#1 Offense, #30 Defense in the month of February

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

The Wolves are sporting an Ortg of 116.1 for the month of February, easily the best in the NBA. On the other hand, they have a Drtg of 117.6, the worst in the NBA. Unsurprisingly, they are 4-4 on the month.

It's clear that for this team to generate offense, they need to play with pace and have real-life PGs backup Ricky (as opposed to Zach). Also, Dieng in place of KG has been a major boost to the offense.

On the other hand, those same backup PGs that are so effective at running an offense (Miller and Jones) are even worse than Zach defensively. And Dieng can't hold a candle to KG.

That being said, I think we need to just keep going with this since at least we are doing something really well.

[bleedspeed]

I think we would have been fine offensively with KG if Zach was starting instead of Prince. Interesting state though. This really makes me think Thibs would have this team playoff bound next year.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Makes it more entertaining to watch.

Remember that 10+ game stretch when the team couldn't even reach 100 points...

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

I think we would have been fine offensively with KG if Zach was starting instead of Prince. Interesting state though. This really makes me think Thibs would have this team playoff bound next year.

Agreed. Despite all our whining about Mitchell's outdated offense (me included!) here we are regularly putting up 105, 110, 115, 120 point outings. We're ranked 13th overall on the entire season, which included one miserable stretch where I think we went something like 9 or 10 games without scoring 100 points.

So Mitchell deserves some credit for finally getting this team to run more and stressing good ball movement.

But defensively.....Oof. The players definitely deserve some of the blame, but it's historically been an area that can be coached up the most. Like Flip last season, Mitchell has largely been a failure in this regard.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

I think we would have been fine offensively with KG if Zach was starting instead of Prince. Interesting state though. This really makes me think Thibs would have this team playoff bound next year.

Agreed. Despite all our whining about Mitchell's outdated offense (me included!) here we are regularly putting up 105, 110, 115, 120 point outings. We're ranked 13th overall on the entire season, which included one miserable stretch where I think we went something like 9 or 10 games without scoring 100 points.

So Mitchell deserves some credit for finally getting this team to run more and stressing good ball movement.

But defensively.....Oof. The players definitely deserve some of the blame, but it's historically been an area that can be coached up the most. Like Flip last season, Mitchell has largely been a failure in this regard.

Mitchell shouldn't get credit for doing something he should have been doing all year. This is how we should have been playing since the beginning and multiple posters here having been calling for it all year. Think of how much further along guys like Zach and Bazz would be if we played this way from the get go instead of rolling out the slow half-court based Ricky/Wiggins/Prince/KG/Towns lineup. Sam fucked up a large chunk of this season with his poor tactics and team management. If anything he should get more criticism for not doing this earlier when we started playing poorly after the hot start.

[MikkeMan]

It is really disappointing that after defense was pretty good at the beginning of the season, it has regressed to equally bad level than last year. It really looks like that all improvement that was seen was mainly because KG was playing. Even in limited minutes he really improved our otherwise horrible defense.

Sam told in the beginning of the season that his main focus was in defense. If our coaching stuff cannot improve defense at all even by putting a lot of effort on it in practices, they have to be worst in whole NBA.

[DNatagal]

So if we have the #1 offense and Ricky cannot shoot, what am I missing? Would the Wolves be scoring 10 pts /game more if he could shoot? Ricky can be the floor general, draw fouls, rebound and defend, do we really need an offensive minded point guard? I would rather keep the offense as is but have a coach with some defensive schemes that the players can work with. #stoptheRickyhate

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

So if we have the #1 offense and Ricky cannot shoot, what am I missing? Would the Wolves be scoring 10 pts /game more if he could shoot? Ricky can be the floor general, draw fouls, rebound and defend, do we really need an offensive minded point guard? I would rather keep the offense as is but have a coach with some defensive schemes that the players can work with. #stoptheRickyhate

Playoff games are grind it out half court wars that you can't win with a primary ball handler who can't shoot. We can run and score a bunch of points and be fun in the regular season, but come playoff time games slow down, refs swallow their whistles and it becomes time to battle and we don't have a defense or a half court offense that can win that battle.

[AbeVigodaLive]

So if we have the #1 offense and Ricky cannot shoot, what am I missing? Would the Wolves be scoring 10 pts /game more if he could shoot? Ricky can be the floor general, draw fouls, rebound and defend, do we really need an offensive minded point guard? I would rather keep the offense as is but have a coach with some defensive schemes that the players can work with. #stoptheRickyhate

Playoff games are grind it out half court wars that you can't win with a primary ball handler who can't shoot. We can run and score a bunch of points and be fun in the regular season, but come playoff time games slow down, refs swallow their whistles and it becomes time to battle and we don't have a defense or a half court offense that can win that battle.

True.

But let's see if the team can win 1/3 of its games first. Then, 1/2 its games. Then, make the playoffs...

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

So if we have the #1 offense and Ricky cannot shoot, what am I missing? Would the Wolves be scoring 10 pts /game more if he could shoot? Ricky can be the floor general, draw fouls, rebound and defend, do we really need an offensive minded point guard? I would rather keep the offense as is but have a coach with some defensive schemes that the players can work with. #stoptheRickyhate

Playoff games are grind it out half court wars that you can't win with a primary ball handler who can't shoot. We can run and score a bunch of points and be fun in the regular season, but come playoff time games slow down, refs swallow their whistles and it becomes time to battle and we don't have a defense or a half court offense that can win that battle.

True.

But let's see if the team can win 1/3 of its games first. Then, 1/2 its games. Then, make the playoffs...

So we should just keep fighting to get to .500 with the same PG who's never helped us get more than a game over .500 and then get whooped in the playoffs before realizing he's not gonna work? Seems stupid to me to wait until he has to be moved before moving him. That would lower his value wouldn't it because teams would know we need to get rid of him?