Bucks simply have a tough salary cap situation. Middleton was going to get the money somewhere so it’s not overpaying if that is going rate for a player. You are worth what the market will give you. Middleton, Lopez, Bledsoe all getting locked up are all important & hard to cry going cheap just because we didn’t plunge into the tax. This isn’t baseball, there is a lot of strategy involved working around the cap. Bucks were a darn good team pre Mirotic & Hill. They were darn good team minus Brogdon & Mirotic down the stretch. I hated losing Brogdon, I have said all season he is 2nd most important guy but 21 million a year with our cap moving forward just wasn’t realistic. Bucks get 3 picks that I suspect we will package & use as maneuvering chips. Are we better? No. Are we worse, a little depending on next moves. Hopefully Hill comes back. He is 34 & should be hunting championships vs money at this point in career. Knicks, Bulls are two of Top other rumors for Hill and neither is winning anytime in future. Sixers got worse.... they were hit harder than Bucks even with max deal to Harris (complaining about Middleton max deal? Rather be forced to pay Tobias even more?) Raptors will be worse.... Leonard is not replaceable for them Nets clearly got better if KD can play at all next season. Kyrie isn’t a leader & don’t think he is that much of upgrade over what Russell was becoming. Jordan can rebound & dunk but is removed from prime. Celtics think got upgrade with Kemba over Irving just from leadership alone. But if Hortford is gone... think that is a lose. Overall, the East as a whole hasn’t done much to get better outside of Nets. Even with Mirotic, Brogdon, maybe Hill gone. Don’t think we lose much ground as a leader in the east.