Bucks Fans Can Officially Exhale After Seeing Jrue Holiday Signed A Massive $160M Extension

The Bucks entered this past offseason with one goal. Do whatever they could to convince Giannis to sign his supermax. The first step in that process was upgrading the roster, 

It was a massive haul, but considering it was a pretty big upgrade at point guard and I'm sure Giannis told them to pull the trigger, you make this move without thinking twice. The risk was that Jrue Holiday was an unrestricted free agent after this season, so there's a chance you gave up your future for a guy who might leave if things don't end well. Then Bucks fans could exhale a little bit because Giannis put pen to paper for five more years

Now they can really exhale because Jrue Holiday isn't going anywhere. Their core of Giannis/Holiday/Middleton is now locked up for the foreseeable future. That's a gigantic win if you're a Bucks fan. To go from a situation where Giannis could potentially leave, to then the possibility that Holiday might also leave to now having all three signed sealed and delivered is quite the emotional roller coaster. Their front office took a risk and it paid off, that's good news for a small market team.

It also helps that Holiday has been pretty nails since joinging the Bucks. Not just last night with his 33/7/11

but really all season. His 17/4.6/5.4/1.8 on 50/39% with 1.9 3PM is the perfect piece to the Bucks puzzle. The simple fact of not having to deal with Eric Bledsoe is a win all by itself. Now maybe you think that production isn't worth a max extension. I'm just not sure what choice the Bucks had. Nobody is coming to MIL in free agency. With what they gave up for Holiday they had to max him out if that's what it was going to take to keep him in a Bucks uniform. Is it a little dicey they will now have three players making 30+ million? Sure, but if those three guys are really good who gives a shit. Let the owner worry about paying the luxury tax. 

With teams like the Nets having their trio for the next few years, it is a bit of an arms race in the East. Locking up one of the best on ball perimeter defenders in the entire league to pair up with a DPOY candidate year in and year out is pretty important. But now comes the hardest part for the Bucks. Now they have to get over the hump in the postseason. That's what the Holiday trade was all about. They've basically been neck and neck with the Nets/Sixers all season (2 games back) but given how their postseason history as looked recently, that's all that really matters now. It's great they were able to solidify their core, but now that core needs to win.