The NBA season starts on Tuesday, and your very own Minnesota Timberwolves earned a spot in the league’s opening-night doubleheader. After the Thibs & KAT 2.0 debut (Knicks-Celtics, 6:30 CT, TNT), the Wolves tip off at LA where they face LeBron and Bronny James. (9:00 CT, TNT).
Last year was a massive success. Fifty six wins. Two memorable playoff series wins – the first for its shocking dominance; the second for its shocking drama. Ant and KAT made All-Star. Ant made All-NBA. Rudy was DPOY. Naz was 6th Man of the Year. Finch finished third in Coach of the Year voting.
The Mavs series was a frustrating crash after the Denver Game 7 Euphoria. The shooting went cold. Flaws were exposed. National commentary pivoted hard from Hype to Hate. Luka Doncic became a true villain. That series sucked, but it didn’t change the basic truth that the Wolves exceeded expectations, and the expectations for once were not low expectations. The Wolves took a huge step and entertained along the way.
An offseason that did not figure to be eventful had a couple of big events. There was draft night. On what was supposed to be a boring night by Wolves-draft standards, Connelly threw a huge curveball by trading into the 8th pick to draft point guard Rob Dillingham from Kentucky. Nobody saw anything like this coming. Then, a couple months later, the KAT trade happened. Out was Towns and his 9 years of Timberwolves service. In was Julius Randle, Donte DiVincenzo, and a protected Pistons pick.
So here we are, ready to roll. What follows are some questions that I think will direct the outcome of this season. Expectations will be high this year, as they should be. The KAT trade might make the Wolves a little bit better or a little bit worse. What it does not do is change the basic expectations dynamic for this team. They have loads of veteran talent that should be competing for a championship. That starts by winning 50 or more regular season games, like they did last year. It continues by upping the intensity in the playoffs, like they did last year. Without further ado:
5th Biggest Question: Does Conley still have it?
Mike Conley has a 100 percent approval rating. That is rare in any profession. Everybody loves Bite Bite for a few obvious reasons. He’s a smart and steady veteran player whose impact on each game is subtle, but almost always positive. He’s a clutch shooter. He’s known to be a great teammate and mentor to his younger teammates, especially Edwards. And he’s the classiest player in the entire league. What’s not to love?
Well, if you were forced to answer, you might say “his age.” He turned 37 last week. Conley played 76 games last year. How many should we realistically expect this go-around: 70? One of the roster tweaks from last year is in the backup point guard department. Monte Morris and Jordan McLaughlin are both gone. I suppose Rob Dillingham is ostensibly the “backup point guard,” but that is probably not going to be the practical reality; at least not right away. When Conley sits, it seems more likely that Finch deploys bigger backcourts with shared ballhandling duties. Both NAW and DDV can expect to bring the ball up the floor plenty, this year. That might be just fine, but there is a difference between having a first-class point guard on the floor, and not having a real point guard at all.
As *Connelly* (gotta keep the spellings straight) continues his boldly successful stewardship of Timberwolves basketball operations, he has to balance Where Anthony Edwards Is Right Now with how things might look when he reaches his prime. Right now — or, at least, as we’ve seen him most recently — Ant is a scoring guard who probably needs a meaningful playmaker by his side. If Conley has a season like he did last year, the Wolves will be in terrific shape. If he cannot sustain something close to that level of play, it will have some ripple effects that might include midseason roster changes, and the team will suffer for it in the win-loss column.
Small Question #1: Will Rob Dillingham actually play?
I tend to think the answer is “No, not this year.” The Wolves are a serious team with a serious coach, and very few 19-year old rookies are Serious NBA Basketball Players. In the preseason snippets we’ve been able to see, there’s no question that Rob has explosive quickness and a shotmaker’s feel for the game. He could easily enter any game and rack up a quick 10 points. The problem as I see it, this year, is that Rob’s not gonna be good enough, or consistently good enough anyway, to justify his highjacking of stretches of games. It’s fun to hypothesize about a bench scorer coming in and just jacking shots, as if bench minutes don’t need to be played seriously at all. Dillingham takes a ton of dribbles to get anywhere on the floor. It looks cool — it really does — but I think he’ll need a fair amount of time to develop more of a passing mentality, so that offensive sets don’t rise and fall entirely with whether he’s hot or not. Jamal Crawford made a career of playing 1 on 5 off the bench, but Jamal was 6’5″, and even his overall effectiveness wasn’t always quite in line with how cool his game was.
