Hollinger's pre-season Wolves analysis

[FNG]

https://theathletic.com/2863490/2021/10/07/hollingers-2021-22-minnesota-timberwolves-preview-lineup-roster-prediction-can-they-find-two-starting-forwards/?source=dailyemail&campaign=601983

I found little to disagree with in Hollinger's article in the Athletic this morning. He summarizes perfectly both the promise and likely poor upcoming season for our beloved Wolves, and ends up close to my forecast at 36 wins. He's clearly high on KAT and Ant, as almost all of us here are, and is also intrigued by some of our young pieces like Jaden, Vando and Naz. But I think he and I would agree that Dlo is the wild card for this team's prospects. It's actually shocking how lowly he values him using his own metrics of VORP/100 and BORD$...as a max player, he needs to have much more value than names like Beverley and Okogie, but those are the two guys Hollinger values closest to Dlo. And that, I think, summarizes both the problem and promise of this franchise, and it's all about Dlo. If he plays like he has in the first 6 years of his career and Hollinger's measurements are reasonable (personally, I see a huge gap between Josh and D'Angelo, but I find it telling that an analyst like Hollinger does not), we're doomed to another season far out of the playoffs. But if he can consistently play like he did Monday night against the Pelicans G League team, maybe...just maybe...this team challenges for the playoffs. I know that oversimplifies things, but I continue to think this season is mostly about Russell.

I note how Hollinger dismisses the Wolves 12-13 record the final 25 games of the season by saying "the Wolves did the opposite of every other bad team by trying to win the last month of the season". I've long thought the final quarter of the NBA season is by far the least important in evaluating a team. Sure, some teams are playing hard as they try to improve their playoff position or even qualify for the playoffs. But the majority of the league is not playing hard...the teams at the top are looking ahead and often resting stars and coasting, and the bottom feeders are doing everything they can to add ping pong balls. Wins against these teams need to be discounted. A few years ago smart NBA friends of mine argued that Sam Mitchell was a good coach because of the Wolves record in the final month of the season. I always liked Mitchell as a guy, but didn't think he was a suitable NBA coach, and I saw the last quarter of the season to not be a true indication of Mitchell's coaching ability. Unfortunately I see the last quarter of last season in the same light. Man, it was fun to see us actually win some games, but we need to understand that many of the teams we were playing were not 100% invested in winning while we were.

Anyway, I'm interested in what others think about Hollinger's Athletic evaluation of our Wolves.

[Coolbreeze44]

I like to say, show me in November and December what you're all about. I don't care about how you perform when we're long eliminated from the playoffs.

[Lipoli390]

I've never thought much of Hollinger. How long did he last in the Grizzlies' front office? I think he's a blow-hard who came up with a meaningless metric. Consider the following sentence about Vanderbilt from his article: "Wandering around the boards looking for second shots, booking down the floor in transition and generally providing energy around three talented but times sluggish stars, his fit at the four seems less datable. In his case, it's just the overall question of whether he's good enough to start on a good team." I think Hollinger meant to include the preposition, "at." As for the "[at] times" sluggish stars, I assume he's referring to KAT and DLO. That's fair. But who is the 3rd sometimes sluggish star? Ant?, McDaniels? Beasley? Sorry, none of those is fairly characterized as sluggish. But those are all minor details. What on earth does Hollinger mean by "less datable" in reference to Vanderbilt? I guess he means he's not as out of place as a non-shooter because he has shooters around him. I guess. As for the Wolves' late-season success, not every team the Wolves played during that time frame was disinterested or trying to lose.

