MILWAUKEE — Forget waiting until next year. The Milwaukee Bucks want to win now. And by acquiring Monta Ellis and Ekpe Udoh in exchange for injured center Andrew Bogut, the Bucks showed that they really, genuinely mean it.
With Milwaukee currently the eighth seed in the Eastern Conference after winning five of its last six games — including a win over Cleveland on Wednesday — the Bucks looked poised to make the playoffs even before the trade. Now with Ellis and Udoh in tow and expected to make their debuts Friday — coincidentally, in Golden State against their former team — Milwaukee could suddenly be a team consistently in the postseason for the next few years.
"We want to win now," Bucks general manager John Hammond said. "We want to be a playoff team. Not only did we improve our team for the immediate, but I think we improved our team for the future. We've got two young players here. Two great future potential long-term pieces for us.
"To add two pieces like this, we think it's a great get for us."
Ellis, at age 26 in his seventh NBA season, was averaging 21.9 points and a career-high 6.0 assists in Golden State before the trade. Pairing him with Brandon Jennings in Milwaukee will form a small but ultra-quick backcourt that could mesh well with a Bucks team that has surprisingly become a fast-paced group this season.
"It's going to be very exciting," Ellis said. "I can come here and take the pressure off (Jennings) getting double-teamed and hopefully we can move the ball and get some wins.
"I can bring a lot to this team. I'm going to bring a lot to this team."
Though Ellis' initial post-trade comments indicated that he thought the Bucks were not in the playoff race, he has since studied up on his new team and thinks that the eighth seed should now be a worst-case scenario.
"With the team that we have right now, I believe we can move up if we just go out and play together," Ellis said. "If we stick to it, I think we can make a big push at this."
Ellis only made the postseason once in his NBA career so far, but that was an epic run in which the No. 8 Warriors knocked off the No. 1 Dallas Mavericks in the first round in 2007.
But Hammond was quick to point out that, despite Ellis being the most well-known name to call Milwaukee his new in-season home, it may be Udoh that improves the Bucks the most.
In fact, Ellis told Hammond in their phone conversation upon the trade's completion that Udoh could be the most important player in the entire trade.
"We mentioned Ekpe's name and (Ellis) starts telling us, ‘You got someone special here,'" Hammond said. "‘You got a heck of a player and a guy who's going to help this team win games. He might be the steal of this trade.'"
After being the sixth overall pick in 2010, Udoh didn't seem to live up to that high selection in his first year and a half, averaging 4.5 points and 3.4 rebounds. Then, once the Warriors began playing him at center in recent weeks, Udoh's game began to look much more impressive. In his final game in a Golden State uniform, Udoh had 14 points on 7-of-10 shooting with six rebounds and two blocks in a win over the Clippers.
"I'm just taking it to another level," Udoh said. "Just handling my business on the court."
Now without a true center on the roster and using undersized Drew Gooden there ever since Bogut fractured his ankle, coach Scott Skiles sounds like he plans to use Udoh in the middle.
"In my mind, (Udoh) came into the league as more of a 4 (power forward), but the game is changing so much," Skiles said. "There just aren't many centers anymore. I don't want to shortchange that position by saying anybody can play center, but a lot of big people can play that spot nowadays."
While the Bucks have aspirations to stray from a rebuilding project and form a team around Jennings, Skiles knows that there's no way of telling whether Milwaukee's latest moves will drastically help the team until the players all get on the floor together.
"Sometimes you're sitting around and you're talking about a deal like this and somebody might say, ‘I know it's going to work and this is why!'" Skiles said. "That's just somebody's ego. We'll see if it works."
Currently, the Bucks' 19-24 record has them set for a playoff matchup against the Chicago Bulls if the regular season standings stayed as is. The New York Knicks — with coach Mike D'Antoni now departed — are also 19-24, but Milwaukee holds the tiebreaker. By beating the Cavaliers, the Bucks dropped Cleveland two full games behind them.
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