The NBA lived up to its reputation as the best soap-opera professional sport when the Milwaukee Bucks traded Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bobby Portis to the Miami Heat for Tyler Herro, Kel’el Ware, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Kasparas Jakucionis, 3 first-round picks, 1 pick swap, and a second-round pick.
I think this was about as good a package as Milwaukee could have received for Giannis. Both the Bucks and Giannis’ camp knew their timeline to compete for titles had changed, and with only one year remaining on his current contract, the Bucks needed to move on from their great player in franchise history before he left in free agency.
Milwaukee acquired some very needed draft capital after giving up picks to bring in Damian Lillard in 2023. The Bucks also acquired some young talent after being the 6th-oldest team in the NBA last season.
Bucks owner Jimmy Haslam has a reputation for being overly aggressive in his ownership of the Cleveland Browns, so I was concerned that the Bucks would get fleeced by whatever team they traded Giannis to. Overall, I think this was a great move to start a rebuild, and they were easily the winner of this trade.
For Miami, I understand why they made this trade, I just don’t think it makes sense. When you have a chance to add a top 5 player in the league, you do it… unless the rest of your roster isn’t close to being a contender. Bam Adebayo is a great center, one of the best in the league, but I don’t think he really provides the spacing needed when you’re bringing in a guy like Giannis. They also traded Tyler Herro, one of the only consistent shooting threats on their roster.
Norman Powell has really developed into a very solid NBA player, but I hate having him as your lead guard in 2026.
The Heat weren’t a Giannis away from winning an NBA title. Honestly, I think they were a lot closer to being a team ready to blow things up than to blow up their core on Antetokounmpo. Giannis hasn’t been consistently healthy the last few years, and if he misses time with injury next season, things could get really ugly for Miami.
I’m assuming the Heat are planning to rework Giannis’ current contract before the season starts, but if things go poorly this year, they mortgaged their future for a one-year rental. The Greek Freak is one of my favorite players in the league, so he could make me look silly here, but I just don’t see this team being any better than what the Bucks were doing for Giannis the last few seasons.
