Minnesota Sports Forum

We're worse defensively this season than last in spite of emptying the vault to acquire one of the League's top paint defenders. Hmm. Last season, the offense carried us and our defense was good enough (13th) to finish 10 games over .500. The defense was good enough in spite of the team's youth and relatively low defensive IQ because Finch maximized the athleticism and speed of the team by getting the players to play an attack-style defense, flying around and harassing opponents. Of course, Beverley and Vanderbilt were good defenders, especially playing that style. The Gobert deal transformed this team into something substantially different. It now relies far more on precision execution defensively and that requires experienced high IQ players, but we don't have those players other than Gobert and Kyle Anderson. Edwards and McDaniels might get there, but they're not there yet, which isn't shocking given their age and only two years of NBA experience after only one year of college.

We can change coaches, but any coach that comes here will find the same problem confronting him - a poorly constructed roster and no assets to significantly improve it without blowing things up. There's no doubt about the individual talent on this team, but Kevin McHale was right that it's not the five best, it's the five who play best together. It's also about timing. No organization should count on 20 and 21 year old players entering their third season to be critical keys to being a contender (top 4 in the West, winning playoff series). Gobert was brought here to anchor the team's defense and improve the team's rebounding, but he couldn't be expected to do more than that. As Draymond Green and many others noted, getting Gobert meant depending on Edwards to be great. I'll add it also meant depending on Jaden to be really good. Edwards has been really good but not great while Jaden hasn't even been really good. I've been a big Jaden booster, but we can't go on with him as our SF averaging 2 or 3 rebounds a game while often getting in foul trouble.

So here we are. After bringing in Rudy to anchor our defense, improve our rebounding and improve on last season's win total, our defense, rebounding and winning percentage are all worse right now than at the end of last season. And that's after playing a relatively soft schedule at full strength the first quarter of the season. None of this is Gobert's fault. The deal was never going to work because of who he is and because of the players around him. Wrong deal at the wrong time has been my refrain and that refrain rings more true as the season progresses. There's no sugar coating this and there aren't any potential head coaching saviors out there. Tim Connelly recently said that he should get the blame for how things have gone so far. He's right. What we've seen so far is a front office/ownership failure. The front office will have to fix it. And in my view, fixing it won't be as easy as replacing one good head coach (Finch) with another.

lipoli390 wrote:We're worse defensively this season than last in spite of emptying the vault to acquire one of the League's top paint defenders. Hmm. Last season, the offense carried us and our defense was good enough (13th) to finish 10 games over .500. The defense was good enough in spite of the team's youth and relatively low defensive IQ because Finch maximized the athleticism and speed of the team by getting the players to play an attack-style defense, flying around and harassing opponents. Of course, Beverley and Vanderbilt were good defenders, especially playing that style. The Gobert deal transformed this team into something substantially different. It now relies far more on precision execution defensively and that requires experienced high IQ players, but we don't have those players other than Gobert and Kyle Anderson. Edwards and McDaniels might get there, but they're not there yet, which isn't shocking given their age and only two years of NBA experience after only one year of college.

We can change coaches, but any coach that comes here will find the same problem confronting him - a poorly constructed roster and no assets to significantly improve it without blowing things up. There's no doubt about the individual talent on this team, but Kevin McHale was right that it's not the five best, it's the five who play best together. It's also about timing. No organization should count on 20 and 21 year old players entering their third season to be critical keys to being a contender (top 4 in the West, winning playoff series). Gobert was brought here to anchor the team's defense and improve the team's rebounding, but he couldn't be expected to do more than that. As Draymond Green and many others noted, getting Gobert meant depending on Edwards to be great. I'll add it also meant depending on Jaden to be really good. Edwards has been really good but not great while Jaden hasn't even been really good. I've been a big Jaden booster, but we can't go on with him as our SF averaging 2 or 3 rebounds a game while often getting in foul trouble.

So here we are. After bringing in Rudy to anchor our defense, improve our rebounding and improve on last season's win total, our defense, rebounding and winning percentage are all worse right now than at the end of last season. And that's after playing a relatively soft schedule at full strength the first quarter of the season. None of this is Gobert's fault. The deal was never going to work because of who he is and because of the players around him. Wrong deal at the wrong time has been my refrain and that refrain rings more true as the season progresses. There's no sugar coating this and there aren't any potential head coaching saviors out there. Tim Connelly recently said that he should get the blame for how things have gone so far. He's right. What we've seen so far is a front office/ownership failure. The front office will have to fix it. And in my view, fixing it won't be as easy as replacing one good head coach (Finch) with another.

