60WinTim wrote:I don't know LST, at some point, Sam's gonna lose these guys. They will still follow the vets lead, and play the good soldiers. But it kind of seems they have checked out for the season already, as far as the coaching staff goes...
It's problematic to me how these guys lack fight after things go south a little. They just fold up shop and stop making plays on both sides of the court. It reminds me of the same Timberwolves team we've been watching for the past decade. Nothing has changed - just different names and faces. Ugh!
thedoper wrote:Beat inside again. I'm surprised there's not more dismay about our interior D, especially in the 2nd half. All the bigs were awful.
Yeah, we saw the Dieng of old tonight, getting pushed around like a ragdoll. Not that KAT was much better, but Dieng took the brunt of it.
Dieng just doesn't care about the ball sometimes. All 4 of his turnovers were horrible. With KAT he is still lost on rotations and is getting out manned by centers with good body position. The good thing about that is I really think it is just more learning for him, but he is not there defensively yet from what I've seen. I totally believe he is going to be an excellent defender, we just could have used it tonight. Their bigs shot 18-28 from the line and 12-15 from the line. Ball game.
thedoper wrote:Beat inside again. I'm surprised there's not more dismay about our interior D, especially in the 2nd half. All the bigs were awful.
Yeah, we saw the Dieng of old tonight, getting pushed around like a ragdoll. Not that KAT was much better, but Dieng took the brunt of it.
Dieng just doesn't care about the ball sometimes. All 4 of his turnovers were horrible. With KAT he is still lost on rotations and is getting out manned by centers with good body position. The good thing about that is I really think it is just more learning for him, but he is not there defensively yet from what I've seen. I totally believe he is going to be an excellent defender, we just could have used it tonight. Their bigs shot 18-28 from the line and 12-15 from the line. Ball game.
His turnover rate is around 20%, which is absolutely awful. One simple thing he should be told to do is that when he gets an offensive rebound, simply kick it out and re-set the offense. He gets a bunch of turnovers by pump-faking a thousand times and either traveling or getting called for 3 seconds. J-Pete mentions this a lot.
This is fixable stuff, just like his tendency to open up his hips on opposing players driving to the hoop, with the hope he can block their shot off the glass. It rarely works. These are correctable problems, but my goodness, he's one of our oldest "young guys", so if he hasn't learned by now, when will he?
60WinTim wrote:Anyone who predicted 12 wins for the season must be feeling pretty good right now! ;-)
Tim, you and LST are the optimists around here, but the Wolves had a lot of people fooled this year into thinking they would be halfway decent. I predicted 26 wins because I was being realistic about the plethora of rookies and injuries. But they have even managed to disappoint me.
KAT is way better than I expected and they have been very healthy this year overall. Unfortunately, the Class of 2013 and 2014 (Dieng, Bazz, LaVine, and Wiggins) have all either flat-lined or regressed compared to last year. That is very troubling and not all of it can be blamed on Mitchell.
Very dangerous to make too many judgments / declarations after a game like this. Best thing to do is file it away and start with a fresh slate tomorrow. If you take what you saw tonight at completely face value, you're likely going to come to some very bad conclusions. There is not one good thing to say about tonights game, so there will be no 2 + 1. Everyone from the coaches to the players to the owner could be ripped after a game like this. So I'm not going to do it. Let's see if Sam can get them to move on and bring a great effort against Philly on Monday.
Good choice to eschew the 2+1 tonight, q. I'm resisting the urge to knee jerk react about Tyus, Zach, Gorgui, Wig, etc, etc, etc
Sam's post-game was interesting though. He talked about the frustration of coaching a bunch of guys who haven't learned anything in AAU ball except how to dunk. He went into great detail about how remedial their practices are, and how the young guys still aren't comfortable with things that used to be second nature to rookies in the old days after finishing four years of college. I sense that it is even more difficult to get things across to guys like Zach, Wig and Bazz who have managed to dominate their whole lives by just being more athletic than their competition. The things he said they go over again and again in practice are the same things Jim Peterson says he watches being taught when he goes to practice. Coaches with veteran teams can work on intricate offensive plays in practice...Sam needs to spend his time teaching his guys things like how to get in a proper defensive stance, because they have never learned it. And it clearly still isn't sinking in.
But blaming Sam for the team's immaturity is like blaming the cowboy who just led his horse to the river because the horse won't take a drink. We gotta keep being patient with these guys, because even on bad nights like tonight I see some new things. Tonight I saw Wig drive the lane and kick the ball into the corner to Ricky for a wide-open three. And I know I'm seeing players setting up outside the arc more frequently than they were even ten games ago. The ball handler isn't always finding them, and when he does, the shot isn't going in frequently enough...but there's some progress nonetheless. Some young guys like KAT with high basketball IQ's get things more quickly, but others like Zach, Wig and Bazz with low IQ's take longer. And some like Gorgui may never get it, and we have to accept him for what he is. But after listening to Jim Peterson today and Sam tonight, I'm confident that the right practices are being taught...they just aren't sinking in as fast as I would like.
I'm resolving to stay patient. And I'm feeling grateful that the Philly game isn't going to be televised!
The Philly game is on League Pass. But I do not have a good feeling about the game at all. We were lucky to beat Philly when they came to Target Center. Our confidence is in the toilet right now. About the only thing that might make the game interesting is if Pek would play a few minutes. But there has been no word about that happening...
