{"id":161935,"date":"2025-09-22T22:03:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T22:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/161935\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T22:03:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T22:03:07","slug":"espn-throws-giannis-to-the-wolves-with-controversial-poll-results","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/161935\/","title":{"rendered":"ESPN throws Giannis to the wolves with controversial poll results"},"content":{"rendered":"

The media have had their backs turned on Giannis Antetokounmpo for a while now, but a new poll by ESPN has taken it to new heights. In the survey, voters were asked to pick the best player<\/a> in the NBA. Denver Nuggets star big man Nikola Jokic earned 19 votes, while OKC Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander earned one. Giannis didn’t even bring home a vote.<\/p>\n

Giannis, Bucks have been written off for a while now<\/p>\n

Nikola Jokic is an incredible talent. There’s a reason he has three MVP awards. However, the results of this poll make it seem like there is an insurmountable gap between the two. There isn’t. It shouldn’t be too controversial for some to take Giannis over Jokic as the best player in the world. However, ESPN simply doesn’t see it that way.<\/p>\n

As odd as it sounds, given that he’s at worst, a top-three player in the world, Giannis Antetokounmpo has become underrated. This is a player who has averaged over 30 points while shooting above 60 percent from the field in back-to-back seasons. In that same span, he’s averaged a career high 6.5 assists per game. That goes without mentioning the defensive impact he has.<\/p>\n

This shouldn’t be too surprising. This is the same network that predicted the Milwaukee Bucks would take the biggest tumble out of any NBA team in a different poll recently. Analysts simply aren’t high on the Bucks heading into the 2025-26 season.<\/a> It’s somewhat deserved due to their recent lack of team success, though injuries have been the biggest catalyst for that (which often gets ignored).<\/p>\n

The only way for Giannis and the Milwaukee Bucks to regain the media’s good graces is to do exactly what they did when they were overlooked in 2020-21: win. Everyone can talk about how the new-look Bucks look on paper,<\/a> but the only thing that truly matters is how they look once they hit the hardwood. This retooled team has what it takes to shock the NBA world.<\/p>\n

Of course, it all starts with Giannis Antetokounmpo, the forgotten star. With no other clear star in the lineup this year, the Greek Freak will have to be even better than ever before.<\/a> There’s a good chance he could take home his third MVP if the Milwaukee Bucks sniff any success this season, especially with all of these polls casting doubt on the franchise.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for more Milwaukee Bucks analysis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The media have had their backs turned on Giannis Antetokounmpo for a while now, but a new poll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161936,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-161935","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}