Game Report - Wolves v. Suns

[Lipoli390]

I'll keep this one short. The Suns out-hustled the Wolves. Too much ball-watching by all the Wolves players except Bell, Culver and KAT. You might not have noticed it on TV, but it was readily apparent live. In addition into too much ball-watching, there was way too much Teague tonight. You have to see the games live to notice how often he fails to hit teammates in optimal positions for shots. He either doesn't see them or ignores them looking for his own shot. His assist numbers are generally inflated beyond his contribution because he ends he's generally the last player to touch the ball before the shooter gets it. You won't see many hockey assists from Teague. As usual, there was less ball movement and off-the-ball player movement when Teague was on the floor.

Culver's perimeter shot remains broken, but he put his talent and high basketball IQ on display again tonight in spurts. I'm really excited to watch his development. Bell provided the Wolves with great energy off the bench. If his teammates had brought that much energy to the floor, the Wolves would have won tonight. Towns was terrific as evidenced by his stats. Also a terrific game from KBD as he hit a career high in points. He showed his long-range touch, but also displayed his skill getting to the basket and finishing. He and Culver made some nice cuts off the ball.

The Wolves really missed Okogie's defense as well as Covington's.

Wiggins was OK tonight. But watching him tonight convinced me the Wolves should look hard to trade him now if they can get decent value. I saw too many flashes of the old Wiggins - poor ball-handling, bad decision-making, matador defense and too much ball-watching. I'm afraid he'll start to regress again and I think now is the time to sell - while his price may be higher due to his good play so far this season.

Like any home loss to a beatable team, this loss was disappointing. But I like what I saw from some our our younger guys - Culver, KBD, Bell and even Nowell. To me, that's what matters the most. Seeing our young talent and giving them a chance to develop around KAT. We look like a .500 team, which is better than I thought we'd be. So I'm satisfied that we're competitive in just about every game and giving the young guys a chance to develop and be evaluated.

[crazy-canuck [enjin:18955461]]

Wiggs looks different because his role has changed with teague being back.

How many times did we do kat wiggs high pnr? 1? 2? I know at least one time they did try, teague stepped in between them for some reason.

He did stay in the corner alot this game, but so did every wing watching and trying to figure out what teague was going to do.

Wiggs on the ball is very different than wiggs off the ball, everyone knows this.

Lastly, i dont know what he did, but the refs are clearly targetting him. He was doing great on booker including 2 blks until the cheap fouls started mounting. I dont know what you saw regarding his defense because he was not a matador. He was our best perimeter defender tonight.

The one thing he sucks at is shooting fts. I have no idea whats going on.

I know people here love teague, but he drives me nuts. His defense is becoming lavineesque where he wont even bother contesting. And yes his assists are inflated.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

The #1 problem with Teague (and Wiggins, although less so this season) is that you either get the engaged/aggressive version or you get the indecisive/laid back version. The indecisive/laid back version dribbles the ball too much and doesn't defend. The aggressive/engaged one takes it hard to the hoop, pulls the trigger on open 3s, and fights over screens. He's even capable of carrying the team for stretches.

I think this is why a lot of fans (not all obviously) preferred Rubio. At the end of the day, Rubio may have not been any more or less effective than Teague, but at least you knew he was bringing it night in and night out. There was never a question of his engagement or effort.

[kekgeek]

Thanks for the report Lip.

I got a question was the spacing as terrible as it was on TV and how much Jim P talked about it.

He was saying Wiggins was having more trouble because us playing 2 bigs the lane was clogged and made Wiggins job a lot harder

[thedoper]

I think this game was completely lost with the 3 ball. 12-42. Teague, KAT, and Wiggins got Saunders the open shots he wanted but no one beyond KAT can hit them consistently against this team. Culver might look impressive running around out there but he's still a total liability in terms of winning games. I really think this was a system loss.

[Monster]

Wiggins wasn't perfect but he was pretty good in this game as a 2 way player. His defense was still good even though he had to play through foul trouble on at least 2 terrible calls.

Teague could have had like 15 assists in this game. There was a bunch of times he drove the lane threw the ball to A wide open player and they didn't make it. I'm not saying Teague was good in this game but he is driving and setting up guys quite a bit.

Best part of this game was KBD. Dude looks like he can play maybe even if he doesn't shoot the 3 well. He changes speed AND has a lot of length to be able to finish in the paint. I think he looks better shooting the 3 also. We might have one of those solid 2 way players every team is looking for.

