The Milwaukee Bucks are reportedly among the teams that have sniffed around Miami Heat star Jimmy Butler in a possible trade, but with the Phoenix Suns still pursuing him aggressively, there is a way that the Bucks could get in on a possible Butler deal without actually landing the mercurial forward. For a deal between Phoenix and Miami to be viable, Bradley Beal has to be involved as matching salary.
The Heat are reportedly not interested in taking on the Beal contract, so a third team would be needed for a deal. This is where the Bucks could come in.
According to Marc Stein, while the Bucks have in the past expressed interest in Butler, they “have been more frequently painted as a team likely to rekindle their previous interest in Phoenix’s Bradley Beal if they intend to pursue a trade for a player in the $50 million range.”
The Bucks looked into a Beal trade when he was on the block in the summer of 2023. He landed in Phoenix, and they moved on to Damian Lillard.
There are obstacles to a Bradley Beal trade
Could they look back at Beal now, when the Suns are seemingly desperate to find a new home for him? Potentially, yes, but there are obstacles. The first is Beal’s no-trade clause. If he doesn’t want to become a Buck, there is nothing the Bucks or Suns could do to change his mind. He has the power to veto any trade. And thus far, it has not appeared as though he is eager to waive that right.
Even if he is, the Bucks would likely need a fourth team to participate in the trade for cap purposes. The Bucks, as a second apron team, cannot aggregate salary in trades right now. However, if a trade got them below the second apron, they would be allowed to aggregate in that deal. That means that the Bucks would have to shed around $6.5 million in any Beal acquisition.
Beal makes roughly $50.2 million. The three-man trade package of Khris Middleton, Bobby Portis and Pat Connaughton would nearly get them there, but Phoenix can’t take on excess salary either as a second apron team, and the Heat aren’t going to want to. That means someone, likely the below-the-cap Pistons, would have to be paid off to take a contract.
Should the Bucks pursue Bradley Beal?
So is the trade doable? Potentially, through various cap gymnastics and pleas to Beal, it could happen. The greater question here is should the Bucks pursue Beal? The answer to that is more complicated. He clearly doesn’t address their defensive shortcomings. Lillard spent years in Portland sharing a backcourt with the similarly small, offensive-minded CJ McCollum. Granted, they didn’t have Giannis Antetokounmpo, but the shortcomings of such a duo are obvious.
But Portis is a luxury as an offensive-minded sixth man on a team with plenty of offense and expensive starters at both frontcourt positions, and Middleton’s health has been a question mark for two years now. In Beal, the Bucks could at least feel reasonably confident in the production they’d be getting even if the fit is iffy. Antetokounmpo offers a bit more skillset variety than Devin Booker or Kevin Durant do for Beal, so perhaps a change of scenery could do him some good.
For now, it’s not even clear if there have been active trade talks on this front. But Butler and the Suns are seemingly desperate to find a way to make a trade possible, and desperation creates opportunities. If the Bucks see one here, it wouldn’t be crazy for them to pursue it.
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