Jrue Holiday Has Been Everything The Milwaukee Bucks Hoped For … And More

It’s safe to say that Jon Horst inherited an ideal situation when he the Milwaukee Bucks named their longtime Director of Basketball Operations as the team’s general manager back in the summer of 2017.

The foundation for a future championship had already been laid four years earlier, when Horst’s predecessor, John Hammond, drafted an unknown teenage phenom from Greece by the game of Giannis Antetokounmpo then picked up former second-round pick Khris Middleton in a trade from the Pistons.

It was up to Horst to surround that duo with championship-caliber talent, and he did just that a few months later when he traded for disgruntled Phoenix point guard Eric Bledsoe, and again ahead of the 2018 season when signed free agent center Brook Lopez to a $3.8 million deal that turned out to be one of the biggest heists in recent league history after Lopez transformed into a 3-point shooting threat under head coach Mike Budenholzer’s offense.

Horst, though, would make his best move two years later when, after two frustrating early postseason exits, parted with Bledsoe, backup guard George Hill and a boatload of draft picks in a four-team mega deal that brought veteran point guard Jrue Holiday to Milwaukee.

In Holiday, Horst found the missing piece to Milwaukee’s championship puzzle. A dedicated defender, a shooter, a scorer, a facilitator and most perhaps most important, the kind of player whose teammates would respect him for how he carries himself off the court as much as for what he can do on it.

The move paid off immediately as Holiday averaged 17 points while shooting a career-high 50.3% from the floor and 39.2% from distance while dishing out 6.1 assists to lead the Bucks to the No. 3 seed in the East and followed that with 17.3 points and 8.7 assists over 23 playoff games to help Milwaukee earn its first title in 40 years.

Holiday has, in short, been everything Horst and the Bucks dreamed of and more since joining Antetokounmpo, Middleton, Lopez as a member of Milwaukee’s core.

Holiday’s value to the Bucks was on full display Sunday afternoon when Milwaukee played host to the Suns in a nationally-televised rematch of the 2021 NBA Finals and a potential preview of the ‘23 Finals.

With Antetokounmpo sidelined with a leg contusion, Holiday seemed to single-handedly will his teammates to a victory. He hit 13 of 22 shots including 4 of 9 3-pointers to finish with a game-high 33 points to go along with four rebounds, five assists.

He also added one steal, coming at the expense of Suns guard Devin Booker, with just 2.4 seconds left to seal a 104-101 victory that extended Milwaukee’s winning streak to 14 games.

“It’s just what he does,” Middleton said. “He’s one of the best on-ball defenders and he proves it every time. He loves that challenge, he takes that challenge personally and came up with a huge play at a crucial time in the game once again.”

Adding players of Holiday’s caliber comes with a price but keeping them around costs even more, as Horst and the Bucks were reminded last fall when they signed Holiday to contract extension worth as much as $134 million if he exercises a fourth-year player option.

He’ll earn $33.65 million this season, the third-highest total on a team that is expected face a luxury tax bill of over $75 million at the end of the season.

It’s a price, though, the Bucks are willing to pay if it means bringing another championship to the city and if Holiday keeps producing the way he has, Milwaukee reclaiming the Larry O’Brien trophy seems more and more likely.