Minnesota Sports Forum

CJ's gone. I don't think Adelman ever envisioned keeping him after last year, but Kahn went ahead and gave him that extra year. Neither Flip nor Adelman have ties to him really so I'd bet that he won't be on the opening roster. Our depth in bigs also contributes to CJ's likely departure.

Hopefully we keep Hummel and Jeffers. Always liked Hummel and his basketball IQ. As for Jeffers, we need as much defense as we can get. I haven't been able to watch the pre-season games, due to not having the package yet, but can anyone tell me if Brown's defense is close to Jeffers if not better? I'd hate to give up on Brown considering I love his size and ability to run an offense.

I think Jeffers is a shoe-in to keep. Plus we will continue to have the draft rights to Brown. He can go play in Europe or the NBDL and come to camp next year with more experience.

I agree with you Tim. Jeffers motor and skills have earned him the spot - and even though we added depth at wing, we were already down two wings last night.

Doper, the play you mentioned was the only one I saw last night, and I agree that it was a good one...both on Ricky's part and Shabazz's. You commented on Muhammad's athleticism, and I wanted to remind the board what his trainer at the P3 clinic in Santa Barbara told Chad Ford last summer after testing him athletically. P3 has trained hundreds of NBA or prospective NBA players, and Shabazz had the highest vertical explosiveness measurement they have ever recorded. This helps explain his effectiveness on the offensive boards, and his ability to score inside (along with the quick release he showed on the play you mentioned).

Unfortunately, vertical explosiveness is only one measure of athleticism, and Shabazz ranked slightly below average at P3 in horizontal athleticism. This ranking explains why he sometimes struggled defensively at UCLA when matched up against quicker offensive players. The P3 trainers said, however, that they believed they could train Shabazz to be as explosive horizontally as he already is vertically, and they designed a series of drills to meet this goal that Shabazz worked on with them for several weeks.

Bottom line on Shabazz's athleticism: he is naturally freakishly explosive horizontally, and will continue to use this asset to his advantage on the boards and offensively. But time will tell if P3 was successful in improving his horizontal athleticism and on-the-ball defense.

As a follow on comment to your reference to the nice interaction between Rubio and Shabazz on his first bucket last night, doper, I immediately thought about how that almost never happened between Shabazz and Larry Drew last season. Q has cited Muhammad's poor effective shooting % last year, and he is right. I believe he had the lowest effective percentage of all lottery picks...not good. But as someone who suffered through the frustration of UCLA's 2012-13 season, I blame Drew for much of that. He sometimes seemed more focused on freezing out Shabazz than winning, and Shabazz was often forced to create his own shot...not his strong suit. I think Rubio's ability and desire to put teammates in the best position to score will really be helpful for Shabazz. If he stays with the elements of his offensive game that he is most effective at, I think he can be a productive, efficient scorer for the Wolves off the bench.

I watched about 6 UCLA games from last year. It seemed that so often Shabazz would be getting his opportunity at the end of the shot clock when everything else had broken down. I think Drew was a good transition PG and horrible at running half court from what I could see. I don't know if it was a personal/competitive thing for Drew or just his lack of ability to position and attack a half court offense. From what I see so far I am very happy we got Shabazz (although he was always the top guy I wanted). He is raw and needs to stay focused but he has all of the right pieces around him to succeed with this team.