OK, now that I've expressed my view of Hollinger, I'll move on to say that his analysis in this article wasn't bad. I certainly agree with his assessment of DLO's play not being on par with his max salary; however, I think he focuses to much on that incongruity. The more important question is what DLO potentially contributes to the team. I can see DLO as a significantly positive contributor if he stays healthy. The good news is that, with Edwards in the fold, DLO doesn't have to be our #2. In other words, DLO doesn't have to play at a max-salary level to help the Wolves. My biggest issue with acquiring DLO initially, other than his salary and what we gave up to get him, was the extent to which we'd have to rely on him as our #2. In that role, he was more of a liability because he's not good enough for that role. Having Edwards dramatically changes DLO's role and puts him in a better position to positively contribute. Moreover, having Beverley and McDaniels can help cover for DLO's defensive weaknesses.

As much as it pains me, I'll admit that 36 wins is a reasonable prediction. But I think Hollinger undersells the Wolves potential to be significantly better this season. Hollinger's analysis is OK, but it's shallow and misplaced in some respects. Interestingly, he leaves out the Wolves biggest vulnerabilities, namely defense and rebounding. Those are the team's most glaring weakness in my view. I think the organization has taken some important steps to improve the defense with the acquisitions of Beverley and Prince. Those two additions, along with the maturation of McDaniels and a bigger role for Vanderbilt, will improve the team's defense. I expect Edwards to be better defensively as well. But it's the rebounding that concerns me the most. if the Wolves don't break the 40-win barrier, poor rebounding will likely be the main reason why.

[FNG]

Lip, I also scratched my head when he mentioned 3 sluggish stars, but I think he was referring to Ant who at times seemed sluggish to me on defense last season. Beasley is never sluggish on defense in my opinion, ust ineffective. I keep saying that the key to this season is if Dlo can play like a max player, but I would put improvement in Ant on defense as the second biggest key (I don't hold out much hope for rebounding improvement, so I don't include that as a key). The optimistic take on the Wolves is that both my keys...consistent 2-way play from Dlo and a big step forward on defense by Ant...seemed quite positive in our first game on Monday. Will it continue on Friday? If so, I'll be feeling much better about this club.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

I wonder if John Hollinger even looked at the schedule and/or box scores of some of the teams that Minnesota beat in the final 22-game stretch. They won 11 of those games with wins against Sacramento (twice), Chicago, Miami, Utah (twice), Houston, Golden State, Orlando, Detroit, and Dallas. Note that six of those wins were against teams actively trying to win to either make the playoffs or solidify home-court advantage.

I'm not saying that 22-game stretch is the evidence needed to say that Minnesota's on the fast track to becoming a contender, but to act like they were gifted those wins or that they weren't the slightest bit eye-opening -- especially beating Utah in back-to-back games and then followed by Golden State days later -- as to what the talent the Wolves have is capable of would be foolish. Hollinger lazily cast that aside as if it had zero meaning when in reality it was really the only time the Wolves' core played together. It was a glimpse into the near future. Those guys are good.

[BloopOracle]

He has had a vendetta against the Wolves for years now, I can't remember what happened but it was documented incident on social media that caused him to be super salty towards us ever since.

[AbeVigodaLive]

1. How was Hollinger dismissive when mentioning the team's record at the end of the season? He simply said they weren't tanking. That's a good thing! And he never brought up the quality/intent of the team's opponents. In fact, he mentions that the late-season stretch helped quell criticism over the Finch hiring... implying that the team was improving. I don't think he deserves criticism for any of that.

2. There were, as Lip noted, two or three instances where a word seemed to be missing. That's as much on the writer as the editor. But a bad look for such a prominent publication nonetheless.

3. Anthony Edwards was indeed sluggish defensively last season. And by his analysis, it seems clear that the team's three stars are Towns, Edwards and Russell. Heck, we used to post gifs last season to laugh at just how "sluggish/lazy/indifferent" all three were on defense last season. So I think he's mostly accurate in that assessment.

4. Yes. We're still relying on an up-to-now underwhelming D. Russell to either make/break this season. Unless he changed drastically overnight... along with others defensively... I think Hollinger is pretty damn close with his 36-win prediction.




[Note: Wait... how many wins did I predict again?]

