Deadspin have offered their unique take on the website and billboard, in part :
“…so some concerned fans have paid for a billboard that would seem to emphasize lottery balls over basketballs.
The folks at SaveOurBucks.com wouldn’t call it “tanking.” They’ve got a multi-part plan for the Bucks to return to competitiveness and stay in Milwaukee, and it involves front office moves and fan support. But the key is to eschew the Bucks’ usual strategy of band-aid acquisitions in favor of trading away veterans, letting young players get minutes, and lose their way into a top pick in next year’s stacked draft.”
Sporting News have covered saveourbucks.com and the launch of the billboard on their site, saying in part :
“A group of concerned Bucks fans rallied together to create “SaveOurBucks.com” with the goal of keeping the team in Milwaukee. They recently purchased a billboard sign outside of the city with a most interesting slogan.”
To celebrate the “Winning Takes Balls” Billboard going up on I-43 & McKinley, meet other Bucks fans and raise money for the MACC Fund. $5 cover at the door ALL goes to the MACC Fund. The bar is also donating a portion of bar sales. There will be drink specials and the kitchen is open if you want to order food.
When : Monday, December 23rd 7pm Start
Where : The Loaded Slate
1137 N. Old World 3rd Street
Milwaukee, WI 53202
414-273-5700
SPECIAL GUEST Milwaukee Native TNA “Impact” Wrestler Austin Aries will be making an appearance to promote & support Save Our Bucks Mission! Austin has been a Bucks fan for decades and a RealGM lurker for years. As a native Milwaukeean Austin Aries is passionate about his city keeping it’s NBA franchise in Milwaukee and built for the future years of success.
The Billboard Launch Party is about to kickoff and so is the live twitter feed on saveourbucks.com , several members of the SaveOurBucks.com team including spokesperson Paul Henning will be providing live updates from the Party.
You can find the live twitter feed here, or by going through the EVENTS tab in the navigation bar. Hope everyone has a great night, remember to use #SOBParty for any tweets from or about the event!
As part of the festivities we’re planning on running a live twitter feed from the event on this website, so if you are tweeting either from or about the party remember to include the hashtag #SOBParty in all of your tweets. We’ll also be providing a rundown of the event with photos and video on the site, so if you can’t make it to the party check in to saveourbucks.com for the next best thing.
We’re hoping to have some freshly printed official SaveOurBucks.com T-Shirts for sale for a very small fee at the event, these will be limited in numbers so if you want one make sure you get to the party.
The support for this movement has been overwhelming, would be great to pack the venue tonight with loads of like-minded passionate Bucks fans!
Frustrated Bucks fans are raising money for a billboard begging the team to lose games
It’s rather crude, you’d surely submit, but a group of desperate Milwaukee Bucks fans have launched their own crowd-sourced campaign to raise a billboard in Milwaukee to remind the team’s front office of an undeniable NBA truth. To win in the NBA, you usually need a star. And the easiest way to acquire a star is to lose enough to draft one. And the only way to lose enough is to stop blindly clinging to mediocre players in hopes of a lower rung playoff berth.
The group, as of this writing, is well on their way to a “$3,000 to $4,000” goal, though “$5,000” is listed on the IndieGoGo.com website. Here’s part of the reasoning behind the drive to launch the billboard:
In order for the Bucks to regain their footing with the fans and the community, they need to drastically improve the product on the court. As we have seen with the Packers in 1992 and the Brewers in 2004, moribund franchises can be turned around quickly. The Bucks can be a successful small market franchise both on the court and financially. However, for the Bucks to do this, they need to change their approach. One way to help change this approach is if the fan base can let the organization know that they will support a full rebuilding of the team under a new front office direction. This means being willing to part with high-priced journeymen veteran players and focus on building around young talent acquired with high draft picks. The talent rich 2014 NBA draft is the place to start.
As Eric Freeman noted in these pages months ago, the Bucks do not want to cast aside those hopes for a .500 record. The team wants to make the playoffs, even if the ceiling for this particular roster – even at full health – is not entirely impressive. In an awful bit of irony that I’m not sure if Bucks fans are in favor for, the team isn’t at full health. And the hoped-for 41 wins seem a long way away, because with franchise big man Larry Sanders out after allegedly injuring his wrist in a bar fight, the team will have to go 39-30 the rest of the way in order to grab that .500 mark. And even at full strength, this is not a 39-30 team.
That’s sort of what happens when you pin your hopes on overachieving late lottery picks like Sanders, John Henson, and Brandon Knight alongside journeymen like O.J. Mayo and Zaza Pachulia, with a respected if retread coach like Larry Drew leading the way. Milwaukee general manager John Hammond has been the subject of mostly league-wide scorn for his attempts to stick in the middle – but to Bucks fans this is no joke.
This is their team, in a city that seems to be falling out of love with NBA basketball. And despite the (hoped-for) presence of a cool court and a top-notch promotional and broadcasting team, we can’t blame fair-weather former Bucks fans for fleeing. There’s no joy in rooting for a team that has no chance at a championship, while at the same time playing at a middling level that would leave the squad’s draft chances out of the top three. It’s a maddening purgatory, one that Bucks fans have been dealing with for over a decade.
With that 2-11 start, Milwaukee may be well on its way back up the lottery ranks. Still, a rather vocal batch of Bucks fans want to remind the team’s front office that this is to be embraced. And even if their play on words is a little crude, we support the cause.
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Courtesy Yahoo Sports
If you aren’t following @KDonhoops yet, make sure you do.
We knew there was a groundswell of support for @SaveOurBucks, but this is amazing! Two days ago some guys put together the Indiegogo funding project to get our message out on a billboard and help raise awareness for this campaign, they had the lofty goal of raising $5000 and some saw that as fanciful – we just hit that target in less than 48 hours.
We’re overwhelmed by the support, thank you to everyone who contributed. We’ll keep you posted on the progress!
We’ll cover it in more detail in the future, but the billboard we’ve been talking about for a few weeks that was paid for using generous donations from like minded Bucks fans is now UP! It’s at I-43 and McKinley in Milwaukee, don’t worry if you’re anywhere nearby you’ll definitely see it! Don’t forget our launch party for the billboard with Bucks fan and pro wrestler Austin Aries at 7pm on Monday 23rd December at The Loaded Slate, all proceeds going to the MACC Fund.
