The Milwaukee Bucks took the sports world by storm when news broke regarding Damian Lillard’s blockbuster move. While the Miami Heat were long considered the favorites to land the seven-time All-Star following his trade saga with the Portland Trail Blazers, it was the Bucks who came in in the 13th hour to hijack the deal.
Now that the hype is dying down, however, the time has come for Lillard and the Bucks to start facing the music.
Championship or Bust for Milwaukee Bucks
Given how much this team had to sacrifice in order to get their hands on Lillard, it’s hard to deny that anything less than a championship is going to be a disappointment for the Bucks this coming season. Even before the Lillard trade, Giannis Antetokounmpo already made his feelings known about winning another chip in the immediate future, and Dame’s arrival only adds more pressure on this team to win it all this year.
Lillard is well aware of the lofty expectations following his high-profile move to Milwaukee, and he also knows all about the inherent risks of being caught up in the hype surrounding the same. According to Dame, this isn’t going to be an issue for him or his new teammates at all:
“For me, that makes me excited because some people probably think I’m too serious about it,” Lillard said. “Seriously, though. In my career, people think I take stuff too serious. And I shoot and I get my work in because I want to check every box to give myself the best chance, so to see so many different guys going about their business like that every day is, like, I feel like it’s more than just talk.
“Nobody just expects it to happen. Like typically when you get in a situation where you feel like we’re supposed to be successful, I get a little nervous that people think it’s just going to happen. But everybody here is like, ‘It’s not just going to happen.’ And that’s comforting.”
That’s all well and good, but at the end of the day, the fact still remains that Lillard, Giannis, and the rest of the Bucks will be placed under a microscope this coming season. Their actions will be magnified significantly as the entire basketball world watches their every step closely. This is simply the harsh reality this team is facing now that they’ve placed all their chips on the table.
The good news for Milwaukee fans is if there’s any team out there who’s capable of living up to the hype and the expectations, it;s got to be the Bucks.
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