Anthony Edwards

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Phenom
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Phenom »

It's not an either or proposition. The deal is to get 2 bites at the apple. One with prime KAT and then again in ANTs prime.
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D-Mac [enjin:19736340]
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by D-Mac [enjin:19736340] »

lipoli390 wrote:
Q-was-here wrote:
Sundog60 wrote:I don't really see the Gobert trade as a bet on Ant, I see it as trying to maximize the KAT prime, while giving Ant and Jaden the opportunity to grow.


Yup. Plus what's wrong with putting a team together that you think can win 50 games per year and be a factor, even if it isn't quite a top level contender yet? This franchise has not had sustained success and such a high floor since the KG days.


It might be true that the Wolves front office and ownership were betting on KAT as the main premise for the Gobert deal. If true, I think they made a bad bet. Some pretty good basketball minds like Draymond Green see it more as a bet on Edwards and I agree. The article I posted provides the rationale. The Wolves clearly cashed in all their chips to win now with Gobert, but you don't compete for NBA championships without a dynamic star guard or wing. You don't do the Gobert deal just to make the playoffs or even win one playoff round. You do it to put your team in the running for a championship. A Gobert/KAT tandem, in my view, doesn't get you anywhere close to Western Conference finals, much less the NBA finals and a championship. Anything short of a Conference Finals appearance would be a failure in my view given what what the Wolves have given up and the position they've put themselves in over the summer.

The Wolves were already a 46-win team last season. They brought in Kyle Anderson and had all their core players coming back with an entire season and playoff experience under their belts playing together. There were other moves the front office could made to further strengthen the team without given up Beverley, Kessler and four future 1st-round picks. So if the goal was to simply to win 50 and "be a factor", there were ways to do that without eviscerating the team's draft capital and financial flexibility. I don't believe for a second that Connelly and the Wolves ownership viewed the Gobert deal as anything other than a move that would put the Wolves in a position to contend for a championship over the next 2-3 seasons. I agree with Draymond and the author of the article I posted that Connelly's aspirations will ultimately turn on Ant's progression to elite all-star status this season and in the next couple seasons thereafter. And as the article noted, that's a lot to expect from a player who just turned 21 last month.


This is exactly the way I see it too. It's a bet on Ant because you don't compete for a title without an elite perimeter player. That should be pretty simple and I don't really know how you can argue against that. This was a bad trade because you're betting on two different things... timing and fit. Timing because i think it's a year early to really know what we have and what we need (you're betting on Ant to become what you hope he'll become). Fit because I still think it's a huge gamble that gobert and kat will actually be able to play together for extended minutes when it really matters against the best teams.

Also I think this team will miss Beverly this year. So Duke, please put me down on the record as saying this was a bad trade also :).
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D-Mac [enjin:19736340]
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by D-Mac [enjin:19736340] »

Phenom's_Revenge wrote:It's not an either or proposition. The deal is to get 2 bites at the apple. One with prime KAT and then again in ANTs prime.


That's a good argument if Prime Kat as your best player actually gets you somewhere, but I don't think It does. What I'm saying and I think Lip is saying is that this team will go as far as Ant takes it, WHEN Ant is ready to take it there. Kat and Gobert are great 2nd and 3rd guys on a championship team for sure, but is our #1 guy ready to be a #1 guy yet? I would have waited a year to find out.
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Phenom
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Phenom »

D-Loser wrote:
Phenom's_Revenge wrote:It's not an either or proposition. The deal is to get 2 bites at the apple. One with prime KAT and then again in ANTs prime.


That's a good argument if Prime Kat as your best player actually gets you somewhere, but I don't think It does. What I'm saying and I think Lip is saying is that this team will go as far as Ant takes it, WHEN Ant is ready to take it there. Kat and Gobert are great 2nd and 3rd guys on a championship team for sure, but is our #1 guy ready to be a #1 guy yet? I would have waited a year to find out.


There's only one way to find out about KAT though. We can project all we want but why not actually see? I also like the chances of Ant unlocking his best surrounded by someone like Gobert compared to player x or draft pick y.
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Lipoli390
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Lipoli390 »

When we learned about Ant's 10-pound weight gain, I had two thoughts. First, I though it was totally unnecessary. Ant was already really wide and strong for his position. My second thought was that it was problematic because of his knee issues and the fact that the name of the game at his position in today's NBA is speed, quickness and agility. That's even more true for someone like Ant who was already strong and wide. And even if all 10 pounds is muscle, that's still 10 extra pounds to carry around, which puts more stress on the knees and potentially reduces quickness and agility. My wife told me emphatically that it wasn't all muscle and now we have confirmation from Ant himself via Jon K's latest article that my wife was right:

Edwards said he put on a lot of weight while working out this summer, but also attributed that to some weight gain in Atlanta when he went home just before training camp. Ever since he has been practicing and playing this season, the weight has fallen off, Edwards said.

"I'm actually back to myself," Edwards said. "I'm trying to get back to used to playing that way."