Lip, The one year less experienced McDaniels and Edwards were on the roster last year too and playing regular minutes on that 13th ranked defense. We swap out Gobert, Anderson, and Rivers for Vando, Beverley, and Beasley. On paper, I struggle with how our defense can be worse this year. I won't blame TC for that.

Gobert is obviously a deterrent in the paint. But shooters are not afraid of him in isolation- either driving him under the rim and pulling up for a mid or floater, and certainly not afraid to splash a 3. Post bigs aren't actually fearful of him either. Lip hit it, with Gobert you need guys who execute precisely around him. In theory, that is a nasty defense. The Wolves just were not ready for that.

Typical Minnesota team, get on the cusp of a built team and swing for a homerun instead of a single to get one or two more runs under their belt. That single was just adding Kyle Anderson while continuing to develop.

All the top stars of the last decade are getting up there - LeBron, Curry, Dame, Durant, CP3, Kawhi, George, etc. The Wolves have a young nucleus of KAT, Ant, DLO, Jaden + a deep bench finally + all their picks + Cap wiggle room, and they handcuff themselves by emptying the coffers for a 40mil, 30 yr old center who requires a complete overhaul of both offensive and defensive systems. It still baffles me.

Tell me that DLo, Ant, Jaden, SloMo, Kat starting with a bench of Jmac, Beverley, Beasley, Prince, Vando, Reid, Nowell, Kessler, Rivers, Moore, Minott + all draft picks with another year of continuity under Finch (fresh off a playoff push) is not better moving forward than what the magic man came in and created.

Q-was-here wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:We're worse defensively this season than last in spite of emptying the vault to acquire one of the League's top paint defenders. Hmm. Last season, the offense carried us and our defense was good enough (13th) to finish 10 games over .500. The defense was good enough in spite of the team's youth and relatively low defensive IQ because Finch maximized the athleticism and speed of the team by getting the players to play an attack-style defense, flying around and harassing opponents. Of course, Beverley and Vanderbilt were good defenders, especially playing that style. The Gobert deal transformed this team into something substantially different. It now relies far more on precision execution defensively and that requires experienced high IQ players, but we don't have those players other than Gobert and Kyle Anderson. Edwards and McDaniels might get there, but they're not there yet, which isn't shocking given their age and only two years of NBA experience after only one year of college.

We can change coaches, but any coach that comes here will find the same problem confronting him - a poorly constructed roster and no assets to significantly improve it without blowing things up. There's no doubt about the individual talent on this team, but Kevin McHale was right that it's not the five best, it's the five who play best together. It's also about timing. No organization should count on 20 and 21 year old players entering their third season to be critical keys to being a contender (top 4 in the West, winning playoff series). Gobert was brought here to anchor the team's defense and improve the team's rebounding, but he couldn't be expected to do more than that. As Draymond Green and many others noted, getting Gobert meant depending on Edwards to be great. I'll add it also meant depending on Jaden to be really good. Edwards has been really good but not great while Jaden hasn't even been really good. I've been a big Jaden booster, but we can't go on with him as our SF averaging 2 or 3 rebounds a game while often getting in foul trouble.

So here we are. After bringing in Rudy to anchor our defense, improve our rebounding and improve on last season's win total, our defense, rebounding and winning percentage are all worse right now than at the end of last season. And that's after playing a relatively soft schedule at full strength the first quarter of the season. None of this is Gobert's fault. The deal was never going to work because of who he is and because of the players around him. Wrong deal at the wrong time has been my refrain and that refrain rings more true as the season progresses. There's no sugar coating this and there aren't any potential head coaching saviors out there. Tim Connelly recently said that he should get the blame for how things have gone so far. He's right. What we've seen so far is a front office/ownership failure. The front office will have to fix it. And in my view, fixing it won't be as easy as replacing one good head coach (Finch) with another.

