Minnesota Sports Forum

FNG wrote:I have strong opinions about Russell, and they were reinforced during the playoffs. On the positive side, I completely agree with Lip about him being a terrific teammate. I first noticed this while going to several games late last season and focusing on his interaction with his teammates. I have to admit I was surprised, because my impression of DLO was admittedly colored by the immaturity he displayed early in his career. But he has grown up, and frankly he is one of my favorite guys on the team from a personality perspective. He's smart, thoughtful, and seldom makes comments that make me roll my eyes (hello KAT).

My problem with DLO is that I see him as a below average basketball player absorbing over 1/4 of our payroll. I saw improvement in his game this season, but in many ways, his performance mirrored the performance of the Wolves. I'm not on board with the prevailing opinion here that "a win is a win"...beating a team missing 2 or more key players doesn't tell me enough about how good we are. And my sense was that DLO feasted on the injured teams we were fortunate to play most of this bizarre season. I was worried about how he would show up against a Grizzly team playing at full strength, and frankly his poor performance in the playoffs was not at all a surprise.

I hear $20M thrown out here as a fair offer for DLO, but I'm not on board...that's far too much to devote to a guy who measures out below average in stats that really matter to me. He has a reputation of being a good shooter, but the numbers just don't support this reputation. His TS% both this year and for his career is significantly below the league average. He has never had a positive net rating for a season on basketballreference,com, even in his "all star" season, and his career negative net rating of 9 is rivaled only by Andrew Wiggins among max players (and Wig is actually just a titch better). And while I had moments this year when I saw improvement in his defense, his numbers once again were not very good. He benefited from playing free safety next to PatBev and at times looked like he was figuring it out, but it was clear Finchy struggled to find ways to hide him on defense in the playoffs. Being benched in favor of a reserve being paid $2 million a year in a critical elimination game (a move that I suspect few here challenged) should tell us everything we need to know about DLO's value in big games.

So as much as I like him personally, moving DLO in this off season has to be priority 1 for our Wolves. I'm more than ready to roll with Beverly and J-Mac at PG (with Wright or a free agent as a third option) with the goal of trading DLO for a PF who can shore up our horrible rebounding that ultimately cost us against Memphis. The good news? While DLO's advanced stats are generally below the league average, his raw stats are rather impressive...18.1 PPG and 7.1 APG might attract the attention of some NBA GM's, and convince them to give up a PF that can really improve us where we need it most,

I keep Beasley (am I the only one who thought he was pretty solid defensively in the playoffs?), draft someone who can rebound, and resign Prince, but make every effort to move DLO. I'm convinced a team with KAT and DLO absorbing half the salary cap will never be successful.

kekgeek1 wrote:A couple things when it comes to Dlo. He isn't a max player but I don't think any of us think that.

Wolves in terms of winning games have been super successful at winning game 55-40 when Dlo and Towns play together (playoff and play-in included) and 14-43 when Kat or Dlo do not play over the last 2 years. So right or wrong the combo of Dlo and Towns has been successful and when 1 is not playing it has fallen apart.

I legit believe Dlo was playing hurt this last month and a half. Here is some semi proof I guess. Dlo missed a game out of the blue March 7th, here is how his production dropped (playoffs not included)

FG%: -5%
3pt%: -6%
FGA: -4
3PA: -2
Pts: -4
+/-: -4.6

Dlo play as an offensive threat really fell off after that random game missed due to an injury that was not announced. Now the Wolves played harder teams down the stretch that could be some of the reason Dlo regressed but Dlo missed game 81 and 82 and also was brought back to the locker room during game 5. I legit believe he was playing hurt down the stretch but with that said that is some of the concern with Dlo he is banged up a lot.

In no way do I think Dlo is a great defender but the Wolves had a above average defense in units Dlo was involved in (64th percentile) and to refute FNG claim it was because of Pat Bev Wolves were in the 52nd percentile on D in Dlo units without Pat Bev. Wolves proved they can create a system where the Wolves can be good on defense with Dlo on the court.

Dlo has now played 11 playoff games and they haven't been good but he was a main reason why the wolves won the play in.

Also I think we are playing a really dangerous game of we have Jmac as the starter. Totally different when Jmac has to play good for 30 minutes instead of 15. Also jmac was not gameplaned against like Dlo was. Also jmac was bad last year, I think most of us were shocked he got a contract going into this season. Also an underrated thing is it seems like Dlo likes it here and it seems like he had the temperament that he is cool playing the 3rd fiddle.

Dlo needs to play fucking better going forward. I can't argue that. He pissed me off the last 2 months of the season. I just think the Wolves need a legit plan if they move on from Dlo, Jmac is not that.

It will be interesting going forward with Dlo because the wolves are good when Dlo and Kat play and pretty awful when one missed a game. Also contract Dlo was pretty fucking good for the Nets.

