The Rake Magazine

Tag: Jefferson

  • Wolves 2007-08 Season Recap, Part 1

    Note: I know I said I’d have a Wolves recap for you Monday, but with all the playoff ball consuming my time (not to mention other writing projects–my editors know what they are) I now realize I’m never going to get this done unless I break it into parts.

    So, here’s Part 1, which deals with what I wanted to hear from Kevin McHale at his season-ending press conference last week. (Please bear with the changes in typeface that may crop up because I cut and pasted some of the press conference transcription.) At least one other part will be an evaluation of each player on the roster: Both how I regard him and how I believe the Wolves’ front office regards him. Anyway, thanks for your patience. I’m also willing to kick around the playoffs, if anybody is interested, and will probably in the next couple of days set up an open thread with a bevy of impressions to get things rolling and see what happens. 

    When Timberwolves personnel veep Kevin McHale did his by-now traditional meeting with the media the day after the 2007-08 season to discuss the State of the Ballclub, his mood was decidedly more upbeat and the number of reporters he was addressing was much smaller than in recent years past. Part of the reason (for both) was that there was no buzz McHale was going to step down. The other part (again, for both) was that the bar of expectations had been set so low, especially for the immediate past and future of this ballclub.

    McHale sought to change that some with his dramatic proclamation that, barring significant injuries, the 2008-09 Wolves should improve by some 20 games, flirting with .500, if not a bottom-rung playoff spot in the ultra-competitive Western Conference. And how was this going to occur? Essentially by standing pat and letting the existing personnel get more familiar with each other.

    McHale said this two or three different ways, but just to be clear, I asked him, "Beyond the seasoning of existing personnel, what does this team need?" This is what he said:

    "It needs to come together and play. Everybody says ‘We’ve got to go and get somebody from the outside,’ [but] those guys have got to go in there and grow together as a team, establish themselves a little bit—Al has established himself—kind of, underneath that how are we going to play, our style of play, becomes more dedicated defensively in getting back; our transition defense needs a big step up. Defensively we have got to get tougher. So most of the growth I see is internally. Now in the draft we’ll get a good player in the draft, but with way it is set up we’ll get a 19, 20, 21 year old kid; if you are hanging your hopes on that coming into a man’s league….I would say that, overall, I would just say basically a little more shooting around Al, because he is going to get double-teamed and you have got to have court-spacers. But I thought Foye, when you had Foye and used Foye to enter the ball on the strong side and when you left him he made shots; that is a big part of it. Because I think Bassy was out trying [to distribute], not shooting a lot. Again I think shooting. But to me the biggest jump we are going to make is that group in there staying together and being confident."

    Asked point blank what *besides* seasoning is needed, McHale repeatedly invoked seasoning.

    There are two fundamental problems with this. Minnesota does not have a legitimate NBA center on its current roster capable of starting for a playoff contender. The other fundamental problem is that the Wolves have a glut of swingmen. You could argue–I do argue–that unless Randy Foye dramatically improves his court vision and attitude and Corey Brewer dramatic improves his strength and sinew, the team’s last three top draft picks are all best suited to play the off-guard position. And yet McHale specifically cites the two aspects of the game in which off-guards are thought to be most adept–transition defense and outside shooting–as the two largest areas where this ballclub needs to improve. 

    I understand where McHale is coming from. He’s not going to say this team needs a hardy, defensive oriented big man, because unless he’s going to reach for a player based on position more than talent in the draft, or overpay in free agency, there doesn’t look to be any way to address that weakness. By contrast, talking about the need for shooting and transition defense sets the to-do agenda for his swingman glut heading into next season. I’d have more sympathy for his hands being tied if he wasn’t the one spooling out the rope.

     

    But make no mistake: Minnesota will never be a viable playoff contender without a staunch big men to take the defensive pressure off the team’s two best players, Al Jefferson and Ryan Gomes. A steady diet of postseason games has reminded me what it takes to be an elite NBA team: A bonafide superstar, a demi-star, knowledgeable role players, and capable team defense. It is possible–not quite probable–that Jefferson is a budding superstar. Gomes is certainly a knowledgeable role player who can find a niche on most any ballclub. But put them on the court together at center and power forward and you cannot defend in a playoff-worthy manner.

     

    The numbers at 82games.com show that the Wolves allow a whopping 12.1 points per 48 minutes more when Jefferson is on the court (116 points per 48) than when he is off it (103.9 points per game). One reason for this is because opposing centers have an eFG% (which factors in three-pointers, not generally applicable to centers and power forwards) of 56.3%. By contrast, the power forwards Jefferson guarded had an eFG% of 40.3%. Unfortunately, the sample size for Jefferson at the 4 is woefully small, so we don’t know if that excellent D on eFG% would hold up; but we do know his inept defense in the pivot, where he played exponentially more minutes, overwhelms that performance. And we know that even a scorer as gifted as Big Al isn’t going to lead his team to many victories if that team is ceding 116 points per game.