Lip, The one year less experienced McDaniels and Edwards were on the roster last year too and playing regular minutes on that 13th ranked defense. We swap out Gobert, Anderson, and Rivers for Vando, Beverley, and Beasley. On paper, I struggle with how our defense can be worse this year. I won't blame TC for that.

You SHOUD blame TC for that, which is exactly what he said last week. Losing Vando and Beverley was a big deal defensively. Also, losing those two along with Beasley and reconfiguring how the team plays has hurt the team's offense, which has in turn affected the team's defense.

The first stage is denial. Then comes anger. Finally there's acceptance. I think many fans are still in the denial stage, unable to accept that the Gobert deal changed this team substantially, but not in a good way. I never thought the deal would work, so I was able to skip the denial stage. I'm still in the anger stage, but transitioning to acceptance. And because I've avoided the denial stage, I'm not inclined to believe that someone who was a really good head coach last season and who is widely respected and regarded around the League (Finch) suddenly became a bad one this season. The team is much worse so far this season and instead of pointing the figure at those who were here last season when the team finished 10 games over .500 we should probably point the finger at the roster changes and those who made those changes. Apparently, Tim Connelly agrees with me.

lipoli390 wrote:

Q-was-here wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:We're worse defensively this season than last in spite of emptying the vault to acquire one of the League's top paint defenders. Hmm. Last season, the offense carried us and our defense was good enough (13th) to finish 10 games over .500. The defense was good enough in spite of the team's youth and relatively low defensive IQ because Finch maximized the athleticism and speed of the team by getting the players to play an attack-style defense, flying around and harassing opponents. Of course, Beverley and Vanderbilt were good defenders, especially playing that style. The Gobert deal transformed this team into something substantially different. It now relies far more on precision execution defensively and that requires experienced high IQ players, but we don't have those players other than Gobert and Kyle Anderson. Edwards and McDaniels might get there, but they're not there yet, which isn't shocking given their age and only two years of NBA experience after only one year of college.

We can change coaches, but any coach that comes here will find the same problem confronting him - a poorly constructed roster and no assets to significantly improve it without blowing things up. There's no doubt about the individual talent on this team, but Kevin McHale was right that it's not the five best, it's the five who play best together. It's also about timing. No organization should count on 20 and 21 year old players entering their third season to be critical keys to being a contender (top 4 in the West, winning playoff series). Gobert was brought here to anchor the team's defense and improve the team's rebounding, but he couldn't be expected to do more than that. As Draymond Green and many others noted, getting Gobert meant depending on Edwards to be great. I'll add it also meant depending on Jaden to be really good. Edwards has been really good but not great while Jaden hasn't even been really good. I've been a big Jaden booster, but we can't go on with him as our SF averaging 2 or 3 rebounds a game while often getting in foul trouble.

So here we are. After bringing in Rudy to anchor our defense, improve our rebounding and improve on last season's win total, our defense, rebounding and winning percentage are all worse right now than at the end of last season. And that's after playing a relatively soft schedule at full strength the first quarter of the season. None of this is Gobert's fault. The deal was never going to work because of who he is and because of the players around him. Wrong deal at the wrong time has been my refrain and that refrain rings more true as the season progresses. There's no sugar coating this and there aren't any potential head coaching saviors out there. Tim Connelly recently said that he should get the blame for how things have gone so far. He's right. What we've seen so far is a front office/ownership failure. The front office will have to fix it. And in my view, fixing it won't be as easy as replacing one good head coach (Finch) with another.

Lip, The one year less experienced McDaniels and Edwards were on the roster last year too and playing regular minutes on that 13th ranked defense. We swap out Gobert, Anderson, and Rivers for Vando, Beverley, and Beasley. On paper, I struggle with how our defense can be worse this year. I won't blame TC for that.

You SHOUD blame TC for that, which is exactly what he said last week. Losing Vando and Beverley was a big deal defensively. Also, losing those two along with Beasley and reconfiguring how the team plays has hurt the team's offense, which has in turn affected the team's defense.

