Monthly Archives: January 2015

Happy Hump Day, Timberwolves fans. Your favorite team will look for its eight win of the season tonight in its game against the Boston Celtics, the 45th of this season. It should be a winnable contest against a Celtics team that fields fewer bad players than the Wolves, but no good ones either. They’re 16-27 and have traded away their two best veterans, Rajon Rondo and Jeff Green. At Target Center, the Wolves should have enough pride to expect a win, or at least a game that goes down to the wire.

Rather than dig into the details of this late-January matchup of lottery-bound rebuilders, I felt more like discussing different things I’ve come across in NBA news and writing over the past few days; some of it Wolves-related, some not.

* Wolves whiffing on Whiteside

I might as well start right here at Punch-Drunk Wolves, where Patrick J wrote about Hassan Whiteside, the current buzz of League Pass; specifically how the Wolves failed to spot a talented, available big man from the free agency scrap heap when Nikola Pekovic was first declared injured and instead Jeff Adrien was pursued and signed. Pat specifically mentioned the relationship between Flip Saunders and Adrien’s agent, perhaps suggesting that the marginal roster decision was made for reasons other than merit. Whatever reasons were behind the Adrien pickup, we know they had nothing to do with long-term potential because he had none of it. And Whiteside did.

I understand the rebuttal to this, because it’s pretty simple: The Wolves missed on Whiteside along with the other 28 teams who failed to sign him when he was available. Props to Miami for finding him and having the proper infrastructure to tap into his enormous talent. He had a points/rebounds/blocks triple-double on national TV on Sunday.

Another rebuttal point could be that the Wolves have enough “upside,” between Zach LaVine, Anthony Bennett, and even Glenn Robinson III. (I leave Andrew Wiggins out, because he’s already pretty good and not a clear-cut “project.”)

But newer readers may not be aware that we’ve both been big fans of Whiteside — or at least “the idea of Whiteside” — for a long time, even devoting a short post to him in August 2012 when there were some rumors swirling that the Wolves might have interest in bringing him in.  I just did a quick “Whiteside” word search in my email inbox, and the list of hits was long, going back over three years. So it wasn’t just after-the-fact, hindsight-is-20/20 for Pat to write that. Whiteside was blocking shots like whoa in his first, abbreviated NBA stint, and his physical tools didn’t disappear in his time away from top-notch competition. If you read his post in full, it’s not like he was crucifying Flip for missing on this, but just acknowledging that the Wolves have been rotating new anonymous big men in all season, and none of them was the available guy who is now dominating the Eastern Conference.

* Lorenzo Brown: a point guard at last! Continue reading →

In a close race of unexpected candidates, Andrew Wiggins is the season’s first-half MVP.

We’ve hit the season’s halfway mark, so it’s time for a Timberwolves mid-term report. At the quarter mark, I did letter grades for players. For mid-terms, I thought I’d change it up and instead do this with superlatives. Some are good, some are bad, and some are just observations with no serious bearing on wins, losses, or potential.

Here goes…

Most Disappointing: The Power Forwards

Thaddeus Young was acquired in a trade in which the Wolves sent a future first round pick (Miami’s) to the 76ers. The idea was that he would be a quality veteran forward who — along with Ricky Rubio, Kevin Martin, and Nikola Pekovic — would help the new young players develop in the context of a competitive environment.

In theory, it made some sense, even if it was criticized by more than a few writers at the time the trade went down.

It has not worked out. Thad is playing some of the worst basketball of his career. His field goal percentage is a career low, at just 43.5 percent. He makes just 60 percent of free throw attempts, and pulls down a measly 5.5 rebounds per 36 minutes (4.8 per game). His PER is the second worst of his career, at a below-average 14.2 and his win shares per 48 minutes are at 0.020, which is way below league averages.  He’s often out of position on defense, he’s undersized at power forward but doesn’t shoot well enough from the perimeter to play the small forward effectively, and his decision making with the ball leaves a lot to be desired.

It has not worked out.

Making matters worse is that his backup, Anthony Bennett, has done little to nothing to challenge Young for minutes. Bennett, the top pick in the 2013 NBA Draft, makes too many mistakes to deserve floor time right now. He plays out of necessity and perhaps in the interest of his own development as a potentially-good player, down the road. Bennett shoots a lot of long two-point jumpers, he shows jitters when he tries to do anything off the dribble, he sometimes looks out of shape (though this aspect is much improved from his rookie year in Cleveland) and he has been generally ineffective far more often than not.