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Can somebody tell me what happened the last time D'Angelo Russell stayed healthy for a season? I must have missed it. :)

Say what you want about the guy, and the health concerns are annoyingly real, but if he plays 70-plus games this team is going to be over .500 for the year. I hope we can revisit some of these things after the year is over and be a happy message board for once.

[FNG]

1. How was Hollinger dismissive when mentioning the team's record at the end of the season? He simply said they weren't tanking. That's a good thing! And he never brought up the quality/intent of the team's opponents. In fact, he mentions that the late-season stretch helped quell criticism over the Finch hiring... implying that the team was improving. I don't think he deserves criticism for any of that.

2. There were, as Lip noted, two or three instances where a word seemed to be missing. That's as much on the writer as the editor. But a bad look for such a prominent publication nonetheless.

3. Anthony Edwards was indeed sluggish defensively last season. And by his analysis, it seems clear that the team's three stars are Towns, Edwards and Russell. Heck, we used to post gifs last season to laugh at just how "sluggish/lazy/indifferent" all three were on defense last season. So I think he's mostly accurate in that assessment.

4. Yes. We're still relying on an up-to-now underwhelming D. Russell to either make/break this season. Unless he changed drastically overnight... along with others defensively... I think Hollinger is pretty damn close with his 36-win prediction.




[Note: Wait... how many wins did I predict again?]

I don't know if anyone here has on off-board relationship with Abe, but I'm curious. Has anyone ever seen Hollinger and him together at the same time?

It's an odd feeling for me, because I usually put little faith in a veteran player (and yes, 7th season is a veteran player) changing dramatically overnight, but a whole lot of me sees Dlo as a different kind of cat. He's mercurial in many ways, and there are a lot of things I like about him personally. I really started to warm to him in some of the games I attended late last season. If a player was going to change in his 7th year, I would have Dlo in my top 10% of likely candidates. There's a chance that Monday night was not fool's gold.

Can't believe I just said that. But I guess I put more faith in Dlo improving his focus and 2-way effort on the court than I do in his chances of playing 60+ games this season. Just my gut feel.

[AbeVigodaLive]

1. How was Hollinger dismissive when mentioning the team's record at the end of the season? He simply said they weren't tanking. That's a good thing! And he never brought up the quality/intent of the team's opponents. In fact, he mentions that the late-season stretch helped quell criticism over the Finch hiring... implying that the team was improving. I don't think he deserves criticism for any of that.

2. There were, as Lip noted, two or three instances where a word seemed to be missing. That's as much on the writer as the editor. But a bad look for such a prominent publication nonetheless.

3. Anthony Edwards was indeed sluggish defensively last season. And by his analysis, it seems clear that the team's three stars are Towns, Edwards and Russell. Heck, we used to post gifs last season to laugh at just how "sluggish/lazy/indifferent" all three were on defense last season. So I think he's mostly accurate in that assessment.

4. Yes. We're still relying on an up-to-now underwhelming D. Russell to either make/break this season. Unless he changed drastically overnight... along with others defensively... I think Hollinger is pretty damn close with his 36-win prediction.




[Note: Wait... how many wins did I predict again?]

I don't know if anyone here has on off-board relationship with Abe, but I'm curious. Has anyone ever seen Hollinger and him together at the same time?

It's an odd feeling for me, because I usually put little faith in a veteran player (and yes, 7th season is a veteran player) changing dramatically overnight, but a whole lot of me sees Dlo as a different kind of cat. He's mercurial in many ways, and there are a lot of things I like about him personally. I really started to warm to him in some of the games I attended late last season. If a player was going to change in his 7th year, I would have Dlo in my top 10% of likely candidates. There's a chance that Monday night was not fool's gold.

Can't believe I just said that. But I guess I put more faith in Dlo improving his focus and 2-way effort on the court than I do in his chances of playing 60+ games this season. Just my gut feel.

I have better hair than Hollinger.