The first stage is denial. Then comes anger. Finally there's acceptance. I think many fans are still in the denial stage, unable to accept that the Gobert deal changed this team substantially, but not in a good way. I never thought the deal would work, so I was able to skip the denial stage. I'm still in the anger stage, but transitioning to acceptance. And because I've avoided the denial stage, I'm not inclined to believe that someone who was a really good head coach last season and who is widely respected and regarded around the League (Finch) suddenly became a bad one this season. The team is much worse so far this season and instead of pointing the figure at those who were here last season when the team finished 10 games over .500 we should probably point the finger at the roster changes and those who made those changes. Apparently, Tim Connelly agrees with me.

He's doing what any leader worth half his salt does and accept responsibility. That doesn't mean a different coach and coaching staff couldn't do better.

The reality is that Tim Connelly isn't going anywhere soon, so when it comes to acceptance, we should start with accepting that fact.

As far as coaching is concerned, it's a mysterious thing in the NBA to me. Multiple coaches have flamed out in one place and then look like a genius when they turn up somewhere else with a different roster and front office. I really don't know if a coaching change would do anything or not, but it's one of the easiest levers for TC to pull. That and a DLO trade. Don't be surprised if one or both happen before the season is over.

Lip, you described the stages of grief well. However, half of this board is not grieving...at least not yet. Grief occurs when the patient is dead or close to dying. I think all of us would agree that while the patient here at times shows signs of illness, it is far from dying. The way the patient performed in the five games prior to last night and in a couple entertaining games before KAT went down tells me that the jury is far from in on this deal...the joy shown on this board during the 7 or 8 games in which they played well this season tells me we are not in a grief situation. Gobert's dominance at both ends of the court has been on display the past 10 days, and while it might take a few more weeks to accustom our young players to playing with him, I'm convinced it will happen. Nobody will be able to convince me that the core Rudy had around him last year was better than what he has now.

I'm going to give it some time. The west standings are tight, and that gives us the luxury of time. But if I'm not seeing more wins by mid January, I'm calling for trades and/or Finchie's head...not Tc's.

Q-was-here wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:

Q-was-here wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:We're worse defensively this season than last in spite of emptying the vault to acquire one of the League's top paint defenders. Hmm. Last season, the offense carried us and our defense was good enough (13th) to finish 10 games over .500. The defense was good enough in spite of the team's youth and relatively low defensive IQ because Finch maximized the athleticism and speed of the team by getting the players to play an attack-style defense, flying around and harassing opponents. Of course, Beverley and Vanderbilt were good defenders, especially playing that style. The Gobert deal transformed this team into something substantially different. It now relies far more on precision execution defensively and that requires experienced high IQ players, but we don't have those players other than Gobert and Kyle Anderson. Edwards and McDaniels might get there, but they're not there yet, which isn't shocking given their age and only two years of NBA experience after only one year of college.

We can change coaches, but any coach that comes here will find the same problem confronting him - a poorly constructed roster and no assets to significantly improve it without blowing things up. There's no doubt about the individual talent on this team, but Kevin McHale was right that it's not the five best, it's the five who play best together. It's also about timing. No organization should count on 20 and 21 year old players entering their third season to be critical keys to being a contender (top 4 in the West, winning playoff series). Gobert was brought here to anchor the team's defense and improve the team's rebounding, but he couldn't be expected to do more than that. As Draymond Green and many others noted, getting Gobert meant depending on Edwards to be great. I'll add it also meant depending on Jaden to be really good. Edwards has been really good but not great while Jaden hasn't even been really good. I've been a big Jaden booster, but we can't go on with him as our SF averaging 2 or 3 rebounds a game while often getting in foul trouble.

So here we are. After bringing in Rudy to anchor our defense, improve our rebounding and improve on last season's win total, our defense, rebounding and winning percentage are all worse right now than at the end of last season. And that's after playing a relatively soft schedule at full strength the first quarter of the season. None of this is Gobert's fault. The deal was never going to work because of who he is and because of the players around him. Wrong deal at the wrong time has been my refrain and that refrain rings more true as the season progresses. There's no sugar coating this and there aren't any potential head coaching saviors out there. Tim Connelly recently said that he should get the blame for how things have gone so far. He's right. What we've seen so far is a front office/ownership failure. The front office will have to fix it. And in my view, fixing it won't be as easy as replacing one good head coach (Finch) with another.

