Ricky and KAT

[thedoper]

Most of last season the offseason there was a large contingency of this board that held that Towns was our best player and Ricky was our second best player. This season Wiggins played great for 10 games and stunk for 4 and again he is to blame for where we are at. Wiggins continues to be a gradually increasing talent, who is very inconsistent. This is who he is and has been since he got here.

On the other hand our two "sure things," Rubio and KAT, have totally under-performed. I call Rubio a sure thing because we have heard people beat to death his intangibles and how his advanced stats positively impact a team. Our "veteran" has brought nothing, and his supposed strength -defense- has been atrocious. I would argue that it is a toss up between him and Zach of players with significant minutes who are negatively affecting our D. KAT also was supposedly a forgone conclusion because of his immense talent, but clearly there is a long way to go as there was last year. I find it somewhat hilarious that people get so emotional about Wiggins shitting the bed, we have all seen it, and frankly it should have been expected. But talk about shitty motors.. KAT and Ricky have yet to show up this season. KAT has had all the rhetoric of KG with the chest slapping and big talk, but none of the substance. And Ricky has been just plain sad.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Good post, but I do think it's fair to point out and acknowledge the one big difference about Towns when comparing him to Wiggins. When he's not scoring, he's still attacking the glass, trying to alter shots at the rim, and make hustle plays wherever he can. His motor is never in question.

Some nights, if Wiggins misses his first handful of shots, he'll shut it down and you won't see him involved anywhere. That's what I find frustrating. You can't score 30 every game, but you can still use energy elsewhere to impact games.

[thedoper]

Good post, but I do think it's fair to point out and acknowledge the one big difference about Towns when comparing him to Wiggins. When he's not scoring, he's still attacking the glass, trying to alter shots at the rim, and make hustle plays wherever he can. His motor is never in question.

Some nights, if Wiggins misses his first handful of shots, he'll shut it down and you won't see him involved anywhere. That's what I find frustrating. You can't score 30 every game, but you can still use energy elsewhere to impact games.

KAT does make hustle plays. But I question his motor on the defensive end sometimes. He has total lapses. The whole team does. He also makes incredible plays. Wiggins hustles on his man on man D too though, but there is a difference in demeanor for sure between the two players.

[Brooklyn_Wolves [enjin:14608167]]

Wiggins is weak, It's mistake to shift the onus from KAT (scoring) and Rubio (playmaking) to Wiggins. And we are playing the price. Thibs should concentrate on teaching his golden boy a thing or two about defense and hustle. He's good vs poor opponents and exposed vs good teams. He's not ready for such big role. Again make him a positive player outside of his scoring first. Then try to make him a Jordan if you're so high on him.

[BizarroJerry [enjin:6592520]]

Wiggins Max deal will definitely be hard to offer at this point.

[thedoper]

Wiggins is weak, It's mistake to shift the onus from KAT (scoring) and Rubio (playmaking) to Wiggins. And we are playing the price. Thibs should concentrate on teaching his golden boy a thing or two about defense and hustle. He's good vs poor opponents and exposed vs good teams. He's not ready for such big role. Again make him a positive player outside of his scoring first. Then try to make him a Jordan if you're so high on him.

Why would a coach that is all about toughness and hustle feature a player who is weak? Offense hasn't been the problem in 3/4 of our games. Defense has in all of them. That is the point of what I'm saying. Rubio and KAT's D has been god awful and their offense hasn't been anything to write home about either. Aren't Rubio and KAT supposed to be our leaders as the surefire plus defenders on this squad?

[Brooklyn_Wolves [enjin:14608167]]

Wiggins is weak, It's mistake to shift the onus from KAT (scoring) and Rubio (playmaking) to Wiggins. And we are playing the price. Thibs should concentrate on teaching his golden boy a thing or two about defense and hustle. He's good vs poor opponents and exposed vs good teams. He's not ready for such big role. Again make him a positive player outside of his scoring first. Then try to make him a Jordan if you're so high on him.

Why would a coach that is all about toughness and hustle feature a player who is weak? Offense hasn't been the problem in 3/4 of our games. Defense has in all of them. That is the point of what I'm saying. Rubio and KAT's D has been god awful and their offense hasn't been anything to write home about either. Aren't Rubio and KAT supposed to be our leaders as the surefire plus defenders on this squad?

I don't have an explanation of that yet. But Wiggins is playing his patented crap defense yet again and Thibs keep talking him up for some got damn reason. The idea of Wiggins to be pushed onto pedestal over KAT is ridiculous to me.
KAT is way smarter, way more skilled, way better passer, better postup player, better shooter, fills up the stat sheet, he even has better stl% than his wing friend.

And our offense is going to get worse. We played some cupcake teams so far. We saw our offense vs some good teams already, it's not pretty and we about to see even more good teams.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Why would a coach that is all about toughness and hustle feature a player who is weak? Offense hasn't been the problem in 3/4 of our games. Defense has in all of them. That is the point of what I'm saying. Rubio and KAT's D has been god awful and their offense hasn't been anything to write home about either. Aren't Rubio and KAT supposed to be our leaders as the surefire plus defenders on this squad?

It's about expectations.

Offensively... Rubio has been the worst starting PG in the league. He's shooting 28.9%. 5.6 ppg / 7.0 ast.

Towns hasn't taken the huge leap many expected. But he's still at 21.3 ppg / 9.4 reb / 50.6%. I value team defense more than individuals. But I think both have been pretty shoddy thus far. That happens with a young team learning a new system, I guess.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Of the starting 5, there is no question Rubio is struggling the most. While he's never been a great shooter/scorer, he's been bad this year by even his standards. In seasons past, he'd be able to manufacture some points by getting to the line in various ways, where he was very accurate....Not this year.