4th Biggest Question: Will this team remain a defensive monster?
Last year’s Wolves were the top ranked defense, measured by points allowed per 100 possessions. It was not even all that close, as their 108.4 d-rating was a full 2.2 points better than second place (Boston). They made their money and won their games on that side of the floor; it was their identity. Rudy was stupidly kept off the All-Star Team (eds note: who wants a shot-contest maestro mucking up a game that can otherwise be scored East 211, West 186?) but he was properly awarded his fourth and very controversial apparently Defensive Player of the Year trophy. Jaden may not have taken certain leaps or even steps forward as an all-around contributor, and at times his defense seemed a bit less dominant on-ball than the year before, but he consistently guarded the opposing star and did that well. He made All-Defense 2nd Team. Ant, in big moments versus big players, is one of the best on-ball defenders in the league. NAW off the bench works harder to pressure the ball and fight through screens than maybe anyone in Wolves history.
KAT’s gone and Randle’s in. Does that alter the defensive chemistry? It might. I tend to doubt that it will because Karl was more of a passenger than a driver of the Wolves’ defensive dominance, but I would be lying if I said he was irrelevant to it. He had the size and skills to be a disruptive forward next to Rudy, and Randle isn’t quite as big. The power forward swap is probably not a huge deal for a defense primarily built upon the shoulders of Rudy and Jaden, but it’s something to keep an eye on. Naz Reid, whose defensive ability and defensive deficiencies are sometimes confounding to me — at least compared to some of the stats — also factors in here, as he stands to play more minutes than in the past.
Bottom line: if the Wolves remain the league’s best defense, they will almost certainly return as a championship contender. Just because it happened last year doesn’t guarantee it will happen again, so it makes the Top 5 Biggest Questions list.
Small Question #2: Will Finch use a consistent rotation?
Conley isn’t the only important Timberwolf who’s put on a lot of miles. Rudy’s entering his 12th season. Randle’s entering his 11th and is just now returning to action after shoulder surgery this past April. It might behoove Coach Finch to use certain nights — road back to back’s, or when someone just needs a day off — to rest his older guys and try to win by going deeper into what might be a bench deep with NBA talent. If Conley rests, that could mean some Dillingham. That one scares me a little bit, but it may have to be at least tested. If Rudy rests, it might mean Garza holds down the 5 spot for 20 or so minutes, with small ball for the other 28. Josh Minott looks stronger and improved, and has positional versatility to fill in, when needed.
As Finch adjusts to the physical realities of coaching a team with some age to it, deep into the playoffs, he’d be wise to shave some regular season minutes off the older legs of the roster, even if it means a less consistent rotation.
3rd Biggest Question: Will Finch live up to his reputation as an “offensive savant?”
First off, Chris Finch is doing a very good job as Wolves coach. The team plays hard, players seem happy to be here, and the young guys have continued to develop under his stewardship. They win a lot of games. Also, he’s not “creditless” for that top-ranked defense, even if the roster has elite defenders — he’s obviously preparing them well and deploying them with sound tactics. He’s doing a better job than any Wolves coach in history, to this point.
But… that offense. It struggles, and it struggles despite having talent. Last year, the Wolves ranked 17th in scoring efficiency, despite employing Anthony Edwards and Karl-Anthony Towns. Before last season in the annual GM survey, Chris Finch received the 4th most votes for “Which coach runs the best offense?” I think a lot of Wolves fans would’ve had a spit take reading that, because of how clunky they had been on that end, the season prior. (Rudy’s first one here, which had D’Lo at point for the first half.) The Wolves under Finch manage to turn the ball over at a high rate, without moving the ball around very aggressively or purposefully in a way that might cause turnovers to be forgiven. Like, if you’re gonna stand around, you should at least be able to hold onto the ball?