Lip, The one year less experienced McDaniels and Edwards were on the roster last year too and playing regular minutes on that 13th ranked defense. We swap out Gobert, Anderson, and Rivers for Vando, Beverley, and Beasley. On paper, I struggle with how our defense can be worse this year. I won't blame TC for that.

You SHOUD blame TC for that, which is exactly what he said last week. Losing Vando and Beverley was a big deal defensively. Also, losing those two along with Beasley and reconfiguring how the team plays has hurt the team's offense, which has in turn affected the team's defense.

The first stage is denial. Then comes anger. Finally there's acceptance. I think many fans are still in the denial stage, unable to accept that the Gobert deal changed this team substantially, but not in a good way. I never thought the deal would work, so I was able to skip the denial stage. I'm still in the anger stage, but transitioning to acceptance. And because I've avoided the denial stage, I'm not inclined to believe that someone who was a really good head coach last season and who is widely respected and regarded around the League (Finch) suddenly became a bad one this season. The team is much worse so far this season and instead of pointing the figure at those who were here last season when the team finished 10 games over .500 we should probably point the finger at the roster changes and those who made those changes. Apparently, Tim Connelly agrees with me.

He's doing what any leader worth half his salt does and accept responsibility. That doesn't mean a different coach and coaching staff couldn't do better.

The reality is that Tim Connelly isn't going anywhere soon, so when it comes to acceptance, we should start with accepting that fact.

As far as coaching is concerned, it's a mysterious thing in the NBA to me. Multiple coaches have flamed out in one place and then look like a genius when they turn up somewhere else with a different roster and front office. I really don't know if a coaching change would do anything or not, but it's one of the easiest levers for TC to pull. That and a DLO trade. Don't be surprised if one or both happen before the season is over.

Thing is, there was a new coach in place and the team and him were getting it together. Under his scheme, at their pace, which most would agree was great. Then you hire a guy who comes in and throws a hailmary wrinkle at it all. Gobert was not a corner piece to the puzzle, he is a middle piece to figure around.. Coaches and players now just aren't coming up organically - unannounced - they're now forced into a window of championship or bust when a championship is not feasible with this roster.

You couldn't regain half the value for Gobert that we gave up. That's called a screwball, cause for fire, and anyone who doesn't or didn't see that is an idiot. One being Tim Connelly. A guy brought in to tool around the core, touted for his drafting (yet trades his options away).

Get ready for another rebuild period.

FNG wrote:Lip, you described the stages of grief well. However, half of this board is not grieving...at least not yet. Grief occurs when the patient is dead or close to dying. I think all of us would agree that while the patient here at times shows signs of illness, it is far from dying. The way the patient performed in the five games prior to last night and in a couple entertaining games before KAT went down tells me that the jury is far from in on this deal...the joy shown on this board during the 7 or 8 games in which they played well this season tells me we are not in a grief situation. Gobert's dominance at both ends of the court has been on display the past 10 days, and while it might take a few more weeks to accustom our young players to playing with him, I'm convinced it will happen. Nobody will be able to convince me that the core Rudy had around him last year was better than what he has now.

I'm going to give it some time. The west standings are tight, and that gives us the luxury of time. But if I'm not seeing more wins by mid January, I'm calling for trades and/or Finchie's head...not Tc's.

FNG - You'll be grieving soon. :). As for Gobert, I like him but it's a huge stretch to say he's been dominant on both ends the past 10 days. I don't even think he's been dominant defensive (very good but not dominant). And he certainly hasn't been dominant on the offensive end.

Was the core around Rudy better last season? That's the wrong question. The right question is whether the core around Rudy last season was better FOR HIM. Clearly it was. I don't think we have the right personnel to fit well with Rudy for the reasons I've already given.

