Despite a ton of trade speculation, Giannis Antetokounmpo remained a member of the Milwaukee Bucks post the Feb. 5 deadline. Antetokounmpo’s long-term future remains unclear, though, and he made some interesting comments about it during an interview with ESPN’s Malika Andrews on SportsCenter.
“As of today, I’m committed to the Milwaukee Bucks,” Antetokounmpo said. “And I’m committed to the people that I work with. My teammates, the coaching staff, coach Doc [Rivers], and Jon [Horst] in the front office. What I’ve said from the beginning of this year is that out of my mouth and the way I’ve carried myself, you will never hear me say I don’t want to be a Milwaukee Buck.”
Andrews has had plenty of conversations with Antetokounmpo over the years, and she sees him as someone who is deeply loyal and a winner. With the Bucks being nowhere near good enough to be regarded as title contenders, she wondered whether those two tenets are clashing.
“No, I am a winner, and I’m extremely loyal,” Antetokounmpo stated. “But the only thing that I feel sometimes… Growing up you dream like, ‘Oh, what if I played for the Knicks [at] Madison Square Garden? What if I get drafted by the Lakers? Now I’m teammates with Kobe [Bryant]? What if I go play for the Cavs and LeBron [James] pass me the ball?’
“Like you just dream,” Antetokounmpo added. “… If there would ever be a scenario of me not being a Milwaukee Buck no more, I don’t want anybody to ever think like, ‘Hey man, I quit on my team’ because this is my team and I love it.”
Antetokounmpo has seemed far too concerned about what Bucks fans and the basketball world, in general, might think. No one is really going to be too hard on the 31-year-old if he asks out.
Antetokounmpo delivered Milwaukee a championship in 2021 and has given his all on the court over the years for the Bucks. You would fully understand if he wants to go to a team that would give him a chance to compete for another title while he is still in his prime.
The Bucks last won a playoff series in 2022, and the drought looks set to extend. They are currently 12th in the East with a 23-30 record, and are going nowhere.
Antetokounmpo, who is averaging 28.0 points, 10.0 rebounds, 5.6 assists, 0.9 steals, and 0.7 blocks per game in 2025-26, is not going to ask out, though. He has even expressed a desire to win another title with the Bucks and retire with the team. Antetokounmpo did add, though, that if that isn’t looking possible, then other options would have to be weighed. The man ultimately wants to win more than anything.
Getting back to this interview, Andrews reminded Antetokounmpo that he had told her after winning the 2021 NBA championship that he’d be fine if he never won another. He’d said he’d rather win one this way than go elsewhere and win two or three, and she wanted to know how he reflects on that now.
“When you’ve had a bite of a really good steak, and all of a sudden you go somewhere else or time goes by, and you’re just having the big steaks in front of you, and it’s just like not good and you know how that steak feel, you want that steak again,” Antetokounmpo stated.
Antetokounmpo has tasted glory once and wants another bite. He has said he will stay with the Bucks if they can build a competitive team, but you doubt they can. It’d be a real shocker if Antetokounmpo is still with the Bucks at the start of the 2026-27 NBA season.