Ant looked much better offensively last night except for his sticky fingers and turnovers. But he still didn't look as quick and explosive as he was the last two seasons. I don't see him exploding off the floor the way he used to. Maybe that will change as the season goes on, but it's something to watch.
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Q-is-here
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Q-is-here »

The Ant-McLaughlin 2-man pairing net rating over the past three seasons....

'22-23: +23, Ant's #1 player pairing so far this year.
'21-22: +10.7, Ant's #1 player pairing last season.
'20-21: -1.1, Ant's #3 player pairing as a rookie.
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Q-is-here
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Q-is-here »

BTW, his worst 2-man pairing in '20-21 and '21-22 was with Naz Reid. I find it fascinating that he does so well with McLaughlin, but not Reid, as both are theoretically playing against opposing bench units.

In '22-23 his worst 2-man pairing so far (minimum 100 minutes played together) is Austin Rivers.

The Austin Rivers phenomena is fascinating. As Abe always says, the guy ends up getting regular minutes no matter where he plays, despite extremely underwhelming production. I think he gives the appearance of knowing how to play and where to be on the floor, so coaches trust him. But like so many other players with the Wolves this season, he is underperforming against even his low bar!
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FNG
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by FNG »

Q-was-here wrote:The Ant-McLaughlin 2-man pairing net rating over the past three seasons....

'22-23: +23, Ant's #1 player pairing so far this year.
'21-22: +10.7, Ant's #1 player pairing last season.
'20-21: -1.1, Ant's #3 player pairing as a rookie.


Interesting, and certainly matches my eye test. And it probably surprises few of us that the Ant-DLo net rating is a -5, despite Finchie playing them together for a team-leading 621 minutes. I've commented before that there are similarities between Ant and DLo...both are very talented at creating their own shot and can put a lot of points on the board in a hurry when they are hot. But both are also notorious ball stoppers, and both are similarly challenged on defense...Ant is showing some promise as an on-ball defender, but like Russell, seems to struggle at times in team defense. JMac on the other hand is entirely different from Ant. He hardly ever looks to create his own shot or overdribbles, and seems to rotate well in a defensive scheme. As others have said here, JMac makes his teammates better.

There is an obvious solution here. Moving JMac into a starter's role could unlock Ant and turn him into an offensive monster, as well as improving our defense at the beginning of games. We should also note that JMac's 2-man net rating is better than DLo's with the other three members of the starting lineup. I also sense that DLo could thrive in a scorer's role off the bench. Finchie could easier hide Russell on defense if he were able to rotate him in after the opponent rested its offensive stars, and Dlo could provide an offensive spark off the bench on nights where he is shooting well like Wednesday. Nowell and DLo are similar hot and cold players, and Finchie would be able to choose the one who is hot that night to bolster the bench offense...or both on many nights.

Lip has been advocating this move for weeks, and the stats at the quarter season mark (as well as last season) seem to support it. The Lakers have played better since they moved their max salary PG Westbrook to the bench (6-4 in their last 10 after a terrible start to the season). Perhaps JMac's calf injury has prevented Finchie from making this move, but he appears to be healthy now. Coach, the time to act is now!
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Q-is-here
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by Q-is-here »

Despite my poking at this issue with those numbers, I'm still on the fence as to whether swapping the DLO/JMac roles makes sense.

We just haven't seen McLaughlin over a sustained period of time start games and play 28+ minutes per night. That's a different deal than coming off the bench for 17 MPG where you can go absolutely balls-out for your entire shift and often against opposing bench units.

That being said, my broader point is that the JMac archetype of PG seems to, unsurprisingly, work best next to Ant. I certainly don't wish for DLO to get hurt, but it would be kinda nice to see a 10 or 15-game stretch where Finch is forced to start JMac, just so we could learn from it!
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FNG
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Re: Anthony Edwards

Post by FNG »

Q-was-here wrote:Despite my poking at this issue with those numbers, I'm still on the fence as to whether swapping the DLO/JMac roles makes sense.

We just haven't seen McLaughlin over a sustained period of time start games and play 28+ minutes per night. That's a different deal than coming off the bench for 17 MPG where you can go absolutely balls-out for your entire shift and often against opposing bench units.

That being said, my broader point is that the JMac archetype of PG seems to, unsurprisingly, work best next to Ant. I certainly don't wish for DLO to get hurt, but it would be kinda nice to see a 10 or 15-game stretch where Finch is forced to start JMac, just so we could learn from it!


Yeah, benching a max player is not an easy move for a coach to make, and we don't know how it would work out despite some revealing stats. Sure, a 17MPG guy might struggle in a new starting role. But NBA players also often say their game improves when they are given more minutes, so it's just as likely that JMac would thrive in a starting role a la Tyus Jones...after all, he certainly thrived at USC playing four years at almost 34 MPG. All that said, Finchie hasn't impressed me as a coach who makes dramatic changes, so absent a DLo injury (which none of us want), I suspect he will continue with the same PG rotation.
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