The horrific injury plague has taken yet another top NBA star. Jimmy Butler is now done for the season after he tore his ACL in the Warriors 135-112 victory over the Heat a day ago. The 36-year-old joins names like Kyrie Irving, Jayson Tatum, Tyrese Haliburton, and more who have had important seasons cut short due to a lower extremity injury.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s worse is where that leaves Golden State. The Dubs were finally starting to pick up some momentum as they battle it out in the middle of the ultra-competitive West. Without Butler, it puts Steve Kerr into a very uncomfortable position. Either he and Jonathan Kuminga start figuring out how to co-exist, or he and Steph Curry will watch another season slip away on their quest for a fifth ring.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the good news. The All-Star break is approaching, and thus comes a heavy time for trades. Kendrick Perkins has a suggestion for who could get plugged into the Warriors\u2019 offense alongside The Chef and make an immediate impact. The player? A little unknown by the name of Giannis Antetokounmpo.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s time. It\u2019s the perfect timing,\u201d claimed Big Perk on the\u00a0Road Trippin pod. \u201cIf I\u2019m Steph right now, I\u2019m getting my light-skinned a**, green eyes, and I\u2019m picking up the f***ing phone. And you know who I\u2019m calling? I\u2019m calling Giannis. And saying, \u2018Hey man, what are you winning on? Dammit, I need you and you need me. Let\u2019s make it happen right now.’\u201d<\/p>\n
As outlandish as Kendrick can be at times with his takes, there might be something to this. It would instantly put the Dubs back on the map as a threat in the West. It would also give them the star power to hang with the elite teams in the West like the Spurs and the Thunder. Perhaps it\u2019s not so bad of a suggestion at all.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re Giannis, and you talk about winning championships, and we talk about winning championships and we talk about that window closing, it\u2019s perfect timing,\u201d added KP. \u201cAnd I\u2019ve said it before, and I\u2019ll say it again. No one is going to be mad at Antetokounmpo if he wants out of Milwaukee. No one should have a damn thing to say about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s for sure. Giannis already won the Bucks a ring, something that will cement him in the Hall of Milwaukee greats. But the franchise hasn\u2019t given him any help. And, when they did with Damian Lillard, wouldn\u2019t you know it, Dame Time went down with a torn Achilles, another injury that has cast a black cloud over athletes.<\/p>\n
It should also be noted that Giannis has been very vocal about wanting to continue building a contender in Milwaukee. On the flipside, he\u2019s recently come out and said, \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d when asked if he\u2019ll end the season as a Buck, claiming he\u2019s taking it \u201cday by day\u201d.<\/p>\n
As an example, Kendrick brought up how the Cavaliers bested the Warriors in that grueling 7-game series back in 2016. When it ended, he shared that Draymond Green was the first person to contact Kevin Durant to help the Dubs get some revenge the following season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho got in the car and called Kevin Durant? Draymond. Mother f***er ay, put your pride aside and make that call,\u201d barked Perkins at Curry. The thing there is that KD was a free agent. The Dubs would have to give up a lot for the Greek Freak. Doesn\u2019t mean that it\u2019s not worth it, but the situations, albeit somewhat similar, are also somewhat distant.<\/p>\n
Regardless, this feels less about Giannis specifically and more about urgency. The Warriors don\u2019t have the luxury of patience anymore. Steph\u2019s window is shrinking, injuries are piling up, and half-measures won\u2019t cut it. If there\u2019s a real chance to swing big, you at least have to explore it. Standing still might be the riskiest move of all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The horrific injury plague has taken yet another top NBA star. Jimmy Butler is now done for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":550506,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3775],"tags":[7,103,123,2058,102,121,3871,6,932],"class_list":{"0":"post-550505","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-milwaukee-bucks","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-bucks","10":"tag-giannis-antetokounmpo","11":"tag-kendrick-perkins","12":"tag-milwaukee","13":"tag-milwaukee-bucks","14":"tag-milwaukeebucks","15":"tag-nba","16":"tag-steph-curry"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115931763581468897","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=550505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/550506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=550505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=550505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=550505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}