Minnesota Sports Forum

Q12543 wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:I'm not saying he had any better options, but it was great to see Flip stay with Wiggins on Johnson tonight. JJ got his points, but Drew made him work for them. And I think he eventually wore him out, and Johnson missed a couple at the end. Really fun matchup to watch!

I actually think Young would have been an option, with Wiggins switching to Garnett, who is no longer much of a post-up threat. Young has a bit more muscle and weight to go along with pretty decent quickness. However, it's hard to fault Flip for sticking with Wiggins. He's grooming him to be our wing stopper, so it's baptism by fire.

I thought about that too, q. But I couldn't really fault Wiggins for his defense, in fact I thought his footwork was extraordinary. Johnson was just better. Hopefully the vets are telling Wiggins that JJ would have been getting those 4th quarter points on anybody in the league tonight...he was that locked in.

Yeah, I'm cool with Flip sticking with Wiggins as our wing stopper. Man, to be given that assignment as a 19-year old rookie is pretty incredible. You can see how he takes far less gambles and reaches than Brewer and that he's already stronger. He just needs time on task.

One thing I noticed coming out of one of the timeouts in the final minute was Sam Mitchell trying to fire Wiggins up. They really want him to assert himself more and play with confidence.

Ha, I noticed the same thing with Mitchell. After one timeout, he slapped him on the back so hard that Wiggins staggered a little bit. It was a treat to watch Drew go head to head with a vet like JJ.

I was thrilled with the way AW played JJ tonight. Guys get hot during a game, but overall he didn't let him go off. Our 19 year old rookie posted 17pts on 12 shots, and gave up 22pts on 17 shots to one of the best SG's in the league. I will take that every time we play them.

I agree that Mo seemed to have limited options, but he was too quick to shoot tonight. I'm not sure why Shabazz didnt' get any minutes in the second half. We needed some scoring, and that seems like what he does well. I would have liked to see Flip throw Zach out there for Brewer as well. I have a feeling that will happen more than a couple times as we get later into the month. It looks like Brewer may play himself out of minutes. When you take away his leaking outlet, there isn't much left to his game.

Still worried about the long 2's we see Bennett, and to some extent Young taking. They both took contested shots from 20 feet with plenty of shot clock left. At least wait until the shot is open before launching them. Would really like to see them get Bennett playing closer to the hoop. He seems to get up so fast that it would be a nice dump off option. Probably need to get him minutes with RIcky to take full advantage though.

This game really made me feel good about the present and especially the future of the team. I know its one game but we saw in this game the improvement of rubio as a player, shooter and leader as well as the potential of wiggins.

The first five won us the game and it was a total team effort. Every player contributed. We dont have that take charge guy yet but Im confident wiggins can be that guy down the road. We see that he can get off his shot easily due to his superior athletic ability and his quickness. He needs to work on his ball handling and continue to be a consistent shooter as he has shown and he could really be something special.

The kid is fun to watch. He may score only 8pts in a game but you will remember them because he made them look great and easy at the same time. Its hard to explain but thats the impression he gave me so far. Still waiting for his first throwdown dunk of his nba career.

Love watching young play as well. You can see why they say he is a pro and class act. Will find ways to contribute every game. Rubio, young and wiggins really makes the team fun to watch. We still have lavine on the bench and AB still developing. Its fun to watch the wolves.

Yeah, nothing Wiggins could do about that stretch. Played him as well as he could. Couple times it just game down to Joe being too damn big for Andrew.

Here's a thought: Despite the differences in body thickness, I think Joe Johnson has a game Wiggins could use to support his own. Post games pretty similar. Shoot over both shoulders. Step back Js are in their comfort zones. Good touch with their right hands, floaters. Neither have terrific handles, but Joe's gets him where needs to be even without much shake. And of course the spot up jumpers. I think that's a level Wiggins can get to. Forget T-Mac projections. If he has Joe's offense in him I'd be thrilled, and I think he can get there.

Cam, I agree that joe's offensive game could be someone wiggins can be like in the future. I do dis agree that joe doesnt have terrific handles. He is a terrific ball handler for a wing and a good playmaker as well. If wiggins can improve his ball handling to joe's level then he will be really good with his superior athletic ability.

Through five games of the 2014-15 NBA season, Ricky Rubio's numbers look like: 12.4 ppg, 9.8 apg, 5.4 rpg, 1.6 spg, 46.4% FG in 31.4 mpg.

That's All-Star/MIP award worthy if he can sustain it, and I think he can. Ricky's starting to blossom under Flip, and his teammates finally fit with his strengths.

Those buckets in tonight's 4th quarter made me smile. A catch and shoot baseline jumper that he cashed in with confidence. The other was a drive left that he finished with his right hand while taking contact. That play especially got me pumped up. I hope it's not too early to say this, but Ricky can score.

I'm trying not to get too excited about Rubio's jumper, but its almost night and day different than what I've seen before this year. Kudos to him being willing to change it up that much and toe Penberthy to have the guts to change it and be a success at helping Rubio do it so far.

I'll point out that one reason the Wolves bench may look so bad in plus minus is that Jack and Tele were pretty terrific and Plum and Anderson were very solid.

I thought there were some possessions Wiggins was terrific on JJ. Great D but better O. JJ used him a couple times, but Wiggins was pretty solid. I would have liked to see Bazz play on JJ a bit more and just more in general, but I think Flip stuck with the starters and threw Brewer out there as well. Brew had one deflection later in the game that was key and while I get people are frustrated with him I don't think he was as bad tonight as people are thinking. I'll say this though Bazz could play his way into a Brewer role if he can be better as a defender. Both are energy guys that are gonna give you everything they have but they have very different strengths. I can see Lavine taking minutes from Brewer as well. Really though if you have guys off the bench that are better than Brewer you have a pretty good team.

I was also earlier thinking that Wiggins offensive game could develop similar way than Joe Johnson's has. Their 1st year college stats were quite similar (Johnson slightly better 3-point shooter but Wiggins getting the line more frequently) and it seems that Johnson didn't have that good handle in the beginning of his career. If Wiggins can develop similar offensive game than Johnson, he will be big time scorer in this league since he is athletically superior compared to Johnson.