Minnesota Sports Forum

Q-is-here wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 10:31 pm

mjs34 wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 1:03 pm

FNG wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 10:24 am

Exactly what I think, WF. What TC and Finchy have done turning this franchise around is extraordinary, and losing to a generationally talented elite team will not change my opinion…even if it’s a sweep or 5 gamer. We share our opinions here, and that’s fine. But I always get a kick out of guys who are so certain they know more than the coach…thinking you’re smarter than an NBA coach who has taken his team to the conference finals 2 years in a row is the real definition of insanity.

I get a kick out of guys who bury their noses up GM's a**es. Maybe it is because we have different definitions of "extraordinary". I don't think taking over a team who previously won 46 games and three years later have won 49 while putting us in cap hell and mortgaging our future by giving up multiple first round picks qualifies as "extraordinary". Anyone with any sense would realize the improvement with this team is due to Ant and Jaden developing.

Whatever the opposite of a fair weather fan is, that's the category you and KG4Ever belong to. I suspect we won't hear anything from you or KG tonight since the Wolves looked dominant.

I am not sure what got your shorts in a bundle, but you'll have to excuse me for having something more important to do than post on here after the game. Q, you have no idea of what type of fan I am so you should refrain from trying to put me or KG4Ever for that matter into some type of category.

If you don't agree with something I posted feel free to point that out.

mjs34 wrote: ↑Sun May 25, 2025 10:16 am

Q-is-here wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 10:31 pm

mjs34 wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 1:03 pm

I get a kick out of guys who bury their noses up GM's a**es. Maybe it is because we have different definitions of "extraordinary". I don't think taking over a team who previously won 46 games and three years later have won 49 while putting us in cap hell and mortgaging our future by giving up multiple first round picks qualifies as "extraordinary". Anyone with any sense would realize the improvement with this team is due to Ant and Jaden developing.

Whatever the opposite of a fair weather fan is, that's the category you and KG4Ever belong to. I suspect we won't hear anything from you or KG tonight since the Wolves looked dominant.

I am not sure what got your shorts in a bundle, but you'll have to excuse me for having something more important to do than post on here after the game. Q, you have no idea of what type of fan I am so you should refrain from trying to put me or KG4Ever for that matter into some type of category.

If you don't agree with something I posted feel free to point that out.

I don't care if you post or not, but it seems like you just happen to find the time when things are going poorly yet we rarely hear from you otherwise. Perhaps it's a little unfair to put you in KG's category since at least you don't insult the rest of us as he has done from time to time.

As for rebutting your criticism of Finch and Connelly, they aren't perfect by any means, but you don't see the cognitive dissonance in ripping the Rudy trade/cap issues and us making two consecutive WCF appearances soon thereafter!?!?

Q-is-here wrote: ↑Sun May 25, 2025 10:24 am

mjs34 wrote: ↑Sun May 25, 2025 10:16 am

Q-is-here wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 10:31 pm

Whatever the opposite of a fair weather fan is, that's the category you and KG4Ever belong to. I suspect we won't hear anything from you or KG tonight since the Wolves looked dominant.

I am not sure what got your shorts in a bundle, but you'll have to excuse me for having something more important to do than post on here after the game. Q, you have no idea of what type of fan I am so you should refrain from trying to put me or KG4Ever for that matter into some type of category.

If you don't agree with something I posted feel free to point that out.

I don't care if you post or not, but it seems like you just happen to find the time when things are going poorly yet we rarely hear from you otherwise. Perhaps it's a little unfair to put you in KG's category since at least you don't insult the rest of us as he has done from time to time.

As for rebutting your criticism of Finch and Connelly, they aren't perfect by any means, but you don't see the cognitive dissonance in ripping the Rudy trade/cap issues and us making two consecutive WCF appearances soon thereafter!?!?

I just don't post as much as I used to. When I do it is usually in response to another post, but something I have noticed is that there is a tendency for several of you to just dismiss viewpoints different from yours. I see no reason to post when my opinion is the same as every other one.

As for Rudy trade/cap, I think two things can be true at the same time. I think I supported my position with facts based on record, salary cap situation, and future assets.

FNG wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 4:19 pm

60WinTim wrote: ↑Sat May 24, 2025 3:54 pm What's funny is I am seeing some talk about the Knicks may need to move off of KAT because they just aren't very good on the defensive end. Good luck moving that contract!

I still think the Wolves were fortunate to move off of KAT with as much return as they got. The salary cap hell they were headed for would have sunk this team.

It was sad to see Indy ruthlessly target KAT on defense last night, and Thibs was clearly pissed post game (it was about the crabbiest I've ever seen him, and that's a high bar!). He drove to the basket well last night, but he just hasn't been a prolific 3-point shooter this post season...I think Julius has as many made threes as KAT in far fewer games. And with his poor defense, he's not a very positive force if he's not making his treys.

Towns 3 point shooting in terms of volume is a bit puzzling. It's not surprising he is shooting them less this postseason than last. In the regular season he shot 1 less per 36 mins than he did last year which is the fewset per 36 he has taken since his 3rd year in the league. Towns 3's taken per 36 for his career is. 6 more than Randle. So it's not surprising he isn't exactly volume shooting for the Knicks in general and for the playoffs. Some of that is on Towns and some is likely on the plan in how he is utilized. The Knicks also have a lot of 3 point shooters so it might not make as much sense to have Towns out there as much.

