Timberwolves will lose vs. Denver.

[AbeVigodaLive]

- Denver is the defending champion. They won 16 playoff games for a reason last season... they beat the Timberwolves EASILY in the playoffs last season. Forget about the nice cursory praise after the title. Denver was up 3 - 0 with a +47 differential... with the closest game being 9 points. As anyone who's watched NBA basketball knows, 9 points is not a close game. And even more... NBA series are over when it's 3 - 0. It was a gentleman's sweep. Meh.

- Nikola Jokic is the best player on the planet. I know it's premature for such things until the games are actually played... but he's fast becoming one of the best players (statistically) of all time. And it's not hollow stats. His impact on the game is immense. Need him to facilitate a top offense? Score 40+? Get 20 rebounds? Heck, he might do all off that in ONE game. Or even consecutive games. Or even an entire season. Nothing is off the table with this guy. Check out his ho-hum stats from round 1 (vs. Anthony Davis):

2024: 28 ppg / 16 reb / 10 ast / 59% fg / 93% ft
2023 playoffs: 30 ppg / 14 reb / 10 ast / 55% fg / 80% ft (and 46% 3fg)

Nobody in the league can come close to matching that. How many people in NBA HISTORY can match that? It's insane.

- Jamal Murray averages 17.5 ppg for his career in the regular season. Jamal Murray averages 24.9 ppg for his career in the playoffs. He just hit two game winners vs. LAL despite having a "down" series. And yet he's a clear #2 player on his team. We all love Anthony Edwards, but are we 100% certain that he's going to be definitely better than this proven playoff star?

- KCP has won TWO titles in the past 3 seasons. He knows his role. He does it well. Perfect complementary piece.

- Aaron Gordon competes. He can guard multiple positions. He doesn't need the basketball... but he still consistently posts 15/6/3 stat lines. He knows his role. And there's few players at his level so willingly capable of helping out in so many ways unselfishly.

- Michael Porter Jr. is 6'10"... and shoots effortlessly from behind the arc. He's a 17/7 guy who can hit 5 threes every game if called on.

- Michael Malone might be the most underrated coach in the league. Looks like the Timberwolves will be without the head coach.

- Chris Finch is having surgery. It's one thing to miss a bit of prep time. It's quite another to actually miss games. What impact will it have on the Timberwolves... most importantly... Anthony Edwards. Can Edwards keep making the easy, simple play when the entire basketball world will want to see him go 1-on-3 and make the more spectacular play? It's one thing to do it for four games vs. a team led by a guy drafted nearly two decades ago. It's another to do it with a much larger spotlight vs. the defending champs and the league's best player... without the head coach there to rein him in.

- Much of the roster has been together for 30+ playoff wins. The Timberwolve have won ONE series together. The Timberwolves have never been competitive in any other playoff series.

- The Wolves destroyed the Suns. Or, the Suns imploded? Two things stand out... (1) Moments after the series ended, published reports about Durant being frustrated were already out there. Only those weren't from comments after the game. It was leaked prior. Obviously, there was tension and dysfunction on that team during the series or before it. (2) The Suns were a team that had a bench player refusing to shoot an end of quarter shot to protect his stats. And nobody called him on it. That was when I knew the series was over.

- Denver has homecourt advantage... and historically, arguably the biggest homecourt advantage in the league with the altitude stuff.

- Ooooh, the Timberwolves won 56 games. They're good! YEAH!!!! Ummm... quietly... the defending champions won 57 games, making it the best season in the franchise's NBA history. Yeah, so there's that.

[rapsuperstar31]

The only thing that would surprise me in this series is if either team were to sweep or gentlemen sweep it. Wolves in 6 or 7 or Denver in 6 or 7 seems inevitable, and I really do think it's gong 7 one way or the other.

[Q-is-here]

Nice to see this feature come back Abe. Reading your write-up here has made me go a bit wobbly on my Wolves-in-6-or-7 prediction!

I totally agree that Jokic is one of the all-time greats and will be the best player on the floor this series. The thing that distinguishes him from every other star is that he almost never has a bad or even mediocre game. His "meh" games are usually 22/10/5 on 45% shooting or something like that. We'd be lucky to hold him to that in one game this series!

Now, there are two vulnerabilities with him. First, he is heavily reliant on Jamaal Murray for end-of-game shot making. As has been the case over NBA history, it's the guard/wing with ball handling skills that usually take the big shots in crunch time. Second, he plays pretty soft defensively in first halves to avoid getting into foul trouble. The rim can be attacked.

I call these vulnerabilities and not weaknesses, as he is perfectly capable of making a dagger shot in crunch time. And he is so huge and smart, that simply positioning himself in the right place in the paint can add a degree of difficulty to finishing at the rim for the opponent.

Bottom line....I don't blame anyone for picking Denver in this series even though a lot of us grizzled and jaded Wolves fans didn't. They have the best player on the planet.

[Wolvesfan21]

I think our defense can do it's thing against Denver. I do wonder if our offense can score enough (can KAT, Naz, Jaden, NAW, Conley etc. do their thing?). Can Ant continue to elevate his game and do what he does with his playmaking and scoring? Denver also played us pretty tough in the regular season. We have a chance to win.