     

    On to Ryan Gomes. Whereas Jefferson had a huge disparity between his minutes at center and those at power forward, Gomes, because he went to small forward not only when a center was slotted in beside Jefferson, but when Craig Smith or Antoine Walker entered the game, is shown to have played 26% of his team’s minutes at small forward and 34% of the Wolves’ time at power forward (meaning he was on the court approximately 60% of the time). Thus, his stats between the two positions are a little more reliable in comparison to each other. And again according to 82games.com, Gomes yielded an eFG% of 48.6% to the small forwards he guarded versus 54.7% to the power forwards he guarded. (His own eFG% was better at power forward–49.7% versus 48.5% at the 3–but not enough to overcome the disparity of his less effective D in the low block.)

     

    Fortunately, McHale understands this. When I asked him at last week’s press conference: "Are you comfortable, long term with Jefferson at center and Gomes at the 4?" here is what he said.

    "Well I don’t think, I think that Al is a 4-5, not a 5-4, and that Ryan is a power 3-4. Ryan gets more shots at the 4 because he can move around and all those big guys have that paint fixation. But he rebounds better at the 3, posts up better at the 3. They give you flexibility and that is a good thing. Do I want to see that 4-5 combination for 48 minutes? No. I would like to have another big guy for when Al plays the 4. Al has got to get better defensively. Randy Foye has got to get better defensively, Rashad McCants has got to get better defensively, Ryan Gomes, all those guys have to get better defensively. I like the versatility that they give you and again that is why I like bigger players that can do different things. To me Gomes may have scored more at that 4 spot, but to me he punished teams more when he was offensively rebounding and going into the post at the 3. I like that style of play. But he can play both."

     

    When I pointed out that the vast bulk of minutes wound up with Al playing center and Gomes playing power forward, McHale acknowledged: "For 25-30 games, yeah. And I thought we fell into that. They are both two-position players which are really good to have. [But] you don’t like Ryan Gomes, who works really hard, against Rasheed Wallace. What you really like him playing 4 is against Luis Scola who is sitting in the paint. But what I like is you can make one substitution and go huge or one substitution and go small."

     

    Compounding the problem is the fact that the Wolves play horrible perimeter defense, and have for as long as I can remember. It wasn’t quite as deadly when Kevin Garnett was the superstar in residence, and totally committed to the defensive end. (KG’s willpower slipped the last two seasons he was in Minnesota. I thought it was age until I saw him this season in Boston, reborn as a panther capable of hounding anyone from the three point arc to the low block.)

     

    The third and final question I asked McHale was: "For some reason perimeter defense has been a chronic defect of this franchise. Why has that happened?" His reply was: "It bothers me too. It bothered me for twelve years. For me it goes back to 7th grade basketball: If you can’t keep your man in front of you, I’m going to take you out. Don’t let him cut in front of you and keep your rear end between him and the rim. That’s as tricky as I like to make it and sometimes I think we scheme up so much we got so many schemes going on that we lose sight of that. We have got to get better at that, at containing the ball. The good teams in our league defensively contain the ball. They may have holes in other areas but they contain the ball…That is a definite, huge area of concern that we have got to work on."

    To me, that in a nutshell is why the Wolves only won 22 games this season: They played an undersized lineup where the center and power forward couldn;t effectively defend their counterpart, and they allowed perimeter players to penetrate into the paint almost at will.

  • The Three Pointer: Painless #60

    AP Photo by Carlos Osorio

    Game #81, Road Game #41: Minnesota 103, Detroit 115

    Season Record: 21-60

    1. One More Smallball Razzing

    Since this will probably be my last Wolves three-pointer of the year (I’ll either do a season evaluation and/or cover the team’s press conference later this week after tomorrow’s Milwaukee tilt), it’s appropriate that I jackhammer on the anti-smallball theme one more time, eh?

    Without being a conspiracy theorist, isn’t it odd that we finally got a long look at Jefferson-Gomes-Brewer-McCants-Foye the other night (a lineup one might think would be deployed on a more regular basis, given that it best reflects the five players this organization is probably most invested in right now) and tonight had not one but two stints where Al Jefferson and Chris Richard actually were allowed to play on the floor together? Now, granted, the first one was just 3:16 in the second period and the second only a tad longer at 3:33 in the fourth, which is hardly a large sample. But lo and behold, how did the Wolves and Jefferson fare in that combined 6:49?

    How about plus +9, factored out at plus +1 in the first half stint and plus +8 in the second half one. If you go plus +9 in 6:49 of a 12-point loss, that means the Wolves were a miserable minus -21 in the 41:11 Jefferson and Richard didn’t play together. Here’s another interesting stat: On a night when Jefferson labored hard to get his 30 points, shooting 12-26 FG, he was 4-5 FG during his time with Richard, and thus 8-21 FG without Richard. What makes this even more skewed is that Richard had a case of the dropsies tonight; he flubbed an easy slam opportunity on a pick and roll, frittered away a basic feed into the post, and couldn’t even retain possession of a rebounded free throw in the final period. Imagine Al Jefferson playing beside a center who could not only hang on to the rock a little bit, but stick a 12-footer just often enough to deter those double-teams. Imagine Ryan Gomes guarding Tayshaun Prince instead of Rasheed Wallace.

    2. The Foye-McCants Redundancy

    It is quite possible that Randy Foye and Rashad McCants can find a way to co-exist in the same backcourt, especially if they realize it is the only way they both get regular rotation minutes. But in a very fundamental way, they really do have a lot of overlap in their respective games. Neither one of them is really a point guard, in that point guards are working for a seamless blend and a synergistic ensemble above all else–they are the Anthony Hopkins or Gene Hackman of hoops, capable of greatness mostly in the context of their character role. Foye and Shaddy are more like Jack Nicholson, the shooting guard of actors, a guy who is essentially himself regardless of what role he plays, a guy who elevates the ensemble by being a shining star, not a blender.

