Doc Rivers didn’t sugarcoat what it was like trying to coach Giannis Antetokounmpo.
On The Bill Simmons Podcast, Rivers laid out his frustrations with the Bucks star in blunt terms, saying Antetokounmpo is “not easy” to manage because of the way he attacks the game.
“He’s not easy. He plays at this crazy downhill pace.
He’s really a difficult guy. He has this great passing ability, but he doesn’t have a super-high IQ at the same time.
He really has only one way of playing. Every play, he wants to force it.
I wish he’d learned how to execute better,” Rivers said on The Bill Simmons Podcast about coaching Antetokounmpo.
That candid assessment comes after a turbulent stretch in Milwaukee. The Bucks opened the 2023-24 NBA season looking like one of the league’s top teams, going 30-13 under Adrian Griffin after adding Damian Lillard in the summer. But Milwaukee still shocked the NBA by firing Griffin, then turning to Rivers, who eventually became quite unpopular in Milwaukee.
Antetokounmpo had long been the center of everything in Milwaukee. From 2013 to 2026, he was the franchise’s main man, and the relationship between the player, the city and the fans was built on loyalty. That bond peaked in 2021, when he powered the Bucks to the championship and sealed it with a 50-point performance in Game 6 of the NBA Finals.
That title came under Mike Budenholzer, who coached the Bucks until 2023 before the team moved on. Antetokounmpo was also a major voice in the decision to hire Griffin, and when Griffin was dismissed, he said he was caught by surprise. He supported the move to bring in Rivers, but the season clearly didn’t stay smooth for long.
Rivers also said Antetokounmpo needs to get better on the execution side, and that criticism has extra weight given the struggles with the Miami Heat as of late. It’s still early in Antetokounmpo’s Heat tenure, but some of the same issues are already showing up.
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Rivers said Antetokounmpo wanted to be traded, but preferred the Bucks management to be the side that initiated it rather than asking out himself, a detail that only deepens the intrigue around how close things may have come to a breaking point. He also offered his coaching view of Giannis game and the areas he believed still needed work, leaving the broader question of what all of that meant for Milwaukees future hanging in the air. [Read more 🡒]
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Jericho Sims has the kind of rebounding and defensive versatility that could help stabilize things, but his minutes have been limited so far. Backup Kelel Ware has not delivered enough on the boards, either, even after some early-season promise, leaving Milwaukee low in both offensive-rebound prevention and defensive rating. At some point, the Bucks may have to decide whether a rotation tweak is the simplest way to address a problem that keeps showing up on the stat sheet and in the final score. [Read more 🡒]