Don't know how hot of a take this is but they were pretty good from a talent perspective last year... not elite but pretty good. People seem to forget or downplay the Bucks taking the Celtics to 7 games last year and that Celtics team was leagues ahead of the Celtics this year offensively, and were better last year defensively too.
Problem for the Bucks was always their coaching imo, Kidd's schemes stopped working after his first year when they got scouted out and he never adjusted, and I can't even remember the name of their interim coach but he didn't change anything. I still think they make the ECFs if they just added Bud and that's it, but all of their role players they've added too have put them into the truly elite territory they seem to be trending towards.