    Everybody knows this about McCants, of course. Tonight he got up 17 shots (making 8, with 2-7 from 3pt range) in 30:30, and received a technical foul for banging into Rodney Stuckey heading back up the court after executing a spectacular dunk that facialed both Jason Maxiell and Amir Johnson in the 4th quarter. Foye is a little less obvious, especially if you just read his stat line in the box score instead of watching him operate an offense. Tonight, for example, he had an impressive 9/1 assist-to-turnover ratio. But what the stats don’t show is after he nailed a jumper midway through the first period for his initial points of the night, he waited three seconds on the team’s next possession to give himself a heat check and try to stick another. Later that same period, he stepped back and made a trey for his second bucket of the night. Eight seconds into the team’s very next offensive possession, he launched another trey–heat check #2 (both heat checks missed).

    On a slightly more macro level, Foye very much buys into his 4th quarter mythology. Tonight, he was 4-7 FG with 4 assists after three periods. But in the final 12 minutes, he launched as many shots as he had in the first three quarters (going 2-7 FG) and doled out even more assists (5, versus zero turnovers). In other words, Foye’s governance of the offense was much more pronounced in the 4th quarter, in ways that were both good and bad.

    There are worse things than two Jack Nicholsons, of course, and by that I mean that both Foye and McCants have undeniable talent. Er, offensive talent, anyway. Neither one seems to be able to play a lick of defense. Randy Wittman has loosened the reins a little bit these past couple weeks, which has certainly made the games more entertaining in the sense of showmanship and skill-rendering, but in the process the Wolves are yielding a whopping 112 points per game during the month of April, and it starts on the perimeter. Tonight, both Chauncey Billups and Ronnie Stuckey could get pretty much anywhere they wanted off the dribble, and Shaddy’s defense was equally porous and lackadaisical.

    Getting a quality point guard would be a boon for this ballclub in more ways than one. It would shake up the pecking order and compel both Foye and McCants to redefine their styles and priorities. It would also nice to see Jefferson, Foye and McCants all benefit from a slick passer with good court vision who, unlike Mr. Telfair, could keep opponents honest with an accurate jumper and/or an ability to finish at the hole as well.

    3. Snyder and Brewer Are Not Redundant

    The largest stylstic difference the past few games has been when Brewer and Snyder have subbed in for one another. Even as Snyder’s defense has become more sporadic, he has gotten to the rim off the dribble more consistently than any of the swingmen or back court players on the roster. Brewer, on the other hand, is thankfully concentrating on defense and rebounding once more and letting the shots come to him by accident–he was an efficient 4-5 FG in 24:46 tonight as a result.

    The biggest similarity between the two small forwards is they both are anxious to exploit opponents in transition and are much less effective when the pace is slow and the offense bogs down in the half court. On the odd chance that Snyder is still around next year, it might be good to see them playing together on a quintet that tries to play three-quarter court traps and just generally pressures the ball. Of course that’s best utilized when you have a shot-blocker to help clean up the gambles of pressing, which brings us back to square one (or at least point one) and the need for a pivot man to prevent small ball from becoming the fallback position.

  • The Three Pointer: Two Ugly

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by David Sherman/NBAE via Getty Images)

    Game #75, Road Game #37: Minnesota 88, Phoenix 117

    Game #76, Home Game #39: Memphis 113, Minnesota 101

    Season Record: 19-57

    1. Jefferson Finally Cracks

    The Timberwolves offered themselves and their fans a choice of embarrassing performances over the weekend: Which do you prefer, an annihilation so complete there was literally 38 minutes of garbage time (the Wolves trailed Phoenix 32-12 with 2:10 to play in the first) or being sluggish early and tepid late in order to drop an eminently winnable home game against one of the few opponents with inferior personnel (Sunday’s loss to Memphis)?

    The Phoenix blowout was the more sobering because it was the first time this season that Al Jefferson was plainly rattled. Even when he was getting lunched a half-dozen times by Samuel Dalembert back in ’07, Jefferson was indomitable and his aggression with respect to both wiles and willpower have been the signature virtue for this ballclub this entire season. So when Jefferson seemed so out of sync and disinclined to bull his way into the paint–and, not incidentally, Shaquille O’Neal–that he couldn’t even coordinate his footwork with his dribble, the Wolves were doomed, injured in the head as well as the heart.

    After torching Phoenix for monster games that keyed improbable Minnesota wins twice this season, it just flat-out looked like Jefferson didn’t want to be out there Friday night. After Sunday’s game, someone remarked to coach Randy Wittman that Jefferson only had one shot in the entire first half against Memphis, and Witt was quick to pounce, saying "That was Al, nothing but his doing." The coach added that the second half Sunday was the first time in awhile Jefferson "had been Al Jefferson," that what he had been doing before was "asking for the ball 15, 20 feet from the basket" and the Wolves weren’t going to reward that. Asked if fatigue was a factor, Wittman said yeah, it probably was, but that the guy Jefferson was replacing–KG was inferred, not mentioned outright–played all 82 most of the time. He added that he was proud Jefferson had played all 76 games for the Wolves this year and that it was important to finish strong.

