Some fun offense Team/individual Stats

[thedoper]

We all can guess how bad we have been between halves. I personally think the youth factor and not fatigue is the explanation for this. I see us making mental errors when the pressure of the game ramps up and then these mental errors compound.

Our defensive efficiency is 11th in the league in the 1st half, then dead last in the second half. Our offensive rating is 6th in the first half, and 25th in the second half.

In the first half we shoot the 6th best FG% in the league at 48% with the 3rd fewest 3 point attempts. In the 2nd half we shoot the 26th best 42% FG attempting 30% more 3s.

Individual player eFG% by half for our big three top usage guys.

1st Half: Zach 59.7% WOW!!
Towns 55.4%
Wiggins 50.5%

2nd Half: Zach 52.1 Still pretty good
TOwns 45.7
Wiggins 45.7

Interesting bit on 4th quarter, we're the 4th worst Net rating in the 4th quarter.

Individual eFG% of our players in the 4th.
Wiggins 52.7
Zach 46.2
Towns 42.5

As I see it Towns seems to be the most fluctuating in terms of indivdual performance and becomes particularly dramatic in the 4th. I really see this as a youth issue. Likewise Zach has minor blips from his excellent offense in the 4th. Where Wiggins gets strangely more efficient.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

It's indicative of what we saw tonight. Amazing.

Here is something even more amazing. Our average point differential is -1.8. Every other Western Conference team with a losing record actually has a worse margin of victory than we do. We're in 8th place in the West based on this metric!

It's because we don't get blown out often, but lose every. single. close. game.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

We get it. You don't like Thibs. But it's seemingly EVERY post?

At least others accept that it's some combination of coaching + players. But it's like you're trying to forcefeed validation for being against Thibodeau last summer. We continuously point to very tangible things the players are doing to screw up. It's on video. Yet you ignore it every time for intangible things like "they must be tired"...

Yes. 5 starters are playing between 31.5 and 37.6 minutes.
Houston has 5 guys between 30.5 and 36.5.
Wash has 5 guys between 31.2 and 36.5.

SOMETIMES... SOMETIMES... losing 10 straight games decided by 4 points or less can be attributed to more than just fatigue. Besides, if such young guys are so destroyed with an extra minute of playing time as other "elite" players that they fall apart EVERY time... maybe it's time to reconsider if they're the type of players we want around.


[Note: Or do you want to blame this loss on a hard day of walkaround practices like you did a few weeks ago?]

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

We get it. You don't like Thibs. But it's seemingly EVERY post?

At least others accept that it's some combination of coaching + players. But it's like you're trying to forcefeed validation for being against Thibodeau last summer. We continuously point to very tangible things the players are doing to screw up. It's on video. Yet you ignore it every time for intangible things like "they must be tired"...

Yes. 5 starters are playing between 31.5 and 37.6 minutes.
Houston has 5 guys between 30.5 and 36.5.
Wash has 5 guys between 31.2 and 36.5.

SOMETIMES... SOMETIMES... losing 10 straight games decided by 4 points or less can be attributed to more than just fatigue. Besides, if such young guys are so destroyed with an extra minute of playing time as other "elite" players that they fall apart EVERY time... maybe it's time to reconsider if they're the type of players we want around.


[Note: Or do you want to blame this loss on a hard day of walkaround practices like you did a few weeks ago?]

I have never attributed our repeated collapses at the end of games to "just fatigue", abe. I agree that our players continue to make mind-boggling game-losing moves at the end of games, and like others, I find it interesting to discuss them. There are many reasons this team is underperforming. But I also want to look for solutions...WHY are they finding creative ways to lose late in games at a pace we didn't see last year? What's different between last March and the first half of this season? Don't we all want to know that?

So yes...as long as Thibs continues to make the same bad decisions every game without changing his approach, and as long as the alarming correlation between his refusal to play his bench anywhere near the league average and tired collapses in the 4th continues at a rate that cannot be ignored, I will continue to point out the correlation. And the great thing about message boards is we can choose to read what we want to read...I don't read Duke's posts because I seldom find any value in them, and if you think there is no correlation between Thibs' league-leading minutes and late-game disasters, you can ignore my posts about them...it's that easy, and saves you the time of having to respond to them. But I think the correlation is relevant, so as long as nights like the last two nights continue to happen, I will continue to point them out.

And no, I don't dislike Thibs at all...he seems like a likable guy who has had some regular season success in the past, and I want him to not fail as dramatically as he has here. And I don't disagree that the players are ultimately responsible for teams' losing games. But when a coach's approach is such an outlier
compared to the rest of the league, smart observers analyze whether it's a good thing or a bad thing. And to me, Thibs' way-out-of-line approach to players' minutes continues to look like a very bad thing.

Come on Abe, where's your curiosity? Aren't you just a little curious to see if our starters would play better at the end of games if Thibs used his bench like other coaches do?

[AbeVigodaLive]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

We get it. You don't like Thibs. But it's seemingly EVERY post?

At least others accept that it's some combination of coaching + players. But it's like you're trying to forcefeed validation for being against Thibodeau last summer. We continuously point to very tangible things the players are doing to screw up. It's on video. Yet you ignore it every time for intangible things like "they must be tired"...

Yes. 5 starters are playing between 31.5 and 37.6 minutes.
Houston has 5 guys between 30.5 and 36.5.
Wash has 5 guys between 31.2 and 36.5.

