Chicago Had 35 Assists. Milwaukee Had 30 Turnovers. Two Different Sports.

Chicago beat Milwaukee 125–104, and this game was basically a basketball clinic in how to share the ball versus how to hand it away. The Bulls had 35 assists and 14 steals. Milwaukee turned it over 30 times. Chicago led 62–39 at halftime, and with each Bucks mistake it seemed like another Bull was getting a clean look on the other end. No, it's not the NBA Finals. Yes, getting embarrassed like that in preseason still ought to teach you something.

Chicago: good offense is more than one hot hand

Matas Buzelis had 19 points and went 5-for-7 from three. Leonard Miller scored 18 on 7-for-11 shooting with seven boards, Norman Powell scored 16, and Jalen Smith added 15 and seven rebounds. Josh Giddey's nine assists helped build the movement even when he wasn't chasing his own points. The Bulls shot 47 percent overall and 40 percent from beyond the arc. Those aren't accidental numbers when so many players are touching the ball before the shot.

Chicago got 22 fast-break points to Milwaukee's six and scored 43 points off Bucks turnovers. That second number is the whole damn game in one stat. If you keep coughing it up, you make somebody else look like the best offensive team in the league. Chicago wasn't perfect—it committed 22 turnovers itself—but the defense and shot quality were good enough to make the Bucks pay disproportionately.

Milwaukee: some players showed up; the offense didn't

Kam Jones led Milwaukee with 23 points on 9-for-14 shooting. Brayden Burries added 19 with five assists, while Kasparas Jakucionis put up 18 points and six assists. Those are encouraging individual performances if you're evaluating young players. But Jakucionis also had five turnovers, and the collective ball security was a mess. Milwaukee shot 39 percent from the field and just 23 percent from three.

The Bucks actually won the rebounding battle 51–42 and got 17 offensive boards. That should have made this a much tighter game. Instead, they were giving away possessions faster than they could create second chances. Ousmane Dieng posted 10 points and 11 boards, another individual positive that got buried under the team-wide mistakes. Several regulars sat, and you have to allow for the lineup context, but none of that excuses 30 turnovers.

6ix Take: Chicago moved it; Milwaukee wasted it

I want to see the Bulls keep this exact energy when the stars on the other side show up. Extra passes, dudes cutting, defenders getting active hands without overcommitting—that's watchable basketball. But I'm not handing Chicago a trophy over a preseason game, either. Let's see if Buzelis and the rest can maintain good decision-making when possessions get harder.

As for Milwaukee, if your offense produces 30 turnovers and your defense gives up 43 points from those mistakes, you're already chasing a game you didn't even get to play properly. Get everybody on the same page, let your guards make the easy pass and stop turning every trip into a rescue mission. The roster evaluation is useful only if it exposes what needs fixing—and this sure as shit did.