    I sat next to Stephen Litel of Hoopsworld, who mentioned that Jefferson’s voice indicated he had the flu or something before the game. He mentioned some other things about their interview that were interesting and that I imagine he will publish soon if he hasn’t already.

    In any case, the daily beat writers have duly noted that Jefferson is in a bit of a slump, at least statistically, lately. He’s already exceeded his career highs in games and minutes-played by a fairly wide margin. I still think his defense has begun to improve, although it is hard to know against Phoenix because Amare Stoudamire is like a man unleashed since the Shaq acquisition–he’s not only going beserk on offense, but deigning to cover his man with some diligence lately. Today against Memphis, the large mobile swingmen, Mike Miller and Rudy Gay, were the tandem that thrashed the Wolves, neither of them Jefferson’s man on D.

    2. Wittman Still Barking; Are Players Listening?

    Last year, I disrespected Randy Wittman’s performance because he walked in declaring that he was going to hold players accountable and then called out some players directly (Trenton Hassell) and indirectly (Kevin Garnett and his locker room leadership) while Ricky Davis personified corrosive dysfunction and Mark Blount laid down like a dog without a public peep out of Witt in either case.

    This year, Wittman hasn’t been afraid to pull out the carrots or the sticks on any and every player on the roster, and the absence of a double-standard represents an improvement. In the past week or so, the coach has also seemed particularly caustic–and specific in both the nature of his criticism and the punishment. Against Memphis, he told Marko Jaric and Corey Brewer exactly why they were being yanked as they went to the bench, and didn’t mince words with Randy Foye either.

    But there’s a chicken-or-egg dynamic that needs to be addressed here. If I was coaching the team the past two games, I’d go batshit on them too, probably–but is all that haranguing precisely why the effort and grit have begun to wane as the meaningless games pile up in the spring? It’s a very subtle line, but the body language exhibited by the players as they’re being blistered is less deferential and respectful, and certainly more dismissive. It is way too dramatic to say that Witt is "losing the team," given that there literally isn’t that much to lose, quite frankly, and that it is hard to motivate any ballclub that owns less than 20 wins in April. But if the idea was to finish strong–for example, Wittman said he was disappointed because overcoming Memphis in the standings had become a late-season goal–well, that isn’t happening, and there’s only six left to play.

    3. Shaky Cornerstones and Robust Afterthought

    There are few things worse that Rashad McCants knowing that it is garbage time–the "I’ll get mine" shots rain down–but two of them are Al Jefferson and Randy Foye being the abysmal catalysts for that premature garbage. Jefferson we’ve already discussed. Foye followed up two dreadful defensive performances against Detroit and Utah with a totally disinterested and mentally casual game versus Phoenix. After he inexplicably launched a airball three pointer for no reason whatsoever with about 15 seconds on the clock Friday, Wittman almost had no choice but to give him a quick hook, and indeed, McCants climbed off the pine almost before that stupid shot hit the floor.

    The theory I’ve been toying with as for why Foye has regressed recently has to do with leadership. He was obviously the heart and soul of a very talented Villanova team in college, and I assume the same was true in high school. His rookie year he’s naturally going to be very deferential to KG, yet he still manages to snag a niche–"4th Quarter Foye"–and make the all-rookie team. After Garnett was dealt this summer, Foye attended preseason media day loudly announcing that he was now the leader of this ballclub.

    Then he goes down before all this new personnel really gets a chance to see anything out of him. While he’s rehabbing, Jefferson steps to the fore, slathered in gushing praise from the VP of Personnel, who is essentially saying that Al Jefferson is the next Kevin McHale, and will someday eclipse even that. Now McHale had his reason for touting Jefferson so highly that are bound up in basketball philosophy, kindred styles, and butt covering on a huge trade that, even if successful in the long run, represents a failure for McHale for having to make it in the first place. But the net effect is that it is impossible for Foye to assert himself as even co-leader of the club any time this season.

    Foye’s most egregious mistakes this year–some weird statements about the point guard position, for example, and a lack of deference and feeding of Jefferson at crunchtime in favor of taking the shot–make more sense if you consider that he’s had to grapple with a setback in the pecking order as well as physically with his own body this season. The "little" things he hasn’t done well, like defend, and generate some consistency in terms of shot selection, reflect a player trying to figure out for himself what his role is on this team–and I don’t mean point guard or shooting guard; I mean co-leader with Jefferson, chief sidekick to Jefferson, crunchtime go-to guy, etc. As much as Wolves fans worry about him being able to play a set position, maybe an equal concern is whether he can accept a set role–like #2 guy, or less.

    Then there is Kirk Snyder, who w
    as probably the best overall Wolves player this weekend. Yes, Snyder’s defense has slipped a bit recently–he was one of the multitude who couldn’t guard Rudy Gay Sunday, but he draws fouls, gets to the rim, and dishes off penetration better than any none point guard on the club, and plays a hard, physical style that is very handy to have contained in your 8th, 9th or 10th man. Snyder could carve a role for himself at the end of a bench on a very good team, the one who steps in for 10-20 minutes a night for 2-3 weeks when injuries have depleted a roster and prevents a steep drop in quality of play and emotional momentum. He might even be more than that. Yet for about three solid weeks now, he has outplayed Corey Brewer. It says something about the Wolves’ doldrums that that passes for good news nowadays.

