Milwaukee Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo could not hide his frustration after his team was eliminated on Tuesday following a 103-94 defeat to the Miami Heat in Game 5 of their second-round playoffs matchup. To make matters worse, the soon-to-be back-to-back MVP could not even help his team on Tuesday, as he was forced to sit out the contest due to an ankle injury.
After the game, Antetokounmpo also chose to spoke about the bigger issue at hand, expressing how proud he is of his team for being able to do their part in the fight for social justice:
Article Continues Below“At the end of the day, what we did…(in) the game against Orlando, it’s bigger than basketball,” Antetokounmpo said, via The Athletic's Sam Amick. “We choose as a team to do both (play basketball and fight for social justice). Is it hard to do both? Yes, it’s hard to do both. But that’s what we chose as a team, to stand for something that’s bigger than basketball, stand up for something that we believe, and at the same time play basketball. But it’s not easy.”
The Bucks were the first team that decided to boycott their game following the shooting of Jacob Blake at the hands of Kenosha police. Other teams quickly followed suit, and at one point, the rest of the season was in jeopardy.
As Giannis Antetokounmpo said, he firmly believes that what's more important here is how they used the playoffs as an avenue to raise their voice against the systemic racism that continues to plague the nation. Kudos to Giannis and the rest of the Bucks for always keeping the bigger picture in mind.