Khris Middleton is lighting it up on the biggest stage possible, just 1 win away from the NBA championship. But his road and journey to this point is quite an interesting and improbable way of getting to the finals.
Let me give you the short version of the Khris Middleton story. What up everybody, my name is Stefan and this is Heat Check. Let’s get into it.
If you’re not a Bucks fan, you may not know that he was not drafted by Milwaukee.
In 2012 the Detroit Pistons selected Khris with the 39th selection, of course making him a second round pick.
But his rookie season was a rough experience. Of course as a second rounder he didn’t get a lot of playing time, and was eventually sent to the G-League to develop and try to get better.
Middleton ended the season for Detroit appearing in only 27 games with modest averages of 6.1 points, 1.9 rebounds and 1 assist per game.
At the same time, Milwaukee as the 8 seed were preparing for their matchup against Miami’s big three.
This is the famous moment for the Bucks culture when Brandon Jennings said that he thinks they are going to win in 6. (Jennings CLIP)
Of course, they got swept and the front office decided that this was the limit for this team.
So they decided to blow it up and rebuild.
During that off season, the Pistons and the Bucks made a trade- swapping their guards. Brandon Jennings was set to arrive in Detroit, and in return Milwaukee would get Brandon Knight, and as a throw-in, a filler to this trade Middleton was also included.
So for all of you that didn’t know, this is actually the unceremonious way of how Khris became a part of this team.
Regardless, from the moment he put on the Bucks uniform, he saw a lot of playing time and chance to prove himself on a young team.
That young and rebuilding team was not good by any means. Dead last in the league.
But Middleton made a big jump doubling his points per game so there was something promising there.
Oh and btw, this was also the rookie season of Milwaukee’s 15th pick of the draft. A guy named Giannis Antetokounmpo. Some greek guy I guess.
The next 2 seasons Khris continued to improve, reaching an impressive 18.2 points per game in 2015-16. So everything is going great right? Well, not exactly.
The following season that was supposed to follow the upward momentum and truly be a breakout year Khris suffered a scary injury.
During practice he slipped on a wet spot on the court and actually tore his hamstring completely off the bone, which apparently is a pretty rare injury.
He would miss a big portion of that 2016-17 season and only play in 29 games.
There was a tremendous amount of concern among the team for how Khris would be able to bounce back from that, and if he would have the same mobility as well as overall game.
But Khris has been nothing short of amazing ever since the moment he came back.
With averages of 20.1 points per game, 5.2 rebounds and 4 assists per game Middleton told everyone that he is that guy, securing a spot in the all star game 2 times in the last 4 years and with that becoming the first G-League player to become an all star.
And to top everything off, this year the Bucks finale broke through the Eastern conference and went to the finals, at the moment just 1 win away from winning the championship. With Khris as their crunch time closer most of the time.
Whatever happens, this truly is a full circle moment for Khris Middleton and his improbable journey to Milwaukee.
Let me know in the comments if you knew his story. That’s it for now, subscribe and talk to you in the next one. Peace out.