Mediocre teams were mincemeat. Good and bad teams not so much.
Win games against bad opponents and split games against good opponents. Both are adages to live by, but the Milwaukee Bucks didn’t exactly follow them this season. Rather, their performances ranged from bad (against bad opposition) to ugly (against good opposition). Instead, their performances were good against mediocre opposition: teams that were neither good nor bad.
Going off the deep end from our own Riley Feldmann’s tiered analysis of the Bucks’ offensive woes, I dug through Cleaning The Glass to try to grapple with the good, the bad, and the ugly of Milwaukee’s performances against mediocre, bad, and good opponents (respectively).
Tiers were determined based on point differential: top-10, middle-10 (technically 9, sans Milwaukee), and bottom-10. The Bucks finished 12th in the league in point differential at +2.1, corresponding to an offensive rating of 116.9 (7th in the league) and a defensive rating of 114.7 (16th in the league).
The Good: Mediocre Opposition
Teams: Indiana, Los Angeles Lakers, Detroit, Orlando, Miami, Sacramento, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas
Overall: 24-7, +7.9 point differential (5th in the league; 8.4 points better than league average), 3rd in offense (120.6), 10th in defense (112.6)
The Bucks had a field day with similarly tiered opposition. This field day was not restricted to one side of the ball, with Milwaukee outpacing both their average offensive and defensive ratings against middle-of-the-pack teams.
Digging through the statistics yielded general improvement against these opponents, but two nuggets stood out, one on each side of the ball. Offensively, Milwaukee performed much better off live rebounds in these games, moving from 27th in the league up to 8th. Defensively, the Bucks were much better at defending corner threes, going from 23rd in the league to 5th. In each case, Milwaukee essentially turned a weakness into a strength. Perhaps the Bucks can aim to cement these strengths across all opponents next season.
The Bad: Bad Opposition
Overall: 19-8, +7.2 point differential (16th in the league; 0.2 points better than league average), 9th in offense (120.3), 22nd in defense (113.1)
Teams: Portland, Phoenix, San Antonio, Toronto, Philadelphia, Brooklyn, Utah, Charlotte, New Orleans, Washington
It may seem unfair to say Milwaukee was bad against bad opposition. They went 19-8! They outscored opponents at a +7.2 clip! But these numbers are only good in a vacuum. In the context of the league’s average performance against these teams, which was unsurprisingly pretty good, the Bucks were mediocre. And in the context of their own average performance (12th overall in point differential), the Bucks fell to 16th in the league. So bad.
The culprit here is defense, which fell to 22nd in the league. Sifting through the numbers, the Bucks fell from 8th to 19th in terms of opponents’ eFG. It’s not rocket science: their defense was worse because their opponents shot the ball better. But peeking under that hood, that’s because Milwaukee’s bad opponents shot better from deep and midrange, with the Bucks falling from 9th to 24th and 14th to 22nd in defending these areas. In contrast, Milwaukee actually fared better at protecting the rim, rising from 17th to 8th.
Taken together, it appears that the Bucks prioritized rim protection at the expense of the rest of the floor against bad opponents. The overall numbers suggest that this was a miscalculation. Bad teams can still make shots from the floor, especially if they’re given breathing room. Conversely, they might struggle attacking the rim anyway.
The Ugly: Good Opposition
Overall: 5-19, -11.4 point differential (23rd in the league; 4.9 points worse than league average), 26th in offense (108.0), 17th in defense (119.5)
Teams: Oklahoma City, Cleveland, Boston, Houston, Minnesota, New York, Memphis, Los Angeles Clippers, Denver, Golden State
Woof. The Bucks’ record against good opposition was bad on its own and downright ugly compared to the rest of the league. But the diagnosis here is the exact opposite of the previous section: the offense dropped to an abysmal 26th in the league.
Again, the surface-level explanation involves eFG: the Bucks’ eFG dropped from 3rd to 15th against good teams. But we can offer more nuance here too. This drop occurred across the floor, but with one exception: Milwaukee remained top of the league in 3P% on corner threes, even rising a couple points to a (somewhat absurd?!) 47%. Moreover, the general pattern indicates that the Bucks’ offensive woes were constrained to halfcourt offense.
Interestingly, when it came to good opposition, the blame can be placed on Milwaukee’s better unit: offense. The Bucks have a good offense, but it didn’t stand the test of quality teams’ defenses. Although across-the-board improvement is likely needed, Milwaukee could try to build on its strength in corner threes to help overcome its deficiencies everywhere else.
Conclusion
The Bucks’ performances against good, mediocre, and bad opposition varied. Relative to the rest of the NBA, their performances against these opponents can be described as good (mediocre opposition), bad (bad opposition), and ugly (good opposition). Although some of that may be due to chance (like whether opposing stars were healthy when the Bucks played them), it is unlikely that would be the case over an entire season. The pattern might indicate a psychological explanation: Milwaukee is scared of top opponents but overlooks bottom-feeders. But diving into the data suggests wrinkles to that narrative. The offense faltered against good opposition, the defense faltered against bad opposition, and corner threes often played a key role.
The Bucks aren’t winning quite enough games against bad opponents, and they certainly aren’t splitting games against good opponents. But at least they’re introducing a new adage: beat the hell out of the teams at your level.