Maybe the Milwaukee Bucks don’t have to add a star this trade deadline. Maybe they can look to boost their depth, keep their limited draft assets intact, and play out the season from there with an eye on improving in the summer.
Even in that case, however, one thing is clear. As long as Gary Trent Jr. continues to give them nothing at all, the Bucks have no choice but to explore moves for a real contributor in the wing rotation.
Instead of being the secondary, or even tertiary scorer the team hoped, Trent is swirling the drain. It’s getting worse. If his season-long slump wasn’t frustrating enough, he’s now gone scoreless in three of his last six games.
That fact puts his struggles in reality’s ugly glare: the Bucks need another answer for the shooting and two-way play they thought Trent would supply, and it’s likely not on the roster.
Bucks must face bleak Trent Jr. truth
Trent began the year inefficiently, shooting 39% in his first seven games, but at least he was producing. Averaging 13.6 points per game, he failed to reach double digits just once in that span.
Since then, he’s lost his job in the starting lineup due to abysmal play on both sides of the ball. By on-off rating on offense and defense alike, Trent is having his worst full season by far.
It’s been especially bad of late. Trent’s efficiency has only decreased despite lower volume, which in theory should allow him to pick and choose quality looks. Part of the drop-off, though, is directly due to his awful shooting all season. Trent shot 38% from the field last month; he’s kicked off the new year by shooting 32%.
It’s caught up to his season stats. Instead of boosting his production up near his Toronto peak, when he averaged 18.3 points per game in ’21-22 and 17.4 the year after, Trent is down in single digits for the first time since his sophomore season at 8.7 PPG. His 38.1 FG% is his worst since a 15-game rookie stint. His 3-point percentage has dropped five full points from last season: from 41.6 to 36.1. He has been bullied on defense, proving unequipped for assignments guarding bigger twos and threes.
It’s not good enough. Not nearly. Doc Rivers has come to that realization and begun giving Gary Harris a sizable share of Trent’s minutes. There’s only so much Harris can do offensively, however, and he too is undersized for a wing. In the starting lineup, AJ Green is still a step away from leveling up his game; he’s not going to make up the Trent-sized shooting void.
That doesn’t mean the Bucks have to go out and sell the farm for, say, Michael Porter Jr., arguably the top wing available. But they could look to add a solid rotation piece in the mold of a Royce O’Neale – just someone who can play defense and make threes, Trent’s supposed floor-level role coming into the year. (The Suns aren’t selling, it seems, so O’Neale himself likely isn’t available.)
Higher up the totem pole, would Cleveland be interested in selling low on De’Andre Hunter? (Again, probably not unless as part of a multi-team blockbuster).
Milwaukee could look to add help in a straight-up swap or by getting in on a multi-team deal as the recipient of such a player in exchange for providing additional salary or assets.
Of course, pursuing an actual needle-mover like Porter is one way, the more exciting way, to acquire wing shooting and scoring. No matter how they do it, the Bucks need to aggressively explore options for bolstering their wing minutes. Trent, expected to be at minimum a key cog in the rotation, has left them no choice.
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