The Milwaukee Bucks’ season didn’t end with their loss on Sunday night, but you’d never know based on the cloud surrounding the organization after the game. Damian Lillard, the star they so desperately needed to salvage a crumbling playoff run, exited Game 4 after just a handful of minutes, forced out by what appears to be a serious achilles injury. Doc Rivers didn’t sound like a man holding out hope. "Just being honest, it's not very promising," Rivers said in his postgame press conference.

The Bucks, now trailing 3-1 to a formidable Indiana Pacers squad, are staring down the barrel of a third consecutive first-round exit. The signs are glaring. After a championship high in 2021, the Bucks have been steadily, stubbornly descending. Sunday night felt like more than a playoff loss, it felt like the end of an era. And if Milwaukee's front office is being honest with itself, it should acknowledge what the rest of the league has been whispering for months: it's time.

Time to give Giannis a real shot at another championship elsewhere. Time to give Dame a real shot at his first championship run. Time to stop gluing together a roster with expired stars and short-term thinking. Time to embrace the uncomfortable but obvious next step: a full-scale reset.

Giannis will have no shortage of suitors—teams with the assets and ambition to make a play for the 30 year old two-time NBA MVP. Damian Lillard, at 34, recovering from a serious injury after having just come back from a DVT diagnosis in unprecedented fashion, will have an uphill battle to return to form. Indeed, trading Giannis while he’s still in his prime might feel blasphemous now, but it would be organizational malpractice to ignore reality for sentimentality’s sake.

Milwaukee can either cash in on Giannis’s generational greatness one more time, or be left with nothing but memories and an unrealistic rebuild.

The Bucks gave their city a title for the first time in 50 years. It was beautiful, improbable, and real. But eras, like careers, tend to end sooner than anyone wants to admit. 

In any case, most importantly, prayers out to Dame for a full recovery. The game is much better when he's playing.