How much will injuries to NBA All-Stars affect the chances of the Milwaukee Bucks and Phoenix Suns getting back to the Finals?
On back-to-back nights, the Bucks and Suns saw key players leave their Game 2 losses because of injuries. On Tuesday, it was Phoenix guard Devin Booker, who was diagnosed with a hamstring strain. ESPN's Brian Windhorst reported Thursday that Booker suffered a Grade I strain, which typically has a timetable of two to three weeks.
Wednesday, it was Milwaukee dealing with Middleton hobbling off with what coach Mike Budenholzer said after the game was an MCL sprain. Thursday, an MRI confirmed the sprain, and sources told ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski the Bucks star will miss the rest of the opening round and will be reevaluated in two weeks.
Let's take a look at how the two teams will replace Booker and Middleton in the lineup as well as what their absences mean MIlwaukee's and Phoenix's chances of reclaiming home-court advantage in their series, both tied 1-1, and advancing long enough for the two players to return.
How the Bucks replace Middleton's production
Milwaukee's situation is different from Phoenix's with Booker, in that replacing Middleton will be much more of a committee approach.
Although Budenholzer might not expand his rotation much beyond the nine players who have seen action in both games of the Bucks' series against the Chicago Bulls, he can lean more heavily on backup wings Grayson Allen and Pat Connaughton as well as guard Jevon Carter.
It was Connaughton who got the call to finish Game 2 on the wing alongside starter Wesley Matthews. That's nothing new for Connaughton, who averaged 23.7 MPG in last year's title run and 26 minutes during this year's regular season. Along with Allen (0-of-4 on 3-pointers, 1-of-6 overall), Connaughton (2-of-13, with all but one of the attempts from downtown) has been in a slump thus far in the series. That's unlikely to continue after Connaughton shot a career-high 39.5% on 3s during the regular season.
As for Middleton's shot creation, particularly in isolation situations, the Bucks will probably rely more heavily on Jrue Holiday. Holiday, too, has struggled thus far against Chicago, posting a 5.9 Player Efficiency Rating (PER), but we have to look only to last spring to see how important he was along Milwaukee's road to the championship.
Because Middleton's absences during the regular season tended to overlap with at least one of the Bucks' other two All-Stars being out of the lineup, it's a little difficult to isolate the impact. When both Holiday and Giannis Antetokounmpo were available and Middleton was not, Milwaukee went 3-2, including a 28-point thrashing of the Bulls in March, when Holiday had 27 points, seven assists and zero turnovers.
Why Milwaukee is still comfortably favored against Chicago
Despite Milwaukee having to grind out a Game 1 win and losing both Middleton and home-court advantage in Game 2, the betting market is still confident in the Bucks. They're 2.5-point favorites for Game 3 on Friday, the second-most favorable line for any higher seed yet to play a Game 3.
Although Milwaukee won't necessarily benefit from shooting in this series reverting to the mean -- both teams have underperformed their shot quality by a similar amount, the two most of any playoff teams thus far according to Second Spectrum's quantified shot-making metric that factors in shooters' ability along with the location and type of shots and distance to nearby defenders -- free throw regression should work in the Bucks' favor.
Milwaukee left points on the table after shooting 35-of-54 (65%) from the line over the first two games, while Chicago went 31-of-34 (91%). Based on the regular-season free throw percentages of the players who shot those attempts, the Bucks would have been expected to make six more free throws, while Chicago would have been expected to make between two and three fewer.
The bigger concern for Milwaukee might be an extended Middleton absence. While the Bucks are still heavy favorites, they would face a trickier matchup in Round 2 against either the Boston Celtics -- who boasted the Eastern Conference's best point differential during the regular season and would have home-court advantage in the series -- or the Brooklyn Nets.
How the Suns' game plan changes without Booker
Booker's longest absence during the regular season came at the start of December, when he missed seven games due to a strain of his other hamstring. During that stretch, Phoenix went 5-2 with a modest plus-3.1 differential, down substantially from the team's league-leading plus-7.4 mark over the course of the season.
Naturally, the Suns are lucky to have a safety net.
Enter veteran star guard Chris Paul, who has shifted his game to be more of a scorer when Booker is on the bench. In 736 minutes without Booker, Paul's usage rate has increased from finishing 18% of the team's plays with a shot, turnover or trip to the free throw line when the two play together to 23% without him, according to NBA Advanced Stats. Although Paul saw no drop-off in terms of scoring efficiency with Booker on the bench, his turnover rate did increase from 2.2 per 36 minutes to 3.2.
Perhaps the biggest issue with Booker's absence is the minutes coach Monty Williams will have to play without either star guard on the court. Because Booker left Game 2 just as Paul was set to take his usual rest, Phoenix played the final 4:35 of the third quarter without either of them. The Suns were outscored by four points during that stretch.
More scoring from Paul alone won't be enough to make up the production lost without Booker, whose 32% usage rate easily led Phoenix this season. No other Suns starter had a usage rate higher than Deandre Ayton's 21.4%. In the nine games he played that Booker missed -- three of them with Paul also out of the lineup -- Ayton's scoring surged to 19.3 PPG from 16.8 when Booker was available.
After scoring 21 points on 10-of-15 shooting in Phoenix's comfortable Game 1 victory, Ayton had just 10 points and attempted merely six shots in Game 2. He was largely a nonfactor as the Suns closed out the game without Booker, scoring two points on 1-of-2 shooting in the final period. Look for Phoenix to try to get Ayton more involved early in Game 3.
We haven't yet mentioned Booker's likely replacement in the starting lineup: Landry Shamet. Shamet hadn't seen any action in the series before Booker left Game 2 but played the majority of the remaining 17 minutes. While the Suns will surely lean more heavily on backcourts pairing Paul with his backup, Cameron Payne, those duos are undersized to match up with New Orleans' starting five. Shamet started all 14 games Booker missed during the regular season and figures to get the call again in Games 3 and 4.
Shamet's 41% 3-point shooting will help Phoenix maintain the floor spacing provided by Booker when he's off the ball. However, he's not the same kind of shot creator and is also a defensive downgrade from Booker. The Suns scored just fine after Booker went out Tuesday but saw the Pelicans shoot 69% from the field the rest of the way, including 7-of-9 on 3s.
Booker's timetable and Phoenix's playoff outlook
Already, the Suns were expecting to be without Booker for at least their next two games in New Orleans. Now, Phoenix may have to hold off the Pelicans without him. New Orleans has already shown this series will be closer than the 28-win gap between the two teams in the standings would suggest. Despite Booker's incandescent 31-point first half Tuesday, the Pelicans held a three-point lead when he left the game.
Phoenix can point to the team's success on the road as a reason for optimism. The Suns were an equal 32-9 both at home and away, joining the 1969-70 New York Knicks as the second team in NBA history with a better road record than any other team's home mark.
The early line at Caesars Sportsbook has Phoenix as a 1.5-point favorite for Friday's Game 3 (9:30 p.m. ET on ESPN). That suggests the Suns have better than a 75% chance of getting at least one win in the two games in New Orleans and about a 25% chance of coming home for Game 5 up 3-1 with a chance to close out the series.
Simultaneously, Phoenix should be hoping for the Dallas Mavericks-Utah Jazz series to stretch on as long as possible, delaying the start of a possible second-round matchup. If the Suns can advance and their second-round series doesn't start until early May, Booker would have nearly two weeks off before it begins.