WildWolf2813 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 5:20 pm
I find what Rob has done to be alright. Definitely alright enough to use him regularly. The things he's good at are the things we struggle at. As long as this team highlights these things, we'll be fine as he continues to grow.
3 games in and the team has never felt like it's gonna veer off course and unravel. That's a good sign.
Miller's been really good. We just have a harsher grade on him because his game looks so ugly.
Welcome to Iowa Amari Bailey.
This is a good point. The things Dilly does well (outside shooting, quickness in transition and solid passing) are needs with the big club. I think he’ll look better with better players around him. I’m not as worried about finishing at the rim or his defense when he’s playing 15 minutes per game with Ant, Jaden, Randle and Rudy. Finch will find ways to make him fit this year.
I don't quite get this, as the Wolves summer league team DOES have better players around him relative to the competition. It's why they are 3-0 and his main running mate is a guy you claim will be the #2 on the team next year!
I haven't lost hope in Dillingham, but after three games of summer league ball I'm not seeing any growth from last season. That doesn't make him a terrible player, but he certainly doesn't look ready to be a major puzzle piece.
WildWolf2813 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 5:20 pm
I find what Rob has done to be alright. Definitely alright enough to use him regularly. The things he's good at are the things we struggle at. As long as this team highlights these things, we'll be fine as he continues to grow.
3 games in and the team has never felt like it's gonna veer off course and unravel. That's a good sign.
Miller's been really good. We just have a harsher grade on him because his game looks so ugly.
Welcome to Iowa Amari Bailey.
This is a good point. The things Dilly does well (outside shooting, quickness in transition and solid passing) are needs with the big club. I think he’ll look better with better players around him. I’m not as worried about finishing at the rim or his defense when he’s playing 15 minutes per game with Ant, Jaden, Randle and Rudy. Finch will find ways to make him fit this year.
I don't quite get this, as the Wolves summer league team DOES have better players around him relative to the competition. It's why they are 3-0 and his main running mate is a guy you claim will be the #2 on the team next year!
I haven't lost hope in Dillingham, but after three games of summer league ball I'm not seeing any growth from last season. That doesn't make him a terrible player, but he certainly doesn't look ready to be a major puzzle piece.
I’m in a similar place. He doesn’t look comfortable running the offense. Too many turnovers. Doesn’t look balanced when he shoot (so odd because he was so efficient when he played in college). And he still really struggles to finish at the rim. He also doesn’t appear to have put on much additional weight. I haven’t given up on him either, but I hoped we’d see more progress. TJS is older I know, but we have see massive growth with his playmaking and three point shot. What have we seen major progress from in dilly’s game?…
TSJ had 7 turnovers today while Dilly had 4 yet we’re talking about Dilly’s turnovers. TSJ was a +5 while Dilly was a +6 today. TSJ is 24 years old with five years of college experience while Dilly is 20 years old with only one year of college and significantly fewer meaningful NBA minutes than TSJ as a rookie. Our SL team is now 3-0 with Dilly as our main PG.
Dillingham will be just fine. He’s a hard worker and he’ll continue to work on his game the rest of the summer with our coaches and in training camp. As he turns 21 and starts to get more NBA minutes in the season his will improve further. My preference was to have Dilly as our #2 PG to Tyus rather than Conley next season so we wouldn’t have to rely as much on Dilly next season because I still think he’s a year away from really starting to come into his own. Having said that, I’m not worried about Dilly playing 20 minutes a game. He’s playing winning basketball in SL and there’s not reason to believe he won’t continue to play winning basketball in the season playing with Ant, Jaden and Randle. Jaden will catch the passes that Miller has been mishandling. Ant and Randle will attract a ton of defensive attention.
Lip makes a fair point that we should keep our evaluations of these guys a bit more balanced. To some degree, we may be unconsciously scrutinizing Dillingham's game more due to expectations based on draft position.
At the same time, while watching the games, I can see a role for TSJ more easily that I can for Dillingham right now.
TSJ needs to clean up his mistakes, particularly some of those sloppy passes, but he's not going to be expected to be the PG. He can clearly step into NAW's offensive role right now and be a Swiss Army knife at a bare minimum, playing off Ant and Julius. And while I think we'll really miss NAW's defense, TSJ is not bad defensively, he's clearly shown the ability to create in transition, and he's closer to Randle and Ant than NAW when it comes to creating shots for others off the dribble, even sometimes in the halfcourt. He has put up 15 assists to go with his 10 turnovers in these three summer league games (by comparison, Dillingham has had 18 assists and 15 turnovers). With TSJ's size and hustle on D, and his baseline offensive toolkit at his size, you can just clearly see him fitting into the rotation. If he's making a few dangerous passes, that can be dialled back a bit and his skillset at his size will still allow him to contribute on both ends. Fair or not, the shot-creation for others off the dribble is kind of treated as a bonus for guard/wing like him. And however old he is, it's nice to see he can do that fairly well.