If TC says he takes responsibility I'm not going to give him credit as a leader if he doesn't mean it. Good leaders just don't pay lip service (pun intended) to responsibility, they fully internalize and accept it. You're right that TC's not going anywhere. And I agree that a coaching change and/or DLO trade (maybe including Naz) is likely in the next 6 weeks or so if this team doesn't turn things around significantly. My point is that I don't see a coaching change or trade between now and February that will make a material difference in the success of this team this season. The one ray of hope is that the Wolves do have a lot of talented players. So perhaps they will somehow begin to fit well together an turn things around. But so far, I don't see that happening - under any head coach. Having said that, and as much as I like Finch as a head coach, replacing him with Snyder would probably be a good move at this point.

lipoli390 wrote:

FNG wrote:Lip, you described the stages of grief well. However, half of this board is not grieving...at least not yet. Grief occurs when the patient is dead or close to dying. I think all of us would agree that while the patient here at times shows signs of illness, it is far from dying. The way the patient performed in the five games prior to last night and in a couple entertaining games before KAT went down tells me that the jury is far from in on this deal...the joy shown on this board during the 7 or 8 games in which they played well this season tells me we are not in a grief situation. Gobert's dominance at both ends of the court has been on display the past 10 days, and while it might take a few more weeks to accustom our young players to playing with him, I'm convinced it will happen. Nobody will be able to convince me that the core Rudy had around him last year was better than what he has now.

I'm going to give it some time. The west standings are tight, and that gives us the luxury of time. But if I'm not seeing more wins by mid January, I'm calling for trades and/or Finchie's head...not Tc's.

FNG - You'll be grieving soon. :). As for Gobert, I like him but it's a huge stretch to say he's been dominant on both ends the past 10 days. I don't even think he's been dominant defensive (very good but not dominant). And he certainly hasn't been dominant on the offensive end.

Was the core around Rudy better last season? That's the wrong question. The right question is whether the core around Rudy last season was better FOR HIM. Clearly it was. I don't think we have the right personnel to fit well with Rudy for the reasons I've already given.

If TC says he takes responsibility I'm not going to give him credit as a leader if he doesn't mean it. Good leaders just don't pay lip service (pun intended) to responsibility, they fully internalize and accept it. You're right that TC's not going anywhere. And I agree that a coaching change and/or DLO trade (maybe including Naz) is likely in the next 6 weeks or so if this team doesn't turn things around significantly. My point is that I don't see a coaching change or trade between now and February that will make a material difference in the success of this team this season. The one ray of hope is that the Wolves do have a lot of talented players. So perhaps they will somehow begin to fit well together an turn things around. But so far, I don't see that happening - under any head coach. Having said that, and as much as I like Finch as a head coach, replacing him with Snyder would probably be a good move at this point.

I'm not going to let you wreck my Christmas, Lip!

Like most here, I've been disappointed with the first quarter of the season...I expected much more. But I still love the trade. Some of the reason is that I never bought into the Rosas roster as much as others here did, and saw last year's win total as fool's gold. I didn't see a very high ceiling for that roster the way it was constructed, and that belief has only strengthened since KAT went down. Can you imagine how we would be faring in these 6 weeks KAT will be out if the only significant off-season move was Walker Kessler (I don't think we could have added SloMo without unloading the 4 players we did). We'd be rolling out a lineup of DLo, PatBev, Ant, Vando and Kessler. DLo is wildly inconsistent, PatBev appears to be done (he's shooting under 30% this year and 23% on threes, and has a net rating of -15!), Ant hasn't taken the leap many of us thought he would, Vando is Vando, and Kessler is a rookie. We would have had a winning percentage of about 20% in KAT's absence. But the roster we have now is at least competitive, even without KAT. I'll admit that the deal will look bad in 5-7 years with the lost picks if we don't advance far in playoffs, but I'm still optimistic we will.

- I'm not sure how the handful of games this season without Karl-Anthony Towns correlates to last year's roster and its perceived ceiling in any capacity because the entire identity/roster significantly changed after the trade for Rudy Gobert was made. Those are two very different teams as we're learning with every game. We also don't know what big(s) Minnesota may have signed or what trades may have been made during the off-season in an alternate reality.

- The Kyle Anderson signing actually came before the Gobert trade using the mid-level exception and the open roster spot they already had available. They always had that to work with. It was just a matter of if they'd be able to use all of the exception or not. To be fair, Josh Minott would probably be on a two-way deal right now in that scenario. But yeah, I think they still end up with Anderson -- or some other valuable free agent addition.

In either case, this is just board chatter. I wouldn't have made the trade for Gobert, but I also still think that it'll work out just fine for Minnesota, one way or the other. They'll either win plenty of games with Gobert, or they'll end up trading him or Karl-Anthony Towns for a haul of players/picks that fit Tim Connelly's vision.