Q12543 wrote:I think it's embarrassing for the franchise. How can they have such a treasure trove of lottery picks parade through here and not be able to assemble something resembling a competitive team?
The "Thibs adjustment period" is over. He had a full training camp, pre-season, and now about 20% of the regular season. And we have nothing to show for it!
I agree completely, they should be 100% humiliated right now. The long time staff are probably numb to that feeling by now though.
I will say one thing positive, may be two....1) That was by far Cole's best game of the year, especially on defense. He was really strong in the middle, and 2) more generally, while our bench sometimes has a hell of a hard time scoring, I actually think they are better defensively than our starters on a relative basis. I'm not necessarily saying they would do better against opposing team's starting 5, but they generally do a much better job defending their opposing bench peers as compared to our starters defending their peers, if you get my drift.
Q12543 wrote:I will say one thing positive, may be two....1) That was by far Cole's best game of the year, especially on defense. He was really strong in the middle, and 2) more generally, while our bench sometimes has a hell of a hard time scoring, I actually think they are better defensively than our starters on a relative basis. I'm not necessarily saying they would do better against opposing team's starting 5, but they generally do a much better job defending their opposing bench peers as compared to our starters defending their peers, if you get my drift.
I agree Q. It helps that our best interior defender(cole) and our best perimeter defender(dunn) made up of 50% of our bench unit.( We only play 9 guys regularly with lavine playing with the 2nd unit).
Nevertheless its on the starters and the coach to get their act together. They are the ones getting the spotlight,money and minutes. The starters just need to compete every game. No more sleepwalking and hero ball. Thibs needs to step up his coaching. The guy was known to be a master defensive coach with a limited creativity on offense. Our defense suck and the offense is not that good.
To be 5-14 you have to be doing a lot of things wrong. You could point at pretty much everything on this team and make an argument. Even Thibs.
The truth is probably much simpler: our main guys are not physically or mentally ready yet to compete on a high level or even a playoff level. Combine that with having to learn a new system, poor point guard play, poor bench play, and losing a lot of close games and you have 5-14. While I think this is underachieving, maybe realistically it's closer to where we should actually be at this point.
I wasn't able to watch this game live but here are my thoughts as I watched it.
Knicks
Tough luck hitting shots early
Some nice defensive possessions on zingis by Wiggins.
Rubio was the catalyst for that little run with the bench. Bazz put the ball in the basket. The bench did their job in that first quarter.
Good start for the Wolves in this 2nd quarter. Bazz doing good bad things then had that bad transition pass to Lavine's feet.
Dunn playing pretty well. I wish they would just isolate him against Jennings and let him just punish Jennings.
I've been watching the Wolves offensively rebounding after a few conversations on the board. Yeah they do seem to sell out a bit too much.
Dunn was really good in that first rotation.
I've seen Rubio up the court several times instead of hanging back waiting for the ball. Interesting.
KRIS DUNN best game so far that one pass to Aldrich...would have been a good pass if Aldrich was expecting it. He wasn't. It probably wasn't the type of pass to be doing in the 4th quarter but man Dunn had been on a roll. Tonight's game give me hope. Dude a wrecking ball at times defensively.
Cole was absolutely terrific
Frustrating game I get it but they came back and then absolutely lost the way a young inexperienced team would lose and the Knicks who have some legit vets won.
Derrick Rose looks solid. If I thought he could stay healthy inam trying to figure out what I would be willing to pay him. It also depends on the rest of the players I had around him.
The comments about Thibs not being encouraging...well he does yell pretty often to get to "Take him!" Etc both on the offensive and defensive end. He isn't cuddly I guess but Jim was talking about how he and Rose used to go out to eat every night. It sounds like they weren't ordering pizza in and watching film either.
As frustrating as this game was it does feel like maybe they have gotten away from those 3rd quarters of doom at least for a few games. Next they can figure out how to win when the game is close. Remember how the Wolves did that early last year...then promptly forgot how even when some vets were still playing? I don't care that much about the schedule they are playing. It's the NBA and team can beat and team any given night and in the Wolves turn things around they will win games. If they end up with another lottery pick fine add some more talent Instill believe in everything they have and I saw a glimpse of what dunn could provide sooner rather than Later. It's similar to what Rubio can do but the upside is a lot higher overall.
Q12543 wrote:I think it's embarrassing for the franchise. How can they have such a treasure trove of lottery picks parade through here and not be able to assemble something resembling a competitive team?
The "Thibs adjustment period" is over. He had a full training camp, pre-season, and now about 20% of the regular season. And we have nothing to show for it!
I agree completely, they should be 100% humiliated right now. The long time staff are probably numb to that feeling by now though.
I agree also. There is no credible counter to Q's reaction and observations. I also agree with the few positives identified by Q in his other post.
Mstermisty wrote:To be 5-14 you have to be doing a lot of things wrong. You could point at pretty much everything on this team and make an argument. Even Thibs.
