The Milwaukee Bucks shocked the entire NBA world when they decided to change head coaches in the middle of the season, firing Adrian Griffin, who had steered the Bucks to a 30-11 start, and replacing him with the polarizing Doc Rivers. One of the reasons behind this seismic decision is that the Bucks wanted a locker room leader that the players will listen to, and more importantly, the Bucks felt like they needed a change to remedy their ailing defense.

Alas, the Bucks haven't yet figured out how to solve their defensive woes that have them ranked 19th in the NBA — a huge drop-off from their fourth-ranked defense last season. In fact, their defensive malaise was in full display during their Wednesday night loss to the Portland Trail Blazers in Damian Lillard's homecoming that the new Bucks head coach didn't have many words to describe his team's lackluster effort.

“Awful,” Rivers said of the Bucks' defense to start the game, per Eric Nehm of The Athletic.

The Bucks engaged in a shootout with the Blazers in the first half; they allowed too much dribble penetration from the Portland guards, with Malcolm Brogdon, Anfernee Simons, and Scoot Henderson all taking turns in carving up Milwaukee's paper-soft perimeter defense.

At this point, it's not quite clear what Doc Rivers must do to fix the Bucks' issues that, at the moment, look very much beyond his control. Milwaukee does have solid to great defensive personnel in Brook Lopez, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Khris Middleton, but interior defense can only mean so much if the guards can't keep the ballhandlers in front of them.

This is where the loss of Jrue Holiday hurts the Bucks so much; Holiday used to be the perimeter anchor of their defense, as he fought hard over screens and steered ballhandlers into the waiting arms of Lopez and Antetokounmpo. Meanwhile, Damian Lillard and Malik Beasley aren't as adept (which is putting it lightly) in containing dribble penetration.

The Bucks may need to make one more trade for a 3-and-D player so they can reach their ambition of competing for the Larry O'Brien trophy come June.