Maybe it's a little unfair to Dillingham that we expect a PG to be more in control at all times than a guy like TSJ, but part of that reflects the fact that the PG just traditionally has the ball in their hands more. And while Dillingham has some really nice handles and is definitely a threat to both score and dish, there's just a somewhat frantic, unpredictable nature to how he plays with the ball that is a little tougher to see fitting into a halfcourt offense (and helps explain those 15 TOs in 3 games). If he were bigger and wouldn't get picked on as much defensively, those offensive growing pains would be easier to take. But you can definitely imagine teams targeting him when they need a bucket. He's undeniably got the ability to make exciting things happen, and at his age, that's great to see. But, IMO, that's still kind of offset by the somewhat scattershot style of offense he sometimes plays and his defensive liabilities. I can definitely still see him becoming good, maybe even great, but it's just that I'm feeling less confident in him becoming, like, a steady, run-the-offense kind of PG than I am in TSJ becoming the kind of all-around contributor we need from a guy his size.
So because of that--the (maybe unfair) expectations of offensive stability from the PG position that Dilly plays and his defensive liabilities due to his size--I can see why people are more excited about TSJ than Dillingham at this point.
Lipoli390 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 10:23 pm
TSJ had 7 turnovers today while Dilly had 4 yet we’re talking about Dilly’s turnovers. TSJ was a +5 while Dilly was a +6 today. TSJ is 24 years old with five years of college experience while Dilly is 20 years old with only one year of college and significantly fewer meaningful NBA minutes than TSJ as a rookie. Our SL team is now 3-0 with Dilly as our main PG.
Dillingham will be just fine. He’s a hard worker and he’ll continue to work on his game the rest of the summer with our coaches and in training camp. As he turns 21 and starts to get more NBA minutes in the season his will improve further. My preference was to have Dilly as our #2 PG to Tyus rather than Conley next season so we wouldn’t have to rely as much on Dilly next season because I still think he’s a year away from really starting to come into his own. Having said that, I’m not worried about Dilly playing 20 minutes a game. He’s playing winning basketball in SL and there’s not reason to believe he won’t continue to play winning basketball in the season playing with Ant, Jaden and Randle. Jaden will catch the passes that Miller has been mishandling. Ant and Randle will attract a ton of defensive attention.
Yeah, TSJ and Rob are almost certain to get additional minutes this season, and there are going to be moments of brilliance combined with moments of frustration. Shannon looks physically ready to be an effective 2-way player. His outside shot may be better than I was originally thinking and I love his ability to get to the basket, and his defense is raw but potentially very effective. But we can't ignore the 7 turnovers despite only 3 assists. He's still raw offensively too. And Rob doesn't look quite as NBA ready as Shannon (he's much younger and less developed physically, so no surprise there), but still is going to get regular minutes backing up Conley...and there will be ups and downs. His shiftiness and first step with the ball in his hands is remarkable...even at his young age it seems almost impossible for his defender to stay in front of him. And we all saw improvement in his ability to finish around the basket last night. He also made some nice passes finding the open man. But I share DLoser's concerns about his shot...he does look off balance sometimes when he shoots. But I note his almost 60% TS% in college along with his 44.4% 3-point percentage, and I conclude that his shooting is going to be fine despite the odd form.
Leonard Miller put up 20 and 8 last night with only 1 turnover, and didn't embarrass himself on defense. He puts up these near double doubles so frequently in SL and G League play. I get that the level of defense is totally different in SL, but I haven't given up on him.
Finally, surprisingly I thought our best 7 footer last night was Edwards. Our defense just looked much sharper when he was out there. So I guess I wasn't surprised to see he was a team-leading +21 in his 15 minutes. Somebody is going to emerge as the Luka option at center this year when the injury bug hits, and I understand that the guy with by far the highest upside (Joan) is the board favorite to fill this role and maybe even get regular rotation minutes. But I wouldn't be surprised if Finchy instead goes to the 25-year-old Edwards. He's not going to give us anything close to what Luka gave us on offense, but he showed me last night that he can be effective defensively.
Lipoli390 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 10:23 pm
TSJ had 7 turnovers today while Dilly had 4 yet we’re talking about Dilly’s turnovers. TSJ was a +5 while Dilly was a +6 today. TSJ is 24 years old with five years of college experience while Dilly is 20 years old with only one year of college and significantly fewer meaningful NBA minutes than TSJ as a rookie. Our SL team is now 3-0 with Dilly as our main PG.
