Ranking the Roster 2016: Be(as)-gone!

With an unsurprising majority of the vote, Michael Beasley has been declared the 12th most valuable Buck left on the roster.

Acquired from Houston in late-September for the sparingly-used Tyler Ennis, Beasley apparently was a trade target of the Bucks' front office even before Khris Middleton went down with a (virtually) season-ending hamstring injury. The 8-year NBA veteran was the 2nd overall pick back in 2008, after a monster college season at Kansas State. While passing, defense, and other general basketball skills are usually things you want from players, Beasley has made his mark in the league by eschewing all of those things in favor of putting the biscuit in the basket.

Beasley's per-36 minute scoring stats describe him perfectly (19.2 points on .509 TS%): he goes after buckets like they owe him money. He is a combo-forward who is an okay rebounder (career TRB% of 11.5%), a passer in theory-only (career AST% of 9.7%), and generally plays defense like a guy who's just waiting to go back on offense again.

Last year, Beasley scored 12.8 ppg while playing only 18.2 minutes, and the general consensus is that he'll continue filling the same role in Milwaukee: sub in, score, sub out, repeat. And while he hunts for midrange jumpers too often, he's at least a passable three-point shooter (including being borderline-deadly from the corners: .405 on corner threes for his career!) and should be able to provide some punch off the bench.

But Beasley is nearing 30, is on his fifth NBA team (including two separate stints in Miami), and is on a veteran minimum contract, so the Bucks have virtually nothing to lose by letting him do his thing. It might be fun, but it's not terribly valuable.

The next few rounds of voting are going to be interesting. The oldest players on the team are all gone (as is last year's first round pick), so there's a bunch of different ways this could go. Who's it gonna be?

(Reminder: we're counting down the most valuable players from a roster-building perspective, not just who is going to be the best player next year. So put on your NBA GM hat and consider all the key factors that go into a player's value: past productivity, future potential, contract, age, personality, etc. So to start, pick the player you think is least valuable -- in other words, if the NBA had an expansion draft, who would be the first Bucks player you'd leave unprotected?)

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12. Michael Beasley
13. Rashad Vaughn
14. Jason Terry
15. Steve Novak