By Jimmy Carlton Sportswriter Published Jul 12, 2017 at 2:55 PM Photography: David Bernacchi

If you are a Milwaukee Bucks basketball fan and you possess human emotions, watch this new Giannis Antetokounmpo commercial and prepare to feel your body become electrified and full of life (and milk).

In the video, which is a Greek advertisement for the Vivartia brand Milko – a chocolate milk product – and entitled "I’ll tell you what basketball is," Antetokounmpo describes the sport in gritty, dramatic and motivational terms. The Bucks’ rising superstar, who was born in Athens and whose incredible, adversity-overcoming, rags-to-riches backstory is now well-documented, has been in Greece since Milwaukee’s season ended in the first-round of the playoffs.

Recently, Antetokounmpo was named to the All-NBA and All-Defensive Second Teams, won the league’s Most Improved Player award and potently addressed free-agency rumors by tweeting a dope Kendrick Lamar lyric. He’s already established himself as one of the most beloved Bucks players ever – and an increasingly popular player across America – but the Greek Freak has remained ever-proud of and vocally active about his nationality.

Speaking in his native language, Antetokounmpo talks emotively about what basketball means to him. It’s less a commercial than a super-well-produced trailer for a film that I would excitedly watch, with a 64-ounce movie-theater cup of Milko, over and over and over again, feeling inspired to try and do anything as well as Giannis slow-motion dunks a ball. It features a legion of Greek children and emphasizes messages of hard work, dedication and believing in your dream. The video ends with a basketball hoop on fire in the middle of the sea (!), followed by Milko’s tagline, "Heads high."

The original ad was apparently translated from Greek to English by YouTube user Dante800, who wrote in the comments that the company responsible for creating it is "pretty active in supporting basketball in Greece, sponsoring streetball events and exhibitions, among other things." The user added that he thought providing a translation would be worthwhile for English speakers, asking the audience to "go easy" on him in the interpretation.

I’m ready to run through a damn brick wall right now, and the video is undeniably awesome – reminiscent of some of the Bucks’ city-stirring ads and Jabari Parker’s 2015 Gatorade spot. But, given Klay Thompson and Kevin Love doing their warrior-archetype, "Build with Chocolate Milk" campaign commercials, it all begs the question: Is anyone really buying the chocolate-milk-as-athletic-recovery-beverage sell? I'm no sports-medicine scientist, and if drinking sugar milk keeps Giannis from breaking his valuable bones, then by all means, but ... I don't know, still seems kind of weird. Speaking of weird "performance" drinks, remember All Sport? 

Anyway, milk or no milk, Giannis is still the best, and we all love listening to him tell us what basketball is.

Jimmy Carlton Sportswriter

Born in Milwaukee but a product of Shorewood High School (go ‘Hounds!) and Northwestern University (go ‘Cats!), Jimmy never knew the schoolboy bliss of cheering for a winning football, basketball or baseball team. So he ditched being a fan in order to cover sports professionally - occasionally objectively, always passionately. He's lived in Chicago, New York and Dallas, but now resides again in his beloved Brew City and is an ardent attacker of the notorious Milwaukee Inferiority Complex.

After interning at print publications like Birds and Blooms (official motto: "America's #1 backyard birding and gardening magazine!"), Sports Illustrated (unofficial motto: "Subscribe and save up to 90% off the cover price!") and The Dallas Morning News (a newspaper!), Jimmy worked for web outlets like CBSSports.com, where he was a Packers beat reporter, and FOX Sports Wisconsin, where he managed digital content. He's a proponent and frequent user of em dashes, parenthetical asides, descriptive appositives and, really, anything that makes his sentences longer and more needlessly complex.

Jimmy appreciates references to late '90s Brewers and Bucks players and is the curator of the unofficial John Jaha Hall of Fame. He also enjoys running, biking and soccer, but isn't too annoying about them. He writes about sports - both mainstream and unconventional - and non-sports, including history, music, food, art and even golf (just kidding!), and welcomes reader suggestions for off-the-beaten-path story ideas.