Minnesota Sports Forum

Q12543 wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

Q12543 wrote:(I'll avoid posting defensive stats. Thibs is hopefully the elixir that cures what ails us).

Q you promised not to post these stats and then you did it. How can I ever trust again? I'll go listen to some Kelly Clarkson maybe that will help.

Whatever floats your boat Monster!

Yeah, the numbers are ugly. But, I've always maintained that a coach has more influence on a defense than on an offense and we have previously cited examples on this board of rosters hardly changing the composition of its players, yet a new coach bringing dramatic change to its defense. The Steve Clifford example in Charlotte might be the most stunning coach-driven turnarounds I've seen.

Q12543 wrote:Shumway, I expect that the high-powered offense we saw from the 5-man starting unit we had to end the season may take a slight hit. Thibs hates turnovers and values defensive rebounding. Yet when you try to play at a fairly high pace of play you may leak out a guy early, thus having one less person to chase down a defensive rebound. Or Rubio may try to make a homerun pass. How many times did we see Rubio hit LaVine or Wiggins downcourt in perfect stride seconds after gaining possession? Occasionally, those passes ended up out of bounds or right into the hands of the opponent. Sometimes we gave up too many 2nd chance points.

We'll see how much Thibs pulls the reigns back on our pace of play, as we aren't optimally suited to play a grinding half-court offense as efficiently as a more open court game (IMO). Hopefully he strikes the right balance and takes advantage of the strengths of the team.

monsterpile wrote:

Q12543 wrote:Shumway, I expect that the high-powered offense we saw from the 5-man starting unit we had to end the season may take a slight hit. Thibs hates turnovers and values defensive rebounding. Yet when you try to play at a fairly high pace of play you may leak out a guy early, thus having one less person to chase down a defensive rebound. Or Rubio may try to make a homerun pass. How many times did we see Rubio hit LaVine or Wiggins downcourt in perfect stride seconds after gaining possession? Occasionally, those passes ended up out of bounds or right into the hands of the opponent. Sometimes we gave up too many 2nd chance points.

We'll see how much Thibs pulls the reigns back on our pace of play, as we aren't optimally suited to play a grinding half-court offense as efficiently as a more open court game (IMO). Hopefully he strikes the right balance and takes advantage of the strengths of the team.

I've gotten a sense from a few things that Thibs has said that he is willing to play fast. He has said play to your strengths etc. Also the talk I heard from both Ryan Saunders and a couple player during summer league was about trying to play uptempo and get good looks etc. if Thibs was wanting to grind things out you can bet he wasn't going to have Ryan let guys run up and down the court on summer league. I don't know what the numbers were on pace for the Wolves (small sample anyway and the comparison teams are wonky) but it certainly didn't seem they were going slow. When they went on that run they played a pretty solid brand of basketball especially defensively. If they had more talent (been able to make more shots) and played like that they would have been even better.

Shumway wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

Q12543 wrote:Shumway, I expect that the high-powered offense we saw from the 5-man starting unit we had to end the season may take a slight hit. Thibs hates turnovers and values defensive rebounding. Yet when you try to play at a fairly high pace of play you may leak out a guy early, thus having one less person to chase down a defensive rebound. Or Rubio may try to make a homerun pass. How many times did we see Rubio hit LaVine or Wiggins downcourt in perfect stride seconds after gaining possession? Occasionally, those passes ended up out of bounds or right into the hands of the opponent. Sometimes we gave up too many 2nd chance points.

We'll see how much Thibs pulls the reigns back on our pace of play, as we aren't optimally suited to play a grinding half-court offense as efficiently as a more open court game (IMO). Hopefully he strikes the right balance and takes advantage of the strengths of the team.

I've gotten a sense from a few things that Thibs has said that he is willing to play fast. He has said play to your strengths etc. Also the talk I heard from both Ryan Saunders and a couple player during summer league was about trying to play uptempo and get good looks etc. if Thibs was wanting to grind things out you can bet he wasn't going to have Ryan let guys run up and down the court on summer league. I don't know what the numbers were on pace for the Wolves (small sample anyway and the comparison teams are wonky) but it certainly didn't seem they were going slow. When they went on that run they played a pretty solid brand of basketball especially defensively. If they had more talent (been able to make more shots) and played like that they would have been even better.

I agree with all these comments Q and Monster. As I said, I'm not sure that anything would ultimately surprise me about the Wolves defensive and offensive rating this season.

Clearly Thibs will bring a stronger focus to defence and so I expect our D Rating to improve. And so my instinct was initially that it may be at the expense of an uptempo game and may really drag the Offence back. But I also recall the comments about playing to your strengths.

So it will be very interesting where we find that balance on things.