Great read. The part about Barea's minutes vs Rubio's in the 4th is glaring. That right there shows Adelman's decisions alone cost the team some wins. What could have been if he had retired last off season & Flip ended up coaching instead? damn..
Agreed and thanks for the link Tim. Remember when Love was hurt for that long stretch a couple years ago, and how well we played without him? I do.
You mean when we went 9-9 in the 18 games he played in and 22-42 in the other 64 games he didn't play in? Pass the flask, I could use a swig of whatever it is you're drinking!
I stand corrected Q. I didn't think it was that bad. But you see, we didn't even have a winning record in games he played?
Lest you forget, Kevin Love is one person in a squad that requires four others on the floor at the same time. While I consider him a top 6 or 7 NBA talent, he isn't LeBron James or Michael Jordan. Also, in that particular year, he was playing hurt and out of shape. He never fully recovered from his hand problems and couldn't shoot the ball worth shit when he did play.....Yet the team clearly did better with him playing than him not playing.
Just go look at his On/Off numbers from this past season Lloyd. Go look at how the team performed while he was on the bench vs. in the game. He is a big-time difference-maker.
Let's not try to convince ourselves that somehow Love was just a stat-padder whose real impact on the game was fairly indifferent because of our lack of playoff appearances. That is an overly simplistic take and simply not true.
Q12543 wrote:Long, The issue with Ridnour is look at how he shot in his last two seasons with us - a pathetic 32% and 31% respectively from beyond the arc. Another maddening case is Martell Webster, who shot 34% for us in his final season and has since been a 40% shooter from beyond the arc. Barea is the latest in a long line of former Timberwolves who progressively got worse shooting the 3-ball when playing with us.
The statistician in me says this stuff is random variability, but why do we always end up with the career low years!?
Hmmm...that explains why my perception of Luke's 3-point shooting is worse than it really is...because he performed poorly for us. I tend to agree with you that it's likely random variability, but perhaps it also has something to do with Adelman's system. Running his offense through a big man at the point maybe doesn't lead to the best chance for 3-point success (although it certainly was an impressive offense at times). Flip favors a more point guard dominant offense which seems to jive with Rubio's talents too, so I'm excited to see if letting Ricky be Ricky leads to more open 3-point looks.
LST, The Spurs ran a lot of action with Duncan at the elbow and they were a great 3-point shooting team. I also think people over-exaggerate the degree to which Adelman relied on the corner offense with a big man working from the elbow. Rubio still ended up making a lot of plays and in fact had a career high in assists per game. It's not like he was just standing in the corner like Derek Fisher was in the old LA Laker triangle days.
In fact, as many of you have read in an article someone here posted, David Blatt apparently covets Love so much precisely because he can facilitate from the perimeter and open up driving lanes. We see all sorts of teams now pull out a big like Marc Gasol in Memphis, Duncan, and Joakim Noah to make plays from the elbow or even further out sometimes. The pick and roll is great, but team defensive schemes are increasingly getting smarter about guarding them.
Meh. Pick-and-roll is still the most effective offense in basketball, in my opinion. It's been used in every era and there's still not a blueprint on how to shut it down.
Having a big that can facilitate is a great weapon to have, but you're taking the ball out of the point guard's hands. If your point guard is as good of a playmaker as Rubio is, then that's counterproductive to me. Let Rubio operate and do what he's best at. Too many times last year our offense was rolling with Rubio handling the rock, and then we went back to feeding Love/Pekovic at the elbow and we lost momentum.
So while I see what you're saying, Q, I'd much rather have Rubio playing pick-and-roll basketball instead of Adelman's corner offense with a big facilitating from the elbow.
I'll take Mo Williams over Luke easily and I do like Luke I kinda always have. For one thing Luke was pretty bad last year and is older than Williams. Luke may be more steady and a good guy Williams can get his shot off and has some real dynamic game in him. Luke at best in his career was a fringe starter. Williams was a pretty good starter or dynamic 6th man type its not even close. He is a nice compliment to Rubio. If we would have signed Luke I don't know if he would be an upgrade over JJ considering his poor year last. Year that was even worse than JJ. Yeah it was that bad.
Look Williams might not end up being that good for us in whatever role he ends up playing but if he had signed with a better team I would be applauding the signing. The 1 year deal is great also keeps us flexible.
I wonder if the sight lines in the Target Center suck. Maybe everyone that plays there, including the visiting teams, shoot worse from 3. Someone go find some arena-specific data.
leado01 wrote:Terrell Brandon, even though his non-injury time was short here - proved what a good mid range shooting point guard could do in Flips offense.
Lead, I always thought of TB as money on that mid-range shot too...Sam Cassell too for that matter. But if you look at their TS% and EFG%, it proves Q's theory that the mid-range game is not efficient. Even though those two guys were two of the best at mid-range, their TS% and EFG% in the years they were here fell far short of Corey Brewer's percentages last year. Layups, free throws and 3-pointers will always be the way to efficiency, not mid-range.
leado01 wrote:Terrell Brandon, even though his non-injury time was short here - proved what a good mid range shooting point guard could do in Flips offense.
Lead, I always thought of TB as money on that mid-range shot too...Sam Cassell too for that matter. But if you look at their TS% and EFG%, it proves Q's theory that the mid-range game is not efficient. Even though those two guys were two of the best at mid-range, their TS% and EFG% in the years they were here fell far short of Corey Brewer's percentages last year. Layups, free throws and 3-pointers will always be the way to efficiency, not mid-range.
The problem with terrell brandon is that he never gets to the line. He was an outstanding ft shooter but rarely took the ball to the hole. It was mid range jumper after midrange jumper for him. He was a very pg and player though. Great passer and protects the ball. Great fit for a pg in flips offense.
