{"id":170512,"date":"2025-08-24T01:20:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-24T01:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/170512\/"},"modified":"2025-08-24T01:20:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-24T01:20:08","slug":"rockets-gm-says-bucks-werent-willing-to-discuss-major-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/170512\/","title":{"rendered":"Rockets’ GM Says Bucks Weren’t Willing To Discuss Major Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Giannis Antetokounmpo<\/a><\/strong> has been the target of trade speculation ever since the Bucks<\/strong> were ousted in the first round of the playoffs, but a rival general manager indicated that Milwaukee hasn\u2019t been willing to discuss deals involving the two-time MVP.<\/p>\n

Appearing Friday on ESPN Radio\u2019s Houston affiliate (YouTube link<\/a>, hat tip to Ben DuBose of Rockets Wire<\/a>), Rockets<\/strong> GM Rafael Stone<\/strong> said he wasn\u2019t able to make any headway on a major deal with the Bucks. League rules preclude Stone from commenting on specific players, but he responded to a question from the hosts about \u201cthe big man from Greece in Milwaukee.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI deal well with (Bucks general manager) Jon Horst<\/strong>, I really like him,\u201d Stone said. \u201cJon was very clear that they weren\u2019t doing anything. So that was that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Numerous stories have indicated that the Bucks don\u2019t plan to pursue an Antetokounmpo trade unless he requests one. There have been multiple<\/a> reports<\/a> this summer that Antetokounmpo is still assessing his future in Milwaukee to determine if he can win a title there, but he hasn\u2019t made any public comments to indicate that he wants out.<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo is currently focused on representing Greece in EuroBasket, which ends a couple weeks before the start of NBA training camps, so it\u2019s probably too late in the offseason for him to ask for a trade. His current contract runs through the 2026\/27 season, and he holds a $62.8MM player option for the following year.<\/p>\n

Horst has been aggressively maneuvering to keep the Bucks in title contention in an effort to convince Antetokounmpo to stay. With Damian Lillard<\/a><\/strong> lost for next season with an Achilles tear, Horst\u00a0waived and stretched<\/a> the $112.6MM that Lillard had left on his contract for the next two years, creating enough cap space to sign<\/a>\u00a0center\u00a0Myles Turner<\/a><\/strong> away from Indiana.<\/p>\n

Horst also added\u00a0Gary Harris<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0Jericho Sims<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Cole Anthony<\/a><\/strong> through free agency and re-signed free agents Bobby Portis<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0Gary Trent Jr.<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0Kevin Porter Jr.<\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0Ryan Rollins<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Taurean Prince<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Giannis Antetokounmpo has been the target of trade speculation ever since the Bucks were ousted in the first…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":170513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[3368,97489,1260,11113,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-170512","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-giannis-antetokounmpo","9":"tag-jon-horst","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-rafael-stone","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115081119408366518","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=170512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/170513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=170512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=170512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=170512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}