It is Prince

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Lavine, Brown, Wiggins, Bud, Hamilton, AP, Onuaku, and Hummel was our entire healthy roster for a decent chunk of last year. Pop isn't getting a single win out of that lineup either. Blame Flip all you want, he had a team full of young players and not enough healthy bodies to ever practice down the stretch to actually coach up a defense. Name one plus defender in that lineup outside of Wiggins. There isn't one. How is any coach having a half decent defensive scheme implemented with no defenders and no practice time to implement a scheme. 4 of those guys were mid-season acquisitions who didn't get to practice at all and didn't have the luxury of a training camp to at least have a base line of understanding of the defensive game plan. I think you're really overrating what any coach could do with that lineup playing as much as they did. That's honestly one of the worst lineups of all time and it makes sense they couldn't win anything.

I'm not a fan of Flip as a defensive coach, but Thibs honestly couldn't do that much better with what we had available last year and the amount of practice time we had.

You are sneaking in a few names for effect. Many of those guys played bit parts i.e. Onuaku's 6 games/68 minutes. Only three of the 3 of the 8 guys you listed were actually high minute guys (over 1000). Those guys were Wiggins, LaVine and Bud - none of which are bad players. The main contributors to last year's team based on minutes played were:

1.) Wiggins - 2969
2.) Dieng - 2193
3.) LaVine - 1902
4.) Thad - 1605
5.) Martin - 1302

Four of those five guys will be expected to start and/or play high minutes again this season. So, if you are saying Flip didn't have any talent to work with last year, then you will be equally disappointed this year. Personally, I'm hoping the defensive breakdowns had more to do with implementation/Execution vs. talent. That's why I'm saying coaching has to be part of the discussion for improving this team. I'm not calling for Flip's head. I'm not saying all our players are terrible. I'm not saying it's the end of the world. I'm just saying I think we can improve the defensive scheme/game planning. It was unwatchable last year.

Anthony, doesn't your list support the assertion that Flip should be given a total pass on last year? Here's what I see. The three guys who were on the court the most last season had a combined 1 year of experience between them at the start of the season...not only do rookies seldom contribute much to a team winning, but injuries forced one of the rookies to play out of position most of the year!

I also see that the guy who played the 5th most minutes averaged less than 16 minutes a game for the season...that leaves a lot of minutes for the Hamiltons of the world to work their magic on the court.

Injuries left Flip with a team that sometimes only had 7-8 healthy players, 2 of whom were rookies, one of whom was in his second year, and the rest who mostly didn't belong in the NBA. What coach can win with that collection? I'm critical of Flip for his antiquated offensive philosophy, but that doesn't explain our woeful season. It was all about injuries to our veterans last year, and I give Flip a pass.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

Lavine, Brown, Wiggins, Bud, Hamilton, AP, Onuaku, and Hummel was our entire healthy roster for a decent chunk of last year. Pop isn't getting a single win out of that lineup either. Blame Flip all you want, he had a team full of young players and not enough healthy bodies to ever practice down the stretch to actually coach up a defense. Name one plus defender in that lineup outside of Wiggins. There isn't one. How is any coach having a half decent defensive scheme implemented with no defenders and no practice time to implement a scheme. 4 of those guys were mid-season acquisitions who didn't get to practice at all and didn't have the luxury of a training camp to at least have a base line of understanding of the defensive game plan. I think you're really overrating what any coach could do with that lineup playing as much as they did. That's honestly one of the worst lineups of all time and it makes sense they couldn't win anything.

I'm not a fan of Flip as a defensive coach, but Thibs honestly couldn't do that much better with what we had available last year and the amount of practice time we had.

You are sneaking in a few names for effect. Many of those guys played bit parts i.e. Onuaku's 6 games/68 minutes. Only three of the 3 of the 8 guys you listed were actually high minute guys (over 1000). Those guys were Wiggins, LaVine and Bud - none of which are bad players. The main contributors to last year's team based on minutes played were:

1.) Wiggins - 2969
2.) Dieng - 2193
3.) LaVine - 1902
4.) Thad - 1605
5.) Martin - 1302

Four of those five guys will be expected to start and/or play high minutes again this season. So, if you are saying Flip didn't have any talent to work with last year, then you will be equally disappointed this year. Personally, I'm hoping the defensive breakdowns had more to do with implementation/Execution vs. talent. That's why I'm saying coaching has to be part of the discussion for improving this team. I'm not calling for Flip's head. I'm not saying all our players are terrible. I'm not saying it's the end of the world. I'm just saying I think we can improve the defensive scheme/game planning. It was unwatchable last year.

Your numbers are misleading also. Thad Young only played 48 games for us last year. Martin only played 39 games for us. Here's who Flip had available to play the most last year based on games since we only won 16 out of 82 games.

Wiggins-82
Lavine-77
Dieng-73
Bud-67
Bennett-57

Martin didn't even play half a season and Payne was Thad's replacement for 32 of the 34 remaining games Thad missed. How can someone be a main contributor to a team he didn't play even half the season for? Or 6 games over half? Hummel and Hamilton played more games than Martin.

Lavine
Wiggins
Bud
AB
Dieng

Who's coaching that team to more than 16 wins when 4/5 of them are second year players or younger? We essentially played an NBA season with a summer league squad and Bud as the most available guys to put on the court in an 82 game season.