SOMETIMES... SOMETIMES... losing 10 straight games decided by 4 points or less can be attributed to more than just fatigue. Besides, if such young guys are so destroyed with an extra minute of playing time as other "elite" players that they fall apart EVERY time... maybe it's time to reconsider if they're the type of players we want around.


[Note: Or do you want to blame this loss on a hard day of walkaround practices like you did a few weeks ago?]

I have never attributed our repeated collapses at the end of games to "just fatigue", abe. I agree that our players continue to make mind-boggling game-losing moves at the end of games, and like others, I find it interesting to discuss them. There are many reasons this team is underperforming. But I also want to look for solutions...WHY are they finding creative ways to lose late in games at a pace we didn't see last year? What's different between last March and the first half of this season? Don't we all want to know that?

So yes...as long as Thibs continues to make the same bad decisions every game without changing his approach, and as long as the alarming correlation between his refusal to play his bench anywhere near the league average and tired collapses in the 4th continues at a rate that cannot be ignored, I will continue to point out the correlation. And the great thing about message boards is we can choose to read what we want to read...I don't read Duke's posts because I seldom find any value in them, and if you think there is no correlation between Thibs' league-leading minutes and late-game disasters, you can ignore my posts about them...it's that easy, and saves you the time of having to respond to them. But I think the correlation is relevant, so as long as nights like the last two nights continue to happen, I will continue to point them out.

And no, I don't dislike Thibs at all...he seems like a likable guy who has had some regular season success in the past, and I want him to not fail as dramatically as he has here. And I don't disagree that the players are ultimately responsible for teams' losing games. But when a coach's approach is such an outlier
compared to the rest of the league, smart observers analyze whether it's a good thing or a bad thing. And to me, Thibs' way-out-of-line approach to players' minutes continues to look like a very bad thing.

Come on Abe, where's your curiosity? Aren't you just a little curious to see if our starters would play better at the end of games if Thibs used his bench like other coaches do?

I think our bench sucks balls. But it's not like our starters are the answer in heavy minutes. I don't know the answer... that's just it. Nobody really does. But when post after post after post is one rallying cry on the same topic... meh. I get weary sometimes.

As for the Wolves futility in close losses:

They are now 0 - 10 in games decided by 4 points or less. That sounds absurd. Almost unprecedented. Oh oh... wait for it...

Just 3 years ago, the Wolves started 0 - 11 in games decided by 4 points or less. So I get the general frustration and the search for ANYTHING to explain the utter ineptness of this franchise.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

I don't have the answers either, abe...only statistical data and personal theories about what those stats mean. The first part is objective (our poor record, starters playing more minutes than any other team, 0-10 in close games), but my interpretation of the meaning of those stats is decidedly subjective and prone to bias...but to me the different theories about why bad things are happening is what makes this message board interesting. I get a little frustrated with the repeated "we're just young...give them time" mantra, especially because our guys seem to be playing "younger" than last year, but I try to keep an open mind about the viability of every theory thrown out here.

I don't agree that our reserves "suck balls" though, and the plus/minus numbers don't seem to support it either. The backups certainly aren't pretty and they cause me to tear my hair out sometimes, but they do seem to play defense with a higher degree of grit than our starters (and maybe smarts too) and as a result they are don't generally let the game get out of hand when they are playing. And their minutes in the court give a precious breather to the starters that we hope can eventually close out a game successfully.

I don't know...just a theory I'm going to continue to keep an eye on...

[MikkeMan]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

Let's look our players minutes during that 20 game stretch last year that so many people in this forum compares this season team.

Wiggins 36.1 -> this season 36.8 minutes
Towns 36.3 -> this season 35.6 minutes
Lavine 35.1 -> this season 37.4 minutes
Rubio 30.5 -> this season 31.5 minutes
Dieng 28.5 -> this season 32.9 minutes

So only Dieng and Lavine are playing clearly more minutes this season compared to that last season later streak that they had and Towns is actually playing less compared to that. I don't see that the amount of minutes would be causing any problems for our starters. Most of the teams that are playing their starters much less are anyway doing that only for saving them to post season.

[kekgeek]

Someone please post the bench minutes for the Wolves compared to the rest of the league...I'd be willing to bet that we have far and away the fewest bench MPG and it won't even be close. Thibs is a huge outlier here. But of course he's the smartest guy in the room, so it must be the rest of the coaches in the league that have it wrong...playing your starters way more minutes per game than your opponents is a sure-fire winning strategy.

Come on guys...tired players aren't going to be as effective as rested players at the end of games...it's that simple. This team has enormous talent, but they're not going to start winning until Thibs learns to work his rotations like other successful NBA coaches do. I'm sick of it.

Let's look our players minutes during that 20 game stretch last year that so many people in this forum compares this season team.

Wiggins 36.1 -> this season 36.8 minutes
Towns 36.3 -> this season 35.6 minutes
Lavine 35.1 -> this season 37.4 minutes
Rubio 30.5 -> this season 31.5 minutes
Dieng 28.5 -> this season 32.9 minutes

So only Dieng and Lavine are playing clearly more minutes this season compared to that last season later streak that they had and Towns is actually playing less compared to that. I don't see that the amount of minutes would be causing any problems for our starters. Most of the teams that are playing their starters much less are anyway doing that only for saving them to post season.

Your the best Mikkeman