Minnesota Sports Forum

Fair point,

kekgeek1 wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

WildWolf2813 wrote:KAT needs to man up and learn defense, but who is gonna teach him? I don't think Thibs is qualified anymore to show it.

Fun stat that was brought up by Britt Robson in an article on the athletic a while ago. The Wolves had the best defensive rating in the NBA in the first quarter.

What guy on our team almost always played the entire first quarter?

Interesting point Cool. I had to look up the minutes for the 1st quarter I really wasn't sure who it was going to be.

Minutes per 1st quarter

11.7 Wiggins
10.7 Taj
9.6 Teague
9.4 Butler
7.9 Towns
4.8 Belly
4.2 Dieng
3.8 Tyus
3.2 Crawford

Another fun stat:

Wolves had the worst defensive rating in the 4th quarter in the NBA. They were still good offensively in the 4th In rating but the defense was bad enough to make it their only negative net rating of any quarter. Their 2nd quarter offense was best in the NBA. If you are wondering yes Carfors averaged more minutes in the 4th quarter than Wiggins. Sometimes I think that did make sense. Other times...no. Interestingly Crawford had a positive plus minus in the 4th quarter. Anywho that was kinda fun.

These kinds of statistical anomalies seem to only happen to the Wolves. I know I bring up the craziness of the 2014 season a lot... but it really was pretty crazy just how odd many of the stats were that season.

So to summarize:

1) The Wolves give us enough ammo to support BOTH sides of so many takes.
2) The Wolves fall apart regularly in the 4th quarter... and it's nothing new. It transcends players/years/coaches.

I know you guys get tired of this narrative, but the bizarre difference between our defensive effectiveness in the first and 4th quarters couldn't be any more understandable to me. Our guys are TIRED in the 4th quarter, and they are playing against fresher players. I mean come on...it's basically the same guys playing at the start of the game and the end. What other reason could explain this remarkable difference?

I mean in 2014 we had 14 guys average more than 10 minutes a game and had a potential hall of fame coach then.

What is your reasoning why we blew so many games that year.

Good question, kek. There are lots of reasons why teams blow leads in the 4th quarter, and those reasons may differ depending on personnel and coaching. In 2014, we clearly just didn't have as much talent as most of our opponents...when Kevin Martin and Corey Brewer are your 2nd and 4th highest scorers, it's a pretty good sign you're not as talented as your opponent. And a less talented team is going to blow a lot of leads. But I don't think you can make the same "lesser talent" excuse for this year's Wolves starting unit of KAT, Butler, Wig, Teague and Taj. Nope, it's gotta be something else other than talent.

Hicks asks another good question as to why we ranked 4th in offense in the 4th quarter if our starters were so tired. I don't have an answer based on empirical evidence...I can only answer based on my personal experience. When I was dog tired in the 4th quarter, I never let my tiredness get in the way of trying to get my points...maybe I was a selfish player, but I never felt too tired to score. But I can't say I brought the same intensity on defense when I was tired as I did on offense. Who knows, maybe the same thing is true for NBA players. All I know is that our players often looked tired on defense in the 4th quarter in games I went to last season, and I'm not at all surprised about the discrepancy between our 1st quarter and 4th quarter defensive effectiveness.