Dillingham will be just fine. He’s a hard worker and he’ll continue to work on his game the rest of the summer with our coaches and in training camp. As he turns 21 and starts to get more NBA minutes in the season his will improve further. My preference was to have Dilly as our #2 PG to Tyus rather than Conley next season so we wouldn’t have to rely as much on Dilly next season because I still think he’s a year away from really starting to come into his own. Having said that, I’m not worried about Dilly playing 20 minutes a game. He’s playing winning basketball in SL and there’s not reason to believe he won’t continue to play winning basketball in the season playing with Ant, Jaden and Randle. Jaden will catch the passes that Miller has been mishandling. Ant and Randle will attract a ton of defensive attention.
Yeah, TSJ and Rob are almost certain to get additional minutes this season, and there are going to be moments of brilliance combined with moments of frustration. Shannon looks physically ready to be an effective 2-way player. His outside shot may be better than I was originally thinking and I love his ability to get to the basket, and his defense is raw but potentially very effective. But we can't ignore the 7 turnovers despite only 3 assists. He's still raw offensively too. And Rob doesn't look quite as NBA ready as Shannon (he's much younger and less developed physically, so no surprise there), but still is going to get regular minutes backing up Conley...and there will be ups and downs. His shiftiness and first step with the ball in his hands is remarkable...even at his young age it seems almost impossible for his defender to stay in front of him. And we all saw improvement in his ability to finish around the basket last night. He also made some nice passes finding the open man. But I share DLoser's concerns about his shot...he does look off balance sometimes when he shoots. But I note his almost 60% TS% in college along with his 44.4% 3-point percentage, and I conclude that his shooting is going to be fine despite the odd form.
Leonard Miller put up 20 and 8 last night with only 1 turnover, and didn't embarrass himself on defense. He puts up these near double doubles so frequently in SL and G League play. I get that the level of defense is totally different in SL, but I haven't given up on him.
Finally, surprisingly I thought our best 7 footer last night was Edwards. Our defense just looked much sharper when he was out there. So I guess I wasn't surprised to see he was a team-leading +21 in his 15 minutes. Somebody is going to emerge as the Luka option at center this year when the injury bug hits, and I understand that the guy with by far the highest upside (Joan) is the board favorite to fill this role and maybe even get regular rotation minutes. But I wouldn't be surprised if Finchy instead goes to the 25-year-old Edwards. He's not going to give us anything close to what Luka gave us on offense, but he showed me last night that he can be effective defensively.
Miller does seem like the kind of guy that can be very opportunistic out there and find ways to score easy buckets in transition and off broken plays. That stuff matters. The problem is he often creates opportunities for the other team as well! If he can limit his mental errors while playing to his strengths, he just might earn a little trust from Finch.
The good news is we are are 3-0 and that's without raining a bunch of 3s, which means we are winning on the things that are more sustainable. It can't just be TSJ doing good things out there for that to be the case!
Lipoli390 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 10:23 pm
TSJ had 7 turnovers today while Dilly had 4 yet we’re talking about Dilly’s turnovers. TSJ was a +5 while Dilly was a +6 today. TSJ is 24 years old with five years of college experience while Dilly is 20 years old with only one year of college and significantly fewer meaningful NBA minutes than TSJ as a rookie. Our SL team is now 3-0 with Dilly as our main PG.
Dillingham will be just fine. He’s a hard worker and he’ll continue to work on his game the rest of the summer with our coaches and in training camp. As he turns 21 and starts to get more NBA minutes in the season his will improve further. My preference was to have Dilly as our #2 PG to Tyus rather than Conley next season so we wouldn’t have to rely as much on Dilly next season because I still think he’s a year away from really starting to come into his own. Having said that, I’m not worried about Dilly playing 20 minutes a game. He’s playing winning basketball in SL and there’s not reason to believe he won’t continue to play winning basketball in the season playing with Ant, Jaden and Randle. Jaden will catch the passes that Miller has been mishandling. Ant and Randle will attract a ton of defensive attention.
Yeah, TSJ and Rob are almost certain to get additional minutes this season, and there are going to be moments of brilliance combined with moments of frustration. Shannon looks physically ready to be an effective 2-way player. His outside shot may be better than I was originally thinking and I love his ability to get to the basket, and his defense is raw but potentially very effective. But we can't ignore the 7 turnovers despite only 3 assists. He's still raw offensively too. And Rob doesn't look quite as NBA ready as Shannon (he's much younger and less developed physically, so no surprise there), but still is going to get regular minutes backing up Conley...and there will be ups and downs. His shiftiness and first step with the ball in his hands is remarkable...even at his young age it seems almost impossible for his defender to stay in front of him. And we all saw improvement in his ability to finish around the basket last night. He also made some nice passes finding the open man. But I share DLoser's concerns about his shot...he does look off balance sometimes when he shoots. But I note his almost 60% TS% in college along with his 44.4% 3-point percentage, and I conclude that his shooting is going to be fine despite the odd form.
