) to stay with the Bucks this offseason, but he could also find a new team if he and the Bucks do not see eye-to-eye about his NBA future. Brook Lopez, runner-up for Defensive Player of the Year, will be a free agent this summer because this is the final year of the four-year, $52 million contract he signed to stay in Milwaukee in the summer of 2019.

Other parts of the franchise, from players on the roster to members of the coaching staff, could change as well, but the core of the team moving forward becomes a question as soon as this season ends, which makes keeping this current playoff run alive all the more important.

At the core of that issue is a single question: How do the Bucks slow down Jimmy Butler?

After four games, the Bucks don’t seem to be any closer to finding an answer to that question than they were after Game 1, but that doesn’t mean there is nothing they can do. There are still plenty of strategies for them left to try.

Just put Giannis Antetokounmpo on Butler

After suffering a lower back contusion in the first quarter of Game 1, Antetokounmpo has played just 49 minutes and 17 seconds, or 25.7 percent, of a possible 192 minutes in this series. That has obviously had a massive impact on the series and the Bucks’ current 3-1 deficit.

But before Antetokounmpo got hurt in Game 1, Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer opted to put Jrue Holiday on Butler instead of Antetokounmpo. Those matchups looked far more like the matchups used in the Bucks’ 2020 five-game series loss to the Heat in the bubble than the Bucks’ four-game sweep of the Heat in 2021.

“I feel like we’ve got a lot of options to go there,” Budenholzer said after Game 1, when asked why they went with Holiday on Butler instead of Antetokounmpo. “Giannis basically played 10 minutes tonight. We feel good. Credit to Jimmy Butler tonight. He was great. He’s going to see a lot of bodies, he’s going to see a lot of different people. We’ll do better going forward.”

The Bucks have tried different players on Butler throughout the series, but overwhelmingly, Budenholzer has used Holiday as the primary defender on Butler. In Game 4, they allowed Holiday to be more aggressive on Butler, stay far more connected to the Heat star at the 3-point line and try all the different things that make Holiday one of the NBA’s best defenders, but it did not work. Butler became just the fifth player in NBA history to record 55 points in a playoff game while shooting at least 65 percent from the field.

All of which leads to Antetokounmpo, Butler’s primary defender in 2021.

In the first quarter, Butler notably beat Antetokounmpo to the rim for this dunk:

Battle at the rim goes to Jimmy ‼️ pic.twitter.com/uABw1W48Bs

— Miami HEAT (@MiamiHEAT) April 24, 2023

But when fully switched onto Butler, instead of trying to catch up on a late switch in a pick-and-roll with Kevin Love, Antetokounmpo did this:

Butler can score on Antetokounmpo, just like he can score on anyone in the NBA. With the Bucks star switched onto him in the first quarter, Butler got around the rim with a back cut and snuck in a finger roll after a couple of pivots for a bucket and also hit a stepback jumper on Antetokounmpo, but Butler cannot bully Antetokounmpo to the rim and the Greek Freak’s length can provide more problems for Butler on jumpers.

There are obvious concerns in putting Antetokounmpo on Butler.

Butler is a master at drawing fouls, so he could put Antetokounmpo into foul trouble. And our Shams Charania reported Antetokounmpo needed an IV after Game 4 because of how far he had pushed his body to record a triple-double in 38 minutes. So defending Butler could be too big of an ask from an energy perspective as Antetokounmpo returns from his back injury, but this is an elimination game.

The Bucks should use their best strategy and it is hard to imagine a better one than letting Antetokounmpo take the primary defensive assignment on Butler, even with concerns over foul trouble or exhaustion.

Doubles, traps, blitzes?

Defending Butler for the entire game may take too much out of Antetokounmpo, so letting Holiday continue to take the responsibility in Game 5 could still be viable for the Bucks, but Butler scored 56 points against that look on defense in Game 4.

Wesley Matthews being off the injury report after missing Games 2-4 with a right calf strain will give the Bucks another option to throw at Butler as well, but the Bucks might need to think even bigger if those options are still not making Butler uncomfortable.

So, would Holiday like to see the Bucks double the ball out of Butler’s hands?

“Maybe?” Holiday replied to the question after Game 4.

For years, the Bucks have built their defense around controlling where teams take their shots and making it extremely difficult for teams to score at the rim. Despite turning to switching defensively from time to time, the Bucks have never been focused on executing higher-risk strategies that attempt to force turnovers or truly make a player uncomfortable on the ball.

Turning to those strategies with their back against the wall in Game 5 might be difficult, but it may be necessary, if playing straight up with either Holiday or Antetokounmpo continues to fail.

“It’s being physical, to the point we can be,” Lopez said of an ideal strategy on Butler after Game 4. “(Butler) does a great job drawing fouls. Being there for one another, realizing he’s great at finding teammates and making plays for people. Just matching his energy because he does a great job coming out and playing hard each and every possession every night.”

Just forcing the ball out of Butler’s hands is not without risk either. The Heat’s other players have been very good off the ball from Butler thus far this series. As a team, the Heat are knocking down over 50 percent of their contested 3s through four games.

Miami is 43/82 (52.4%) on contested 3s in this series. League average this season was 33.5% while the Heat shot 33.2%. https://t.co/IgA0gfhfrB

— Anchorage Man (@SethPartnow) April 25, 2023

No matter what the Bucks do though, they have to find a way to consistently make it difficult on Butler and they just haven’t been able to do that thus far this series.

“It’s a tough assignment, so just trying to make it tough on him,” Lopez said. “I know I’ll be there for whoever’s guarding him, if they want to get into him a little bit more. I don’t know what the game plan necessarily is going to be the next game, but I always got my guys back. If they want to put him downhill more, that’s fine with me, I’ll be there for them. But I know our guys are going to come out and play hard and play tough again in whichever game is next.”

The Bucks are on the brink of elimination. If they don’t find an answer, their season ends tonight at the hands of the Eastern Conference’s No. 8 seed. They will need to play with high focus and intensity. And if that doesn’t work, they may need to try something more desperate.

(Photo of Giannis Antetokounmpo and Jimmy Butler: Megan Briggs / Getty Images)