Also nice game for a Jordon Bell he gave the team a shot in the arm.

Nowell looked plenty big out there but the Suns play a lot of undersized wing players except Obre.

Martin struggled to hit shots in this game and fouled a 3 point shooter. We are still good at doing that. Lol

[Coolbreeze44]

Teague needs to come off the bench. We can't have Wig standing in the corner while Jeff whittles the shot clock down with his over dribbling. When Teague was playing with the 2nd unit the team was playing its best basketball. One way to get KAT more looks is to take Teague off the court.

[Lipoli390]

Kekgeek - Yes, the spacing was terrible. But I wouldn't attribute the lack of driving lanes to having 2 bigs in the floor. It was more a result of the Suns' zone defense and the lack of credible 3-point shooters other than KAT. The problem with Wiggins was that he attempted dribble penetration too often without driving lanes.

Doper - I wouldn't call this a system loss. But that's just semantics because I agree with you that the lack of good 3-point shooters other than on this team was a major reason for last night's loss. As for Culver, his perimeter shooting remained terrible last night, but I like his skills and basketball IQ a lot. He's much quicker and more athletic than I thought when we drafted him and, therefore, has a much higher upside than I suspected. I wouldn't call him a "total liability." He makes good decisions and keeps the ball moving. He cuts well off the ball and has a good 2-point field goal percentage.

Monster - Watching the replay, I think Wiggins looked better on TV than in person last night. But don't get me wrong, I thought Wiggins was good overall last night. My point was that I saw enough of his weaknesses last night to convince me we should look to trade him now while he's playing well in the hope that we can get better value. I fear we'll get if we wait because I fear he'll regress. As for last night's game, I don't put the blame on Wiggins at all. I saw him as a net positive last night.

Cool - I agree completely that Teague should be coming of the bench. He's a terrible fit with KAT and Wiggins on the floor because of how he stifles ball movement and the flow of the offense.

[Monster]

Lip thanks for clarifying on your thoughts on Wiggins. Let me ask you this what does selling high on Wiggins really look like? What timeline/s are you looking it when it comes to dealing him? You don't have to rack your brain or the Gupta trade machine if you want to just what kind of asset/s you would be getting back. I'm genuinely curious what you are thinking. Honestly...I'm starting to believe Wiggins could be a positive player for this team at a higher level than I was even thinking a few weeks ago. I'm not suggesting he is untouchable but...I also think if some people here are even starting to believe and even myself...there are probably some other teams that are starting to wonder if they believe too. I think The Wolves need to be blown away by an offer otherwise all this goodwill/family thing they have will seem a bit hollow. Plus as I have said before I think Towns believes and likes Wiggins. Curious to hear your thoughts.

If you watched the broadcast you probably heard Jim Peterson harp on the bad spacing from very early on. It was bad at times because guys were not spacing out. Some of tyhat had to do with playing more bigs. It certainly gave more appreciation for Covington playing the 4. I am not saying thats an iron clad reason for him to play there but just saying. The spacing to me was a combo plateer of playing more bigs, playing less experienced players and teams maybe doing some things as you suggested.

Also one thing i didn't say in any other threads...as a guy that likes Saric he didn't do anything in this game that really made me wish he was still here. I still think he is a good NBA player but...how good?

[Lipoli390]

Monster -

Regarding Wiggins, good question about what selling high on Wiggins really looks like. Honestly, I don't know. My sense is that his value is significantly higher now than it was before this season started based on his consistently high quality play so far this season. But his starting point before the season was really low as we all know, so I'm not sure what we could get for him. Before the season, I think we would have had to give up a future 2nd round draft pick to get a team to take on Wiggins' contract (absorbing it or swapping a shorter-term contract). Now I think we could swap him for a shorter term smaller contract and actually get a lottery protected 1st roundpick in return. I could see a team like Charlotte swapping Batum and a future top 10 protected 1st for Wiggins right now. Of course, I could be way off. My timeline is ASAP before he regresses. Having said all that, I'm not totally dismissing the possibility that he's turned some corner and that what we've seen from him this season so far is permanent. I'll go further and mention that watching him complain the the refs a lot last night about the bad calls against him was a sign that he's a different player than he's been. Talking to the guy who sits in front of me last night, we couldn't recall the last time we saw Wiggins complain to officials. Our take was that it shows he cares. And with Wiggins that's more than half the battle.

I think Jim was correct about the bad spacing and I agree with your combo platter assessment. But the lack of ball movement and player movement were as bad as the poor spacing.