60WinTim wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2024 2:56 pm
So here is something to monitor...
Finch clearly prefers a 9-man rotation. And as of late, JMac has clearly been the #9 guy in that 9-man rotation. And Finch's #9 guy gets minimal minutes -- significantly less than the #8 guy, which is usually SloMo. So where does Morris fit into the rotation? I have to think his role will be much bigger than JMac's.
Assuming Morris is meeting expectations, I would speculate that SloMo will see the biggest drop in minutes. Maybe Conley will see a few minutes shaved off. NAW and NAZ seem to have solidified their roles. So the minute split between Morris and SloMo will be an interesting thing to watch.
Tim, I think Monte's minutes will come from a number of different places, but yes, Conley and SloMo may be where most of them come from. Since most teams have a bench scoring wing or guard as their 6th man, it feels like NAW is mostly going to mirror that person's minutes. And Reid gives us scoring punch, which we continue to desperately need.
SloMo's minutes can now be more matchup-dependent since his ball handling and playmaking are less critical now. There are certain players, like Zion, Doncic, LeBron, and Durant, where we need Kyle's combination of length and mobility defensively. Other teams like OKC and Sacramento probably don't require Kyle out there as much. So I definitely see games where Kyle is our 6th or 7th man and other games where he's our 9th man.
60WinTim wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2024 2:56 pm
So here is something to monitor...
Finch clearly prefers a 9-man rotation. And as of late, JMac has clearly been the #9 guy in that 9-man rotation. And Finch's #9 guy gets minimal minutes -- significantly less than the #8 guy, which is usually SloMo. So where does Morris fit into the rotation? I have to think his role will be much bigger than JMac's.
Assuming Morris is meeting expectations, I would speculate that SloMo will see the biggest drop in minutes. Maybe Conley will see a few minutes shaved off. NAW and NAZ seem to have solidified their roles. So the minute split between Morris and SloMo will be an interesting thing to watch.
He will play more minutes than JMac did...Finchie never seemed to trust JMac, but he certainly must have been part of the decision to trade for Morris. I see three sources for Morris minutes. Against smaller teams (and most teams are smaller than us), I see him taking some minutes away from SloMo...I even think we will see Conley and Morris playing together at times. But even though Finchie has managed Conley's minutes well (less than 30 MPG), I wouldn't be surprised to see Morris getting some of his minutes too. Finally, we have needed NAW's 23 MPG because he was Finchie's primary ballhandler off the bench. But if NAW's 3-point shot declines (I still think he may not be the 36% guy he has been this season), then I think Morris will get some of his minutes.
Morris has averaged 25 MPG for his career, so I think we can count on him getting at least 20 here.
Happy to see Morris take all of Jmac's minutes and tap into any time Slowmo was running point. Getting him to 20 shouldnt be a problem with how little we have been getting from Jmac and Kyle this year.
60WinTim wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2024 2:56 pm
So here is something to monitor...
Finch clearly prefers a 9-man rotation. And as of late, JMac has clearly been the #9 guy in that 9-man rotation. And Finch's #9 guy gets minimal minutes -- significantly less than the #8 guy, which is usually SloMo. So where does Morris fit into the rotation? I have to think his role will be much bigger than JMac's.
Assuming Morris is meeting expectations, I would speculate that SloMo will see the biggest drop in minutes. Maybe Conley will see a few minutes shaved off. NAW and NAZ seem to have solidified their roles. So the minute split between Morris and SloMo will be an interesting thing to watch.
Tim, I think Monte's minutes will come from a number of different places, but yes, Conley and SloMo may be where most of them come from. Since most teams have a bench scoring wing or guard as their 6th man, it feels like NAW is mostly going to mirror that person's minutes. And Reid gives us scoring punch, which we continue to desperately need.
SloMo's minutes can now be more matchup-dependent since his ball handling and playmaking are less critical now. There are certain players, like Zion, Doncic, LeBron, and Durant, where we need Kyle's combination of length and mobility defensively. Other teams like OKC and Sacramento probably don't require Kyle out there as much. So I definitely see games where Kyle is our 6th or 7th man and other games where he's our 9th man.
Carlos Danger wrote: ↑Thu Feb 08, 2024 7:27 am
Looks like everyone is pretty happy with the deal and I am as well. My only pick was similar to what I saw Cool write - wish we could have held onto TBJ. He's still only 24 and has shown he can be a somewhat productive bench guy. I thought he could've fit with the second wave of youngsters. I'd rather they gave up WMJ instead, but oh well. TBJ really wasn't getting much run here so I assume the high powers were not sold on him.
Regardless. At the end of the day we cleaned up the bottom of the roster a little and got better which was what almost everyone was hoping would happen.
I agree. I hope we offered Moore instead of TBJ. If that happened and the Pistons said no, then I’m satisfied.
It’s pretty simple Brown was included to match Salaries. Putting Moore instead of Brown wouldn’t have been enough in terms of the luxury tax. I like Brown and I think the Wolves did to some extent but he isn’t valuable enough to worry about going over the tax for especially when the trade opened up a roster spot. For all we know Moore might be considered a negative asset since he costs money beyond this year. If he was included in this trade the Wolves may have had to give up another 2nd rounder to get rid of him. Let’s see what the Wolves can do signing a guy to their roster to see how this shakes out.
