In the aftermath of the 2016 NBA Draft, Jason Kidd and the rest of the Milwaukee Bucks brass are beaming about their two new additions: Thon Maker and Malcolm Brogdon.
With a selection in each round of the draft, Milwaukee added two very different prospects. Maker, a 19-year-old forward, stands at 7-foot-1 and has no collegiate experience, while the 23-year-old Brogdon measures at 6-foot-5 and brings five years of experience from the University of Virginia. But as different as they might seem, Coach Kidd sees many similarities between the two.
“For both guys, if you’re listening, they talk about the team first, and not I. When you talk about the Bucks, that’s what we talk about everyday,” Jason said. “They’re off-the-chart people. They say all the right things, and then they do all the right things on the court.”
Maker is perhaps the most interesting prospect in the draft, and one with an immense ceiling. Born in South Sudan, Maker has been all over the globe since fleeing the war-torn country at the age of six. After stops in Uganda, Australia and Louisiana, he settled in Virginia, where he starred at Martinsville’s Carlisle School. He then moved to Ontario and graduated from the Orangeville District Secondary school in June 2015. He stayed for a post-graduate year at the Athlete Institute of Ontario.
Maker then turned down a host of scholarship offers from essentially every top collegiate basketball program in America, including Kentucky, Duke, Kansas—and even Brogdon’s UVA. Instead, he petitioned for 2016 NBA Draft eligibility, and it was granted. He showed off his athletic ability at the Draft Combine in Chicago, but J-Kidd and Co. really fell in love with his work ethic during workouts in Milwaukee.
“He had his workout, then he came back to work out again, and it just showed his commitment to trying to get better,” Jason said of Maker. “It just fits into our program. We have practice, and then something called night school. To see him do that on his own, we felt that fit in what we try to do during the season.”
Brogdon’s story isn’t quite as complex. He was one of the Top 100 players in the nation coming out of the Greater Atlanta Christian School (Norcross, Ga.) in 2011. The guard played 28 games as a freshman before breaking his foot—an injury that forced him to redshirt the following season. He returned in 2013 and started 108 games over the following three seasons for UVA, leading the Cavaliers to an 89-19 record in that span, as well as a Sweet 16 and an Elite Eight appearance.
At age 23, he’s already older than six of his new teammates, including regular starters Giannis Antetokounmpo and Jabari Parker. But Jason believes he’ll fit in perfectly with the young Bucks.
“It’s going to be easy. His maturity is going to rub off on some of the younger guys, but his ability to play his role—he understands his role and plays it well, so I think he’s going to fit in just fine,” Jason said. “His basketball IQ is very high. He’s a guy who’s going to take care of the ball. He’s about his teammates first, before he’s about himself. He checks all the boxes for us. He’s 23 years old, he’ll be a rookie, but he’ll be a guy who will make his teammates better from Day 1 when he steps out on his floor.”
Jason is also excited about what the Virginia product will bring to the defensive end of the floor for the Bucks. Just as it is under Coach Kidd, defense was king for UVA coach Tony Bennett. Brogdon leaves Charlottesville as the back-to-back Defensive Player of the Year in the Atlantic Coast Conference. He was also a consensus first-team All-American,
“When you look at Malcolm, he’s a competitor on the defensive end,” Jason said. “We’ve talked about that a lot—we’ve got to get back to playing defense. What he brings, he’s been well-coached, he understands who he is, and we’re very lucky to be able to get someone like that. We feel we got better tonight in the draft.”
The Bucks went into the draft with defense in mind, while looking to also address the team’s desire to add perimeter shooting. Coach Kidd believes both draft picks can fit those needs—and both players will mesh well in Milwaukee.
“You talk about the three. Both guys can shoot the three. When you talk about fitting in, they’re going to help us in that department. But we talk about defense first, second and third, and these guys can help us in that department as well,” Coach Kidd said. “They’re unique, they are going to be special, and we’re lucky to have them.”