How much of this is due to Rudy Gobert and the limitations he puts on offensive strategy? Some, I’m sure. But Rudy’s teams in Utah typically ranked pretty high on offense, and without as much offensive talent as he has around him in Minnesota. How much of it was due to KAT and his sometimes stubborn refusal to just Stay TF Outta the Way on offense, and embrace being a shooter? I think some of it was probably that. Julius Randle enters the picture as the All-Star replacement for Towns. I’ll save him for the next Big Question. But Finch has an opportunity here to live up to his reputation as a great offensive tactician. If the Wolves can even stay Top 5 as a defense while maximizing what they have on O, they’ll be a stronger playoff team than they were a year ago.
Small Question #3: Do Connelly and Finch ever disagree?
This is really a question about Rob Dillingham.
Connelly, in charge of the roster, allowed both of Finch’s backup point guards to leave town. To replace them, he made the aggressive draft-night deal for Dillingham. In doing so, did Tim really believe that Rob would crack this year’s rotation?
If we take him at his word…. yeah, he kinda did.
If I had to guess, Connelly would like this one back. (Eds note: The comment; not the draft decision.) There is the quasi commitment to 19-year-old minutes on a team hoping to win a championship. There is also the quasi infringement upon the coach’s duties. It’s Finch’s job, not Connelly’s, to allocate playing time. Then there’s the statement for Finch, equating their respective hype levels over Dillingham, effectively saying to the media that Finch plans to give him minutes.
Does Finch intend to follow through on this?
Let’s consider some of his own remarks. Speaking to Britt Robson shortly before the trade that brought back Donte DiVincenzo (increasingly thought of as a backup point guard option, and in fact the starting point guard of a preseason game that Conley sat out) here’s what Finch said of minutes for young players, including Dillingham:
“Yeah. TJ (Shannon), of course. Josh (Minott) has had a really good summer. There is probably not going to be room for all of them to play, but certainly one, maybe two of them. We’re not going to be married to any single one coming in.
With our need for a backup point guard and our need for a long-term point guard succession plan, Rob has got a lot of expectation on him. Managing that is going to be important. There is going to be failure, there is going to be bumps and bruises, but you’ve got to make sure you don’t kill his confidence along the way.”
That’s a decidedly more tepid endorsement of Dillingham as a 2024-25 rotation player.
How about more recently, after Rob played in several preseason games? Here’s Finch:
Dribbles too much, needs to be more of a distributor first, needs to “understand the purpose of how he plays,” and he’s short and skinny as a defender.
To be clear this is an absolute non-story as far as any actual beef between front office and coach. I just think it’s reasonable to believe that Connelly was and maybe still is more excited about Rob Dillingham than Chris Finch is. Had the DDV trade not happened, this would be a bigger deal than it is right now.
2nd Biggest Question: Is Julius Randle a real piece of the puzzle?
When analyzing the trade through a favorable Wolves-fan lens, I think there is a natural instinct to downplay the importance of Randle. The clearer or more certain benefits of the deal are the improved salary-cap flexibility for the years that should be Ant’s prime, and the seamless fit that should be Donte DiVincenzo in a rotation somewhat devoid of pure shooters and strong basketball IQ. Towns was an awkward fit next to Rudy, it wasn’t clear how much he really contributed to last year’s success — in the regular season, anyway — and even if Randle is a flop, we have Naz Reid waiting in the wings as a viable starting power forward.
For this season, at least, I think we all have to acknowledge that Randle is very important. He’s probably the third best veteran player the Timberwolves franchise has ever acquired. (Eds note: Jimmy Butler and Rudy were better. I put this out to Twitter, listing Sprewell and Terrell Brandon as chief competition, and got a ton of replies. The best were Mike Conley and Sam Cassell. But Mike was well past his prime, and Sam had never made an All-Star Team. Randle’s made 3 of the last 4, including last year’s. I’ll stand by my “third best” proclamation.) He’s a ball-dominant playmaker on a team that lacks offensive cohesion. Can he mesh with Anthony Edwards? Can he mesh with Rudy Gobert? If the answers are yes, then the Wolves might be the best team in the West this year. If the answers are no, and Randle is either traded at the deadline or just struggles through it all year, then they might not be a Top 4 seed in a West that figures to be a little bit stronger than it was a year ago.