[Carlos Danger]

Flip is GM and Coach. He assembled the roster. He decided the roster moves when guys went down. He coached the team. He has accountability for the third worst performance in Franchise History. End of story. And to add a little more perspective...Flip's coaching record over his last three seasons: 41 wins and 140 losses for a .227 winning percentage. Kurt Rambis career coaching record? 56 wins and 145 losses for a .279 winning percentage. I'm sorry, but I cannot understand how anyone can say Flip has zero room for improvement and and nothing that happened last year was his fault. I doubt even Flip himself would say such a thing.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

Flip is GM and Coach. He assembled the roster. He decided the roster moves when guys went down. He coached the team. He has accountability for the third worst performance in Franchise History. End of story. And to add a little more perspective...Flip's coaching record over his last three seasons: 41 wins and 140 losses for a .227 winning percentage. Kurt Rambis career coaching record? 56 wins and 145 losses for a .279 winning percentage. I'm sorry, but I cannot understand how anyone can say Flip has zero room for improvement and and nothing that happened last year was his fault. I doubt even Flip himself would say such a thing.

You're making all of these judgments on the assumption he coached and GM'd the team to win every game last year. He didn't. He tanked for the number 1 pick and he got it. 16 wins is a fake number because it wasn't attained while trying his hardest to win games. You don't trade Brewer, Mo and Thad away for KG and scraps if you are trying to win every game. Flip the GM basically rid the roster of most of it's talent because he knew Flip the coach would always try to coach guys up to win. He made sure he couldn't win while giving himself a chance to build something moving forward so we could get a guaranteed top 4 pick. Mission accomplished. I think you're way too hung up on the 16 wins like that was our organization 100% going all in to win and we ended up with that. That's just not the case. He had the most injured team in the league so he changed course and accomplished his goal of being the worst. As an organization, we weren't trying to win and in the NBA when you do that, 9/10 teams will take the free win and that's how you end up with 16 wins.

[Carlos Danger]

Flip is GM and Coach. He assembled the roster. He decided the roster moves when guys went down. He coached the team. He has accountability for the third worst performance in Franchise History. End of story. And to add a little more perspective...Flip's coaching record over his last three seasons: 41 wins and 140 losses for a .227 winning percentage. Kurt Rambis career coaching record? 56 wins and 145 losses for a .279 winning percentage. I'm sorry, but I cannot understand how anyone can say Flip has zero room for improvement and and nothing that happened last year was his fault. I doubt even Flip himself would say such a thing.

You're making all of these judgments on the assumption he coached and GM'd the team to win every game last year. He didn't. He tanked for the number 1 pick and he got it. 16 wins is a fake number because it wasn't attained while trying his hardest to win games. You don't trade Brewer, Mo and Thad away for KG and scraps if you are trying to win every game. Flip the GM basically rid the roster of most of it's talent because he knew Flip the coach would always try to coach guys up to win. He made sure he couldn't win while giving himself a chance to build something moving forward so we could get a guaranteed top 4 pick. Mission accomplished. I think you're way too hung up on the 16 wins like that was our organization 100% going all in to win and we ended up with that. That's just not the case. He had the most injured team in the league so he changed course and accomplished his goal of being the worst. As an organization, we weren't trying to win and in the NBA when you do that, 9/10 teams will take the free win and that's how you end up with 16 wins.

It's good to have goals and accomplish them! :-)

[JasonIsDaMan [enjin:7981157]]

First of all, Phenom: Nationwide is on your side...until you work for them, then not so much.

Abe, Alex, Q: Some things have to happen. Flip has to sit him down and tell him that he can get his name announced and do the chalk thing, but he will only be playing 20-24 minutes a game. Those minutes have to come at the 5, which means Dieng can spend more time at the 4, so it is better for everyone involved. And he has to change his mindset so he is conserving his energy during pregame/lay-up-lines instead of looking like a 5 year old hopped up on Redbull while waiting in line for Space Mountain.

Wolves management, and some of their fans, have to change their thinking. There is a scenario where, if Flip manages the minutes of his top 10 to 13 players, and therefore managing their health/matchups/mistakes, this team can will 45 games.

The thing I hate about what BSPN did is they just picked a number out of the air. 24. And not the good one with Dennis Haysbert.

Lets try this: The Wolves, whether they were trying the whole time or not, were a minus 8.8 with 16 wins. We know OKC was trying, and they were plus 2.2 with 45 wins. KD being injured isn't the point. They were trying, and that was the result. Is there no scenario of health/talent/matchups that has MIN improving by 11 points a game? I say there absolutely is.

1. BlondeRicky has to play half or more of the PG minutes. The rest can be split up amongst Miller, Jones and Lavine, but B/R has to have as many or more than the other 3 combined.
2. The wings should be treated as two combos. Bjellica and Bazz should play together to force the other team's SG to guard Bazz, and Bazz KILLS "2"s. Kmart and Wiggins should play together because Wiggins SF splits are better than his SG splits (I have no idea why). Lavine and Prince can mop up and/or play when injuries occur. (GM BIll Duffy has done a great job. Bazz looks like a modern-day Adrian Dantley, Lavine looks like he could be one of the 5 best from the '14 draft, and only giving up Love to get Wiggins was a masterstroke. My compliments. We'll see if passing on Flip-favorite Okafor turns out to be as wise.)
3. The majority of Dieng's minutes should be at the 4.
4. The majority of KG's minutes should be at the 5.
5. I would like to see KAT at the four over Bennett/Payne after Pek gets back.
6. If MIN has injuries in the post, like the first few weeks with Pek, then Bennett and Payne HAVE to make some sort of improvement/leap, assuming they are both still here.
7. Last but not least, they are a long team, capable of crushing the will of "smallball" lineups with post-ups, and they have to do that, rather than settling for midrange jumpers.