  • Open Thread: Wolves Top Jazz Again

    Minnesota played its best basketball game of the season to beat Utah earlier this season. They played one of their worst, least inspired games in the rematch with the Jazz, a contest in which my criticism of the Wolves’ effort was greeted by many commenters with: "We knew they had no chance because Utah remembers what happened the first time and wants revenge."

    Okay, I wasn’t there this afternoon–out of town on another assignment–so what happened?

    As in the first game, it looks as if the scoring was very balanced, with seven players in double figures, and an 8th, Randy Foye, with 9 points on just 5 shots. Kirk Snyder, bumped from the starting lineup for the first time in nearly a month, led the Wolves in plus/minus and Jefferson, McCants and Gomes led them in scoring. On paper, it looks as if D-Will had a bad game.

    So chime and let me know what happened.

  • Abbreviated Three-Pointer: No Tanking Here

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by Sam Forencich/NBAE via Getty Images)

    Game #64, Road Game #31: Minnesota 121, Seattle 116

    Season Record: 15-49

    1. Engines In the Backcourt, Stoppers Up Front

    My decision to keep a life and hold off on getting League Pass this NBA season is biting me this weekend, as the Wolves were short-circuited by a double-overtime hockey game (U of M vs. Mankato) that allowed me just 5 minutes of second quarter action (the hockey intermission between OT and 2OT) and then the last 20 minutes of the game (after Mankato St. won it, 1-0), from the 7:55 mark of the third onward. And tonight against Portland is blacked out. Hence the abbreviation of this trey.

    But as luck would have it, the television feed clicked in just two minutes before the Wolves exploded for a 23-5 third-quarter run that transformed a 69-77 deficit into a 92-82 lead in just 5:26, the turning point of the ballgame. And they accomplished this with a lineup that almost certainly had never been deployed before, prompted first by Chris Richard subbing in for Al Jefferson, then Rashad McCants entering the game for Marko Jaric. Suddenly the Wolves had defensive stoppers as two out of three front court personnel–Richard and Kirk Snyder, with Ryan Gomes at the 4–and a couple of sticks of dynamite on the perimeter in Randy Foye and Rashad McCants.

    Sonics coach PJ Carlissimo tried to staunch the outburst, using everyone in his 9-man rotation during that 5:26 stretch but Luke Ridnour, to no avail. McCants in particular found the sweet zone between sharing and selfishness, getting 11 points on 2-3 FG while drawing enough fouls to earn 6 trips to the line. Foye fostered ball movement and kicked off the burst with a trey. Gomes had five points, Richard and Snyder a pair of free throws each. But it was on the other end where the change really happened: With Richard/Gomes/Snyder all active in the paint, Seattle mustered just 2-9 FG, and their 5 points in 5:26 stood in stark contrast to the 116 they scored in 48–meaning they got 111 in the other 42:34.

    Sounds like a simple plan: Spread the floor on offense with perimeter threats–Foye, McCants and Gomes all nailed treys in that 5:26 burst–who can also penetrate and either dish for open looks or draw the foul. Yes, Seattle is horrible defensively, but 23 points in 5:26 is good work against the junior varsity–it’s, ah, about 200 points per 48. And on defense, put a pair of sweat equity guys (Richard and Snyder) between the savvy Gomes and instruct them to negate the paint. Presto: Zero points in nearly 4 minutes of action for Chris Wilcox, who’s murdered the Wolves in all four games he played against them this season. Zero points for Kevin Durant, whose inability to solve Snyder has done more to raise Snyder’s defensive profile than any player in the league this season. Just two points for Nick Collison. Just 3 points for the backcourt of Gelabale and Watson. And that was the ballgame.

    2. Another Rant About Jefferson At Center

    There was a disheartening story in the Strib this week about Craig Smith–not the Rhino himself, of course, who is something of a feel-good tale, albeit one that won’t totally turn the frog into the prince. No, the head-slapping part was how the braintrust has told Smith they want him to work on his midrange game so that when he slots in alongside Al Jefferson in the frontcourt, they won’t be ruining each other’s spacing in the low block. The implication, of course, is one that the Wolves have been making in a dozen different, equally perplexing ways this season–that they foresee Jefferson as their center of the future.

    Now there are times when the Jefferson-Smith tandem has been more effective than I would have imagined. It can be an interesting wrinkle, part of a lineup rotation that falls somewhere between a gimmick and the team’s bread-and-butter. But I fear the Wolves Jefferson in the pivot of whatever go-to quintet they assemble. Their quartet of relatively legit centers have been purposefully sliced and diced into discontinuity: Chris Richard leads with 310 minutes, followed by Theo Ratliff with 214, Michael Doleac with 206, and Mark Madsen with 130–by comparison, Randy Foye already has 632 minutes since returning from injury about a month ago. Obviously the idea of getting Jefferson accustomed to the center slot is more of a priority than keeping him at his natural power forward position. Meanwhile, the primary alternatives at the 4 have also been relative pipsqueaks–Craig Smith (6-7 is generous), Ryan Gomes (6-8 with small forward instincts) and Antoine Walker (6-9 outside gunner).