The truth is probably much simpler: our main guys are not physically or mentally ready yet to compete on a high level or even a playoff level. Combine that with having to learn a new system, poor point guard play, poor bench play, and losing a lot of close games and you have 5-14. While I think this is underachieving, maybe realistically it's closer to where we should actually be at this point.
We shouldn't be worse than we were last season, but we are. By worse, I mean worse than last season in its entirely not just worse than how we played after the allstar break last season. And we are enormously worse than we were post-allstar break last season. I know some are in denial and try to come up with ways to diminish that comparison. The latest feeble effort forced on some wins against teams that weren't very good or weren't at full strength. Well, we've played generally mediocre teams so far this season and played a number of teams missing key guys. Remember our win over the D-League version of Memphis earlier this season? That's just one example. So yes, we are far worse than we were later last season and the team late last season should be more reflective of the caliber team entering this season.
We can point to a lot of things that account for our pathetic performance thus far this season. But at some point a root-cause analysis needs to be done. I think it's obvious where the weight of the evidence is pointing. But I've vowed to give it another 30 days before giving up completely on the bellowing bag of negativity carping on the sideline.
Like all of us management thought we had a legit vet presence in Rubio to help us close games. We don't, he sucks. Boys can't win a man's game. Love then or hate them, having guys like Melo and Rose is the difference between our record and the Knicks. We have children playing an adult game who are weak minded and fragile. None of our guys can string together more than a few nice performances in a row right now. They just aren't bringing it every night. I am running out of sports cliches but none of this should be a surprise with the makeup of our roster.
Mstermisty wrote:To be 5-14 you have to be doing a lot of things wrong. You could point at pretty much everything on this team and make an argument. Even Thibs.
The truth is probably much simpler: our main guys are not physically or mentally ready yet to compete on a high level or even a playoff level. Combine that with having to learn a new system, poor point guard play, poor bench play, and losing a lot of close games and you have 5-14. While I think this is underachieving, maybe realistically it's closer to where we should actually be at this point.
We shouldn't be worse than we were last season, but we are. By worse, I mean worse than last season in its entirely not just worse than how we played after the allstar break last season. And we are enormously worse than we were post-allstar break last season. I know some are in denial and try to come up with ways to diminish that comparison. The latest feeble effort forced on some wins against teams that weren't very good or weren't at full strength. Well, we've played generally mediocre teams so far this season and played a number of teams missing key guys. Remember our win over the D-League version of Memphis earlier this season? That's just one example. So yes, we are far worse than we were later last season and the team late last season should be more reflective of the caliber team entering this season.
We can point to a lot of things that account for our pathetic performance thus far this season. But at some point a root-cause analysis needs to be done. I think it's obvious where the weight of the evidence is pointing. But I've vowed to give it another 30 days before giving up completely on the bellowing bag of negativity carping on the sideline.
While I think learning a new system and adjusting to a different style of coaching has contributed, I don't see Thibs as the problem. Maybe by the end of the season I'll think differently. But all I see is young players making stupid decisions on the court, trying to play hero ball, and struggling on defense, often under the hoop getting manhandled. When the game is on the line they start thinking the game instead of playing. A good example tonight would be the Zach and Wiggs 2 on 1 fast break. That should be 2 points every time.
Could they be better? Yes. But honestly I'm just starting to think this team was meant to take it's lumps until the main guys figure it out. It's frustrating though. We all want to see it happen sooner than later.
thedoper wrote:Like all of us management thought we had a legit vet presence in Rubio to help us close games. We don't, he sucks. Boys can't win a man's game. Love then or hate them, having guys like Melo and Rose is the difference between our record and the Knicks. We have children playing an adult game who are weak minded and fragile. None of our guys can string together more than a few nice performances in a row right now. They just aren't bringing it every night. I am running out of sports cliches but none of this should be a surprise with the makeup of our roster.
Good points and there certainly is some reality there. I'm taking an even and long term view of this team and franchise but the frustration from fans questioning everything about this team players coaches etc that's absolutely fair.
There is so much we don't know. What are guys doing in practice? Are they doing well in practice? What is Thibs emphasizing in practice and preparation and in games? It sounds like Thibs has taken a less of a grinding stance when it comes to practices etc. Has that approach been something Thibs has to adapt to himself?
Some people have made the observation and good points about Towns playing in the paint and not being on the perimeter. You know what really talented offensive player has struggled with that for a couple years and now seems to have found his place? Kevin Love. If he struggled playing with Lebron on a good team with a couple really good scorers imagine what Towns is having to deal with playing with 2 very young scorers in Lavine and Wiggins and a couple young vets in Dieng and Rubio and not much help with bench vets. The guy has a heck of perimeter game because he is such a terrific shooter. Finishing that balance has to be tricky. Defensively? Yeah that's a different thing but offensively he can do so much. What I would like him to improve on most is being more effective in the screen game. He doesn't do much except set a screen. What he does after that isn't that exciting a lot of the time. He will figure it out though. It's obvious how talented he is we may be expecting too much from the guy to get it all right away.
