Milwaukee Bucks' Senior Vice President Alex Lasry did not hide his displeasure with the NBA's supposed double standard. This comes after reports that league officials are looking into possible tampering violations by the Bucks in their attempt to negotiate a sign-and-trade deal with the Sacramento Kings for Bogdan Bogdanovic.
The Bucks executive took a passive-aggressive approach on Twitter, by re-tweeting several instances of other teams committing the same thing in previous years, but was not penalized by the league.
Alex Lasry is RTing stuff about other teams tampering but ain't claiming his team didn't makes it pretty clear they did it.
— Anthony Doyle🍉 (@Anthonysmdoyle) November 20, 2020
Lasry cited instances done by Dallas Mavericks and Boston Celtics, even before the free agency period was supposed to begin.
The Bucks are reportedly in hot waters after allegedly reaching out to the Serbian sharpshooter before they were even legally allowed to. NBA teams are only permitted to negotiate terms when free agency begins on Friday, November 20.
Initial reports claimed that Bogdanovic's (along with Justin James) move to Milwaukee was pretty much a done deal in exchange for Donte DiVincenzo, D.J. Wilson, and Ersan Ilyasova going to Sacramento. However, that's no longer the case as Bogdanovic will enter the market as a restricted free agent.
Lasry, on the other hand, already deleted those re-tweets, but it's clear that he is buying into the whole ordeal of the NBA wanting Giannis to play in a bigger market. The Bucks earlier acquired Jrue Holiday in a bid to make superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo stay, and Bogdanovic was supposed to complete the puzzle. Making matters worse for the Bucks is that they already waived Ilyasova's $7 million salary, which was key to absorbing the 28-year-old swingman's new contract.
The Bucks can still salvage the deal and just alter the package, but it will be tricky especially if the NBA decides to penalize them after the investigation.