    Normally smallball is designed to pick up the pace and ambush teams with quickness in transition. To push the polemic a little bit, however, what the Wolves have done is create a frontcourt that is both small *and* slow. That’s why they are 29th in blocks–at 3.65 a game ahead of only the listless Knicks–and 27th in scoring; not only 28th in fast break points but 29th in allowing fast break points, and 28th in creating points off turnovers–they get screwed on both ends of the small-and- quick versus large-and-slow equation. They *do* rank in the top 5 in second chance points, mostly because they grab more than 50% of the available rebounds despite their miserable FG%. These things are a tribute to Jefferson’s tenacity.

    To update the argument, let’s go to some pretty stunning numbers versus Seattle last night. As usual, rather than playing a defensive-minded center like Richard beside Jefferson in a large duo, Wittman and the front office subbed one in for the other. And the numbers give a pretty good indication when Jefferson does not belong as the main man on defense beneath the hoop.

    In the first quarter, the Sonics were 12-17 from the field until Richard replaced Big Al with 1:26 to play in the first, at which point Seattle shot 2-4 FG. When Richard was logging the 6:26 of the second period, Seattle shot 6-15, or 40%. When Jefferson came in to play the remaining 5:36, Seattle was a perfect 8-8 from the field. Got that? First half stats: Seattle shoots 8-19 FG with Richard in the game and a whopping 20-25 FG–80%!–with Jefferson as the last line of defense. Go the second half, which included that 2-9 FG stretch for the Sonics mentioned in the first point of this trey. With Jefferson on the floor for the first 3:07 of the third, Seattle shot 3-4 FG, which actually reduced the percentage the Sonics were shooting against him. When Richard too over for the final 8:53, Seattle shot 7-18. Okay, so after three periods, it is 15-37 against Richard and 23-29 FG against Jefferson.

    Richard finished his night helping Seattle go 0-2 FG in the first 1:22 of the 4th quarter, by which point the Wolves had grabbed a commanding 101-88 lead. Understand that Jefferson is a proud man, who could see the disparity that was occurring between he and Richard on the court as keenly as anyone. In his concluding 10:38 of the game, he worked really hard on that end of the court, frequently biting on up fakes and making a determined effort to deny penetration, two things that provoked 3 fouls in that 10:38–all of them greeted with a passionate protest from Jefferson. But the good news is, Seattle shot only 8-20 FG during that 4th period, giving Jefferson a final mark of 31-49 FG, or 62%, versus Richard’s 15-39 FG, which works out to 38%.

    Obviously these stark numbers are not quite that simple. There were always four players besides Jefferson or Richard working the defense, and that needs to be considered. But to me, the more glaring stat is the 0:00 that a limited scorer but hustle guy defender like Richard spent alongside a gifted scorer who has trouble on D like Jefferson. Finally, on the plus/minus end of things, Jefferson was minus -12 in 29:30 (despite shooting 8-13 FG, committing t
    hree steals and blocking two shots) and Richard was plus +17 in the remaining 18:30.

    3. Not Tanking

    There will be the usual controversy about what teams are dogging it for the lottery and what ones are not. Right now, the Wolves will almost certainly finish ahead of Miami, and last night’s win puts them in a win tie with Memphis, just one behind Seattle. The Knicks are also in their sights. The arguments for and against tanking have been made ad nauseum. But for what it’s worth, I just want to give the ballclub credit for continuing to work hard to maximize their production on the court. Perhaps karma will reward them. Because it certainly seems karma has punished them the past two seasons, robbing their tank-centric draft picks of a second productive year in the league two times in a row (McCants and Foye).

    Okay, the Portland tilt is on tap and I am sans visuals. For those who catch the game, educate us about it in the comments.

  • The Three Pointer: Lost in the Crunch

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by David Sherman/NBAE via Getty Images)

    Game #63, Home Game #33: Portland 103, Minnesota 96

    Season Record: 14-49

    1. When It Matters Most

    Al Jefferson did not score a single point in the first 19 minutes and 4 seconds of this game, which I’d wager is his longest drought of the season thus far. By the time he grabbed an offensive rebound and tossed in the putback, three of his teammates–Marko Jaric, Rashad McCants and Craig Smith–were already in double figures and the Wolves were up 5. In the locker room after the game, Jefferson sprawled easily in his chair and exclaimed that the situation showed "that my teammates had my back." This is the way a leader talks.

    The screws were turned for almost this entire game, making it one of the more enjoyable to watch this year. There were no double-digit leads, 16 ties, and 18 lead changes. In such a game you knew that Jefferson’s prominence would steadily rise, and you suspected that on Portland’s side, a similar dynamic was coalescing around combo guard Brandon Roy.

    And so it went. Jefferson’s point totals through three periods were 0-2-6. Roy’s were 7-5-6. In the 4th quarter, Jefferson led all scorers with 12 points, shooting 6-9 FGs, while the rest of his teammates shot 2-13 FG and coughed up a 5-point lead in an 18-6 run over the final 6:06 of the game. Asked if he got frustrated with the disparity between his own accuracy and that of his teammates during these final 12 minutes, Jefferson replied, "I got frustrated with myself for missing shots and tried to get myself going."