Bennett has the excuse of inexperience, having played only one college season and being injured and deconditioned for most of his rookie year, surrounded by dysfunction in Cleveland. Sam Mitchell and others have characterized this as his real rookie year. That’s fair, but it is discouraging to see such a disconnect between ability and execution. He has a beautiful jump shot, a bulky-in-a-good-way forward’s body, and shows flashes of supreme athleticism. Yet he usually plays poorly. I think he’s worth a significant, long-term investment but I’d be lying if I said that it wasn’t without risk. He might never “get it.” But in the NBA and much of the modern pro sports world, impatience trumps wisdom and the long view and big picture take a back seat.

Perhaps this is one area where Flip Saunders’ GM-Coach combo status can pay off. He doesn’t really answer to anybody but himself, so if he wants to be patient, he can be patient. That doesn’t mean he likes Bennett (I don’t know, and can’t really tell if he does) but it might at least give him some flexibility that less-secure coaches would not feel like they have.  We’ll see.

In any event, the power forwards have been disappointing. In some ways, I think Robbie Hummel is their best option at the four, which — while I like Hummel more than most — is a damning statement about the other two.

Most Pleasant Surprise: Shabazz Muhammad’s Emergence

Patrick and I have probably been higher on ‘Bazz than most since he was drafted but neither of us would be telling the truth if we said we saw this coming. Muhammad is hurt right now — out with a hip or oblique injury — but when healthy (35 games played) he’s been a pretty awesome scorer. It took Flip a while to trust Shabazz — maybe he was surprised, too — so his playing time is limited right now to just 23 minutes per game. In that time he’s put up 13.7 points on 49 percent field goal shooting, including 41 percent from downtown and a steady supply of aggressive dunks that buck the outdated/alarming trend of mid-range jumpers on this team.

Shabazz knows how to score. It’s that simple. It’s what he likes doing and what he does best. When he comes off a pick and catches a pass, his eyes are either on the rim for a potential shot, or on a lane to shoot as if out of a cannon, to the rim. In the post, he establishes position with physicality and continues to show deft touch on that lefty hook shot. He’s not yet a good passer, but he’s a better one that he was in college or as an NBA rookie. He’s improving. He’s been the team’s most pleasant surprise and we all hope he gets healthy soon.

Most Valuable Player: Andrew Wiggins

Continue reading →

“I’m tough on players that I think have a chance to be very special. At one time everyone thought I wasn’t tough enough on Garnett. I couldn’t be tough on him because he did everything I always asked him to do and he very rarely made any mistakes and he played hard. I thought that if he kept on playing that way, he’d be great.

My toughness on them has to do with repeated mental mistakes.”

That was Flip Saunders after the recent loss to the Spurs at Target Center. It reminded me once again just how unique Saunders’ challenge is, coaching this team that is just so replete with bouncy athleticism and yet — in its current form — so totally devoid of all-around NBA basketball players.

Consider that Andrew Wiggins leads the team in minutes played and Zach LaVine is fourth. Each guy is 19 years old; the age of most college freshmen. Shabazz Muhammad is fifth in minutes and he’s 22, the typical age of a college senior, and Anthony Bennett is 21, barely old enough to legally drink a beer. He’s eighth in minutes.

Flip is coaching a college team against NBA competition.

Continue reading →

I haven’t been doing game wraps this season because, ever since Rubio, Pekovic and Martin went down, the game outcomes took on very little meaning. Very shortly after Ricky’s injury was that horrific weekend on the road where the Wolves lost by (a franchise record) 48 points at New Orleans and then allowed a layup line the next night at Dallas. They won at home against the Knicks — who we now know to be the very worst team in basketball — and then lost by 29, 12, and 17, in the next three games, all at Target Center.

The season changed from an intriguing question mark to a definitive rebuild.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t have observations and I don’t mean to let losing get in the way of posting.

With that introduction, here’s an updated scrap of things I’ve been thinking over the past few games. We’ll do this Good, Bad, and Ugly style, but for sake of manufactured balance, I’ll throw in an “Interesting” to close things off.

The Good: If you squint just the right amount, you can kinda see a young core of players beginning to bloom.

Continue reading →