Randle’s career has had ups and downs. He’s now on his fourth team. Daniel Chin of The Ringer wrote a piece exactly two years ago, titled “Which Julius Randle will the Knicks get this year?” The piece details the roller coaster ride that he’d been on, just since joining the Knicks. The highs involved All-NBA Team appearances. The lows involved struggling on the floor, and even openly beefing with Madison Square Garden fans. Close viewers of Randle’s Knicks career tend to focus on the degree of responsibility and difficulty that he takes on, as part of an offense. If he holds the ball too much, and takes too many contested shots, things get dicey.
Randle has said all of the right things since arriving in Minnesota. He’s almost over the top in his praise of Finch, who assistant coached him in New Orleans. Finch, for his part, immediately quelled any notion that there might be a positional battle for the starting 4 spot. (Randle would be the starter; not Naz.)
I don’t think Randle has to pan out for the Wolves to ever win a championship with Anthony Edwards. I don’t even think that Randle has to pan out for the Towns trade to have ultimately been a success. If it means the team is better off in 2, 3, 4 years, that’s probably what ultimately matters most.
But I do think Randle matters a whole helluva lot to this year’s success or failure. Randle’s really good, and he plays in a way that makes himself really important. If he can find ways to co-exist with Rudy and Ant on offense, and do a half-decent job at replicating KAT’s defense at the 4 (and, probably sometimes versus physical post players, the 5), then this year’s team can win a championship. It might even have a higher upside than last year’s team.
Those are big stakes. Randle matters.
Small Question #4: Will the West be better than last year?
Maybe a little bit. The Grizzlies figure to be much better than they were in last year’s lost season. The Suns acquired Tyus Jones, whose superpower is making good teams even better. We are supposed to assume that OKC will clearly be the best regular season team in the West. Sure, I guess. They’re good, too. The Clippers lost Paul George, however, and Kawhi Leonard’s preseason vibes are less than great. They figure to take a step back. The Nuggets lost Kentavius Caldwell-Pope and haven’t looked especially sharp in a preseason that follows their loss to the Wolves, and Jamal Murray’s rough summer of looking bad in the Olympics. It’s en vogue to rip on the Nuggets – I’m not quite there yet. They still scare me. The Warriors and Lakers continue to get older. The Mavs still exist, we don’t need to spend more time thinking about the Mavs though. The West will be tough because it’s always tough. If the Wolves play like they did last year, they’ll be in the thick of the 1-seed race.
The Biggest Question: Will Ant continue to improve?
Generally speaking, winning NBA championships is about having the best player. Most of the 80s titles were won by Bird or Magic. Most of the 90s was dominated by Jordan. Most of the 00s was dominated by Shaq, Kobe, or Duncan. And most of the 10s was dominated by LeBron and Steph.
Ant is not in that class yet, but the trend looks good. Strong showing in the 2022 playoffs. All-Star in 2023. All-NBA in 2024. Stats in which Ant has improved in each of Years 2, 3, and 4 include: points per game, field goal percentage, free throw attempts per game, assists per game. Most would agree that his defense has also steadily improved.
Asked on Media Day what he worked on in the offseason, he didn’t hesitate: “Catch and shoot trey ball.” His shooting form looks slightly tweaked, suggesting that purposeful work was put in.
In last year’s playoffs, we saw what happens when Ant plays his best. The Wolves destroyed the Suns before dethroning the Nuggets, in Denver. But we also saw what happens when Ant doesn’t play his best. The Mavs series turned into a discussion about whether Edwards was wearing down. I suppose there could have been a physical exhaustion element, but that isn’t very satisfactory to me. I think more likely is that he just didn’t play his best. Greatness is about consistency, and that’s what he’s aspiring to attain.
If this year Ant does what he did last year, and the year before that, and the year before that, and noticeably improves as a player, that more than anything will increase their odds of playing into June and possibly winning a title.
Go Wolves.