    Roy led his team in fourth quarter field goals (3-5), free throws (3-4), points (9) and assists (2). "Roy got to the rim," Wolves coach Randy Wittman stated. "They didn’t settle for 25-foot jump shots."

    Let’s address this Brandon Roy versus Randy Foye thing head-on for a moment. Through no fault of his own, Foye is apparently destined to be bedeviled with Roy comparisons, due to the Wolves drafting Roy and immediately trading him for Foye. Since Roy was Rookie of the Year during Foye’s rookie year and was an all-star while Foye’s sophomore pro season has been spent recovering from a knee injury, it is difficult to claim, at this point anyway, that the Wolves got the better of the deal.

    Roy is one of those players better appreciated in person than on the stat sheet. There is a marvelous placidity to his style, a level-headedness that has a calming, confidence boosting effect on his team. From the Wolves being up 90-87 with 5:48 to play, he keyed a 14-4 run over the next 5:14, either scoring or assisting on every point but James Jones’s three-pointer, including two kamikaze drives through traffic that, as Wittman admiringly noted, finished at the rim.

    Foye did not have one of his better crunchtime performances, going a little too strong on his classic running banker down the right lane with 1:32 to play and Portland up 2, 94-92, and then having a similar shot swatted away by Joel Przybilla with the Wolves down 7, 101-94, at 34 seconds to go. The contrast was sharp.

    But the greater point here is overall crunchtime leadership–those who have it and those who don’t. And on that count, Foye has shown a willingness and proclivity to make big shots. To further the bedevilment, he doesn’t offer the same versatility of ways to beat you that Roy seems to, and his ballhandling and overall mien is less calming than it is propulsive and perhaps infectiously energizing.

    Crunchtime prowess is probably the most compelling argument for starting Foye at point guard ahead of Sebastian Telfair, even when Telfair returns and is healthy enough to play. As eye-opening as Bassy has been in terms of floor generalship and pacemaking, we have seen, more than once, what happens when opponents practically dare Telfair to shoot when the game is on the line. Meanwhile, opponents would not be remiss in doubling Foye, or at the least preparing for his hell-bent-for-leather traipse down the right lane.

    As a longtime defender of Kevin Garnett, I know how skewed and inaccurate the "can’t score in the clutch" epithet can be; but, that said, understand why someone would invoke crunchtime as a means of separating Lebron James and Kobe Bryant from KG among the top 3 MVP candidates this season. Some guys, for better or worse, in wisdom or lopsided ego, just want to seize these make or break moments. Some don’t.

    And some shouldn’t, which brings me back to the "Lost in the Crunch" title of this trey. Marko Jaric had a nice game tonight: a dozen points, six assists, three steals and zero turnovers. But is anyone surprised that Jaric had 10 of those 12 points in the first period on 4-5 FG and was scoreless in 5:57 of the 4th, with his only FGA a wild, ill-advised airball on a left handed layup attempt with Portland up 1 with 4:30 to play? Is anyone surprised that Shaddy McCants nailed his first 7 shots, executing that jab-step, pull-back-and-shoot move to literal perfection, and went 7-8 FG through three quarters, only to go 1-4 FG in the fourth, culminated by an airball trey with Portland up 5 and less than a minute to go? And is anyone surprised that Corey Brewer strode into a long jumper in rhythm yet still clanked it, then mimicked Jaric’s crazy drive to the basket and left handed airball–two shots that comprised half of his 0-4 FG evening–during the crunchtime swoon?

    After the game, Wittman tempered his criticism of the 4th quarter offense, obviously in deference to the confidence of this clank crew. "We had our chances," he said. "We had good looks. Ryan had several good looks." That would be Gomes, the superglue and team barometer who likewise has proven to be shaky in the clutch. He went 0-2 FG in the 4th tonight, but was missing wide open looks most of the evening en route to his 5-14 FG performance, further besmirched by his zero assists and 2 measley rebounds (such are the hazards of guarding Joel Przybilla, who doesn’t score but boxes out pretty well).

    BTW, here’s a link to the "Clutch Stats Chart" at 82games.com:

    http://82games.com/CSORT11.HTM

     

    2. Free Throw Bugaboo Strikes Again

    At the 5:55 minute mark of the third period, Foye committed yet another of the team’s dumb, reach-instead-of-shuffle fouls on defense, putting Portland in the penalty. At the time Minnesota had hit 8-9 FT, almost exactly the same as Portland’s 9-10 FG, and the Wolves were up 68-65. I leaned over to Myles Brown of slamonline.com and said, here comes a free throw parade. If the Wolves can stay within ten FTs of Portland, they’ll win. Otherwise, they’ll lose.

    Well, Minnesota never again got to the free throw. The Blazers got 16 more free throws, and made 13–more than enough to turn a 3 point lead into a final 7 point deficit. And to anyone who has watched the team play this season, my prescience wasn’t that visionary, in fact rather predictable. Minnesota is next to last in the league in the number of free throws they shoot and have the fifth largest amount of free throws shot against them. That’s how you can score more field goals than your opponents over the course of 63 games and still be 14-49. Opponents have converted a whopping *433* more free throws than Minnesota, which works out to 7 points per game.