One last thing wolves will have about about 62 million in expiring going into next season what is not bad at all.

Going to be an interesting offseason. Hope whatever the GM decides to do with Dlo ends up being right

Wolves in terms of winning games have been super successful at winning game 55-40 when Dlo and Towns play together (playoff and play-in included) and 14-43 when Kat or Dlo do not play over the last 2 years.

Q-was-here wrote:

Wolves in terms of winning games have been super successful at winning game 55-40 when Dlo and Towns play together (playoff and play-in included) and 14-43 when Kat or Dlo do not play over the last 2 years.

Kekgeek's line above is the one that gives me so much pause. I mean, look at that pathetic record when either KAT or DLO don't play! And it's not heavily weighted toward KAT. We saw how much this team struggled earlier this season when DLO was out. It was ugly.

And DLO isn't our biggest problem. We have got to upgrade the frontcourt. Vando and Naz are nice players. Vando especially was great at the high wall defense, where scrambling to X-out guys and switch when necessary plays to his strengths. But he just isn't the long-term solution as the 2nd big playing next to KAT.

That's why I'm fine sitting on the fence with DLO and just let him play out his existing contract. Let's figure out the PG position next summer.

Carlos Danger wrote:I dunno. I can't get there with the DLO high IQ/team leader stuff. He got pulled out of a pivotal playoff game for JMac for crying out loud. If he's a team leader and a high IQ guy, then he should have found a way to positively effect the game. If his shot is off (it happens), then find a way to get easier shots for you and your teammates. And of course, you can always step up your defense when your shot is off too....

As far as him possibly being hurt. I can't buy that either. His minutes never dropped in March or April. And he would still randomly put up good games. In fact, he averaged 21 points/8 assists for his last three games in the regular season. Then he sat for the last two games of the season with bilateral leg weakness or something. But he came back and had a strong game for the play in against the Clippers. He sure looked healthy in that game. Even in the playoffs he put up 22 points/8 assists in game 3. He looked plenty healthy in that game too. If he's hurt, it must be a very sporadic thing....

D-Mac wrote:

Q-was-here wrote:

Wolves in terms of winning games have been super successful at winning game 55-40 when Dlo and Towns play together (playoff and play-in included) and 14-43 when Kat or Dlo do not play over the last 2 years.

Kekgeek's line above is the one that gives me so much pause. I mean, look at that pathetic record when either KAT or DLO don't play! And it's not heavily weighted toward KAT. We saw how much this team struggled earlier this season when DLO was out. It was ugly.

And DLO isn't our biggest problem. We have got to upgrade the frontcourt. Vando and Naz are nice players. Vando especially was great at the high wall defense, where scrambling to X-out guys and switch when necessary plays to his strengths. But he just isn't the long-term solution as the 2nd big playing next to KAT.

That's why I'm fine sitting on the fence with DLO and just let him play out his existing contract. Let's figure out the PG position next summer.

Totally agree with everything you wrote here. Bringing in a starting caliber big needs to be our top priority this off-season. While I'm not on the fence with Dlo, I'm fine just letting him expire next season

Q-was-here wrote:
All good points. What would you suggest we do then this offseason? PBev is only going to miss more and more games and be less effective as he ages, so do we really want to pencil him in as our starting PG next year?

As for Lil' Mac, how soon we forget some of his struggles. Let's remember he's actually older than Malik Beasley, so it's not like he has a ton of upside left. Love him as a 2nd or 3rd string PG, but not sure he's built to play 25+ MPG as a Western Conference starting PG.

Carlos Danger wrote:

Q-was-here wrote:
All good points. What would you suggest we do then this offseason? PBev is only going to miss more and more games and be less effective as he ages, so do we really want to pencil him in as our starting PG next year?

As for Lil' Mac, how soon we forget some of his struggles. Let's remember he's actually older than Malik Beasley, so it's not like he has a ton of upside left. Love him as a 2nd or 3rd string PG, but not sure he's built to play 25+ MPG as a Western Conference starting PG.

I like JMac. But I understand his limitations. People are right in saying "he's a backup". My plan would be to use the money they would otherwise spend on DLO to get a stud PF next to Towns. I know - easier said than done. But that's my perfect scenario.

As for PG, I'm not sure who's out there for Free Agents. Ideally, find a vet guy with a reasonable contract to give depth behind PBev/JMac. They don't have to score 20 points/game. As others have stated many times, this has to be the Anthony Edwards show going forward. Edwards #1a option. Towns #1b. I want both those guys taking more shots next year.

Q-was-here wrote:
But DLO is under contract for one more year, so in order to do what you say, we have to try to trade DLO for a PF. And then that leads to the issue of finding a starting-caliber PG, which isn't easy even if we don't need a 20 PPG type guy.

I'm not suggesting we cling to DLO and don't test the market, but I just think it's unlikely we are able to go make all the various upgrades we want all in one offseason.