Leonard Miller put up 20 and 8 last night with only 1 turnover, and didn't embarrass himself on defense. He puts up these near double doubles so frequently in SL and G League play. I get that the level of defense is totally different in SL, but I haven't given up on him.
Finally, surprisingly I thought our best 7 footer last night was Edwards. Our defense just looked much sharper when he was out there. So I guess I wasn't surprised to see he was a team-leading +21 in his 15 minutes. Somebody is going to emerge as the Luka option at center this year when the injury bug hits, and I understand that the guy with by far the highest upside (Joan) is the board favorite to fill this role and maybe even get regular rotation minutes. But I wouldn't be surprised if Finchy instead goes to the 25-year-old Edwards. He's not going to give us anything close to what Luka gave us on offense, but he showed me last night that he can be effective defensively.
Miller does seem like the kind of guy that can be very opportunistic out there and find ways to score easy buckets in transition and off broken plays. That stuff matters. The problem is he often creates opportunities for the other team as well! If he can limit his mental errors while playing to his strengths, he just might earn a little trust from Finch.
The good news is we are are 3-0 and that's without raining a bunch of 3s, which means we are winning on the things that are more sustainable. It can't just be TSJ doing good things out there for that to be the case!
Yep, and Miller also doesn't do much to help his teammates...zero assists last night. He had only 1 turnover, but some of that is because he doesn't look for assists...when he gets the ball he either looks to score or hands it off with a safe pass. Can't disregard his physical gifts though.
Lipoli390 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 15, 2025 10:23 pm
TSJ had 7 turnovers today while Dilly had 4 yet we’re talking about Dilly’s turnovers. TSJ was a +5 while Dilly was a +6 today. TSJ is 24 years old with five years of college experience while Dilly is 20 years old with only one year of college and significantly fewer meaningful NBA minutes than TSJ as a rookie. Our SL team is now 3-0 with Dilly as our main PG.
Dillingham will be just fine. He’s a hard worker and he’ll continue to work on his game the rest of the summer with our coaches and in training camp. As he turns 21 and starts to get more NBA minutes in the season his will improve further. My preference was to have Dilly as our #2 PG to Tyus rather than Conley next season so we wouldn’t have to rely as much on Dilly next season because I still think he’s a year away from really starting to come into his own. Having said that, I’m not worried about Dilly playing 20 minutes a game. He’s playing winning basketball in SL and there’s not reason to believe he won’t continue to play winning basketball in the season playing with Ant, Jaden and Randle. Jaden will catch the passes that Miller has been mishandling. Ant and Randle will attract a ton of defensive attention.
Yeah, TSJ and Rob are almost certain to get additional minutes this season, and there are going to be moments of brilliance combined with moments of frustration. Shannon looks physically ready to be an effective 2-way player. His outside shot may be better than I was originally thinking and I love his ability to get to the basket, and his defense is raw but potentially very effective. But we can't ignore the 7 turnovers despite only 3 assists. He's still raw offensively too. And Rob doesn't look quite as NBA ready as Shannon (he's much younger and less developed physically, so no surprise there), but still is going to get regular minutes backing up Conley...and there will be ups and downs. His shiftiness and first step with the ball in his hands is remarkable...even at his young age it seems almost impossible for his defender to stay in front of him. And we all saw improvement in his ability to finish around the basket last night. He also made some nice passes finding the open man. But I share DLoser's concerns about his shot...he does look off balance sometimes when he shoots. But I note his almost 60% TS% in college along with his 44.4% 3-point percentage, and I conclude that his shooting is going to be fine despite the odd form.
Leonard Miller put up 20 and 8 last night with only 1 turnover, and didn't embarrass himself on defense. He puts up these near double doubles so frequently in SL and G League play. I get that the level of defense is totally different in SL, but I haven't given up on him.
Finally, surprisingly I thought our best 7 footer last night was Edwards. Our defense just looked much sharper when he was out there. So I guess I wasn't surprised to see he was a team-leading +21 in his 15 minutes. Somebody is going to emerge as the Luka option at center this year when the injury bug hits, and I understand that the guy with by far the highest upside (Joan) is the board favorite to fill this role and maybe even get regular rotation minutes. But I wouldn't be surprised if Finchy instead goes to the 25-year-old Edwards. He's not going to give us anything close to what Luka gave us on offense, but he showed me last night that he can be effective defensively.
Agreed regarding Edwards. The defense was so much more balanced when Edwards was on the floor. At first I thought it was because of the experience of who was on the floor with him, but we looked better defensively with everyone when Edwards was on the floor. There was a lot less defensive players taking each other out of the play like we saw when Beringer was paired with Miller. Edwards looked serviceable