    As usual, tonight was a combination of stupid fouls on defense and a lack of foresight and aggression on offense. McCants and Gomes were chief offenders of the cheap, reach-in type that is a Wolves’s specialty. And in postgame remarks, Wittman called out his team for not attacking the rim when Portland’s big, especially Aldridge and Pryzbilla, showed hard on the pick and roll, leaviing the lane open to express layups.

    3. Hit and Run

    Sure hope it is the Gator rook’s nagging thigh bruise and not some "extended look" or pecking order shenanigans that has Kirk Snyder getting many of the early minutes–including the starter’s minutes–that not so long ago belonged to Corey Brewer.

    Yet another too-small sample size and yet another decent plus/minus–a team-best zero–for Chris Richard tonight.

    Crazy schedule makers had the Wolves out west, then back home for one game tonight versus Portland, then back out to the West Coast. Would a road game in Portland that saved two flights given them more of a shot at victory than a home drive-by ?

  • The Three Pointer: Seattle Slew

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by David Sherman/NBAE via Getty Images)


    Game # 58, Home Game #31: Seattle 111, Minnesota 108

    Season Record: 12-46

    1. An Improving Beast

    During Kevin Garnett’s dozen years with the Wolves, I wrote a slew of game recaps which included as a stock phrase the caution that people shouldn’t take the incredibly high-level consistency KG was offering for granted. I think I’m safely on the record as saying that Al Jefferson is not, and probably never will be, the versatile monster that Garnett is on the court, but here goes my first-ever time pointing out that you do Big Al a disservice ignoring or downgrading his tremendous effort in the overtime loss to Seattle last night.

    Jefferson started the game shockingly cold from the field, bereft of his now famous touch around the hoop. He faked Johan Petro out of his jock and then drove left baseline, only to sail an airball in a manner that made it seem like he thought he was going to get fouled and went too strong. But he did it again later in the first quarter, on his patented spin move where you wonder how he knows where the hoop is–this time he didn’t, for airball 2. In between, he received a perfect feed in stride from Sebastian Telfair headed straight down the lane, only to barely graze the front iron with his floater, snatch the offensive rebound, and then travel while attempting the putback. He missed his first five shots and the Wolves, beseiged by bad matchups at the other end due to their small lineup (more on that later), fell behind by 10 before he finally got on the board via a fast-break layup off a Corey Brewer steal with 1:58 to play in the first. At the half he was 3-11 FG and Minnesota was still down 7, 51-58.

    But great players will themselves past off nights, and that’s exactly what Jefferson did in the second half. His 4-7 FG fueled Minnesota’s 3rd quarter surge into a one-point lead heading into the final period, and his 4th quarter was a demonstration of unstoppable thirst for baskets against double and triple teams as the Wolves fought tenaciously to hold their slim lead. After getting his early-quarter blow, he entered with 7:14 left to play and the score tied. Within two and a half minutes, he had a slam dunk, a baseline-spinning four-foot banker on the left block, and–a new wrinkle–a 5′ jump hook moving left to right across the lane. On the latter two baskets he was gang-guarded by Nick Collison, Damian Wilkins, Chris Wilcox. Didn’t matter. Wolves up by 5 with 4:45 to play.

    Yes, Jefferson and Craig Smith had difficulty containing Wilcox at the other end. There is no question that a defensive-oriented, shot-blocking center would be the ideal complement. But let’s talk about Jefferson’s most obvious leap forward during this game–his passing. After he’d consistently schooled the Sonics in crunchtime, he saw the looming triple-team and shrewdly dished it out to Corey Brewer for a wide-open look. When Brewer’s shot clanged, Jefferson bulled his way for the longish rebound, and then, with Seattle determined to thwart the putback, he rose up and dumped it down by the hoop to Craig Smith for an easy layup, his career-high fifth assist of the evening. (Smith likewise had a career-high five dimes, continuing his recent push for more stable and vital playing time.)

    To bring this Garnett-like point in the trey full circle, folks can rightly point out that Jefferson didn’t finish when it mattered, missing four of five field goal attempts and two crucial free throws during the overtime. Certainly fatigue might have played into this. At the end of regulation, Jefferson had scored 20 points in 20:05 of grueling, pressure-packed action in the second half, sinking 9-13 FG and 4-5 FT, the last two coming with 15 seconds left to play and the Wolves up two, 99-97. But I’d rather simply say, without Jefferson, there is no overtime happening in the first place. On a night when he clearly was out of sync with his shooting rhythm for most of the first half, he finished with 30 points, 13 rebounds and 5 assists, with the vast majority of those points coming with the game on the line and the opponents dead-set on ensuring that he wasn’t the player who beat them. That’s stardom treatment. And while it would certainly be nice if Jefferson became even a consistently mediocre defender, stardom is where he’s headed.

    2. Smallball Mistakes and Motley Mismatches

    It was interesting to note that nobody–Jefferson, Smith, Wittman–seemed especially disheartened by the loss, perhaps knowing that playing hard, entertaining games while positioning themselves for more ping-pong balls is not a bad outcome for a ballclub that just dumped Theo Ratliff and have the word "build" prominent in its new marketing campaign. (Fresh removed from two championships, Corey Brewer was the exception, dejectedly talking about the free throw that likely would have iced the game for Minnesota in the 4th quarter.)

    Anyway, it wasn’t with real rancor but simple force that Wittman said "I thought we were a