As for defensively...if Towns is on you and no other true big in the game for the Knicks as long as you can beat Towns nobody is meeting you at the rim. In previous playoffs one of the things Towns did well or held up OK was on the perimeter. I didn't watch the game but based on what I have seen Towns do before I gotta wonder what else was going on with the Knicks Defense... Or the Pacers offense. If nothing else the Knicks might be showing why a good defensive center still has value.

Edit: Just Watched game 1 from about midway of the 3rd on. Towns was honestly really good overall. Gonna do roughly the same thing for game 2.

Is it down to ZERO? Yep.

Wolvesfan21 wrote: ↑Tue May 27, 2025 2:14 am Is it down to ZERO? Yep.

If it were ZERO, I wouldn't watch the next game...

But it feels pretty damn close to ZERO!

I wonder if Finch takes this opportunity to get a couple more of the young guys some playoff experience (like Clark, and maybe Dilly, and more than token minutes for Shannon)???

Nahh. He won't do it.

60WinTim wrote: ↑Tue May 27, 2025 7:49 am

Wolvesfan21 wrote: ↑Tue May 27, 2025 2:14 am Is it down to ZERO? Yep.

If it were ZERO, I wouldn't watch the next game...

But it feels pretty damn close to ZERO!

I wonder if Finch takes this opportunity to get a couple more of the young guys some playoff experience (like Clark, and maybe Dilly, and more than token minutes for Shannon)???

Nahh. He won't do it.

Let's say we're 25% to win on the road, 50% at home (this team is pretty good so maybe fairish approximations / odds). 12.5% to force game 7 and 3.125% to win the series.

Actually seems possible!

I would be shocked if he played Dilly and wave the white flag essentially to his team. 3% is crazy long odds, but it Anything Is Possible! We need a minor miracle for sure.

Now those odds don't include maybe a SGA sprained ankle, Chet knee, etc... early in next game. Series odds could go up to 6% pretty quick!!!

Chances are pretty bad right now, I will say this though. OKC has beat Memphis by 51 and Denver by 43 and 32. The way OKC played yesterday with physicality, their offensive rebounds, and forced turnovers, felt like the kind of game where they would have beaten a team by 40+ and we were right there with a chance to win it. We can put blame on whoever, but a few less turnovers a few less offensive rebounds, a few less lucky bounces like SGA falling down throwing it under someones legs and they hit a three.

This is a really good team. A team that turned over Joker 8, 6, 7, and 5 times in 4 of the games, and held him to shooting 31.8%, 32%, and 37.5% in three of the games. Held Murray to 40.5% and 30.6% on the series with 3.3 turnovers per game with 4 games shooting 37.5% or worse and a best of 47.4%. Held Bane to 15.3 points on 31.7% from the field and 21.9% from three with 3.8 turnovers per game. Bane is a career 47.5% shooter and 41% from three. Dort, Caruso, Williams, Chet, SGA, Wallace are all awesome defenders. Just destroyed Denver by 43 and 32 and Memphis by 51 in some games where they gave teams absolutely no hope from the very first minute of some games.

rapsuperstar31 wrote: ↑Tue May 27, 2025 10:44 am Chances are pretty bad right now, I will say this though. OKC has beat Memphis by 51 and Denver by 43 and 32. The way OKC played yesterday with physicality, their offensive rebounds, and forced turnovers, felt like the kind of game where they would have beaten a team by 40+ and we were right there with a chance to win it. We can put blame on whoever, but a few less turnovers a few less offensive rebounds, a few less lucky bounces like SGA falling down throwing it under someones legs and they hit a three.

This is a really good team. A team that turned over Joker 8, 6, 7, and 5 times in 4 of the games, and held him to shooting 31.8%, 32%, and 37.5% in three of the games. Held Murray to 40.5% and 30.6% on the series with 3.3 turnovers per game with 4 games shooting 37.5% or worse and a best of 47.4%. Held Bane to 15.3 points on 31.7% from the field and 21.9% from three with 3.8 turnovers per game. Bane is a career 47.5% shooter and 41% from three. Dort, Caruso, Williams, Chet, SGA, Wallace are all awesome defenders. Just destroyed Denver by 43 and 32 and Memphis by 51 in some games where they gave teams absolutely no hope from the very first minute of some games.

Pretty much. I thought it was pretty clear that we were watching the two best teams in the NBA battle it out last night.

We need to make a couple small adjustments and play game 5 with the same ferocity that we displayed in the 4th quarter. We might not win anyway, but it's all about bringing the series back to Minnesota. The odds aren't good but we don't need to worry about winning three in a row right now.

Here are the adjustments I would make:

Double Shai more often to get the ball out of his hands near the timeline. Getting 30 shots like last night is too many.

If you're going to play Ju (and I wish they wouldn't), get him down low on offense instead of above the arc. If you get him on the block, you take away one bad thing that can happen when he gets the ball.

Play Mike Conley and Jaden as many minutes as they can handle. We have to keep the turnovers down and the best way to do that is having Mike orchestrate the offense. Jaden needs to go 45-48 if he can. Don't give the Thunder a break when Shai goes to the bench. Move Jaden onto Williams at the beginning of the 2nd and 4th quarters, and back onto Shai when he comes back in. We have to shoot our shot in this game.

Pound the defensive glass with all 5 players. We don't run a fast break anyway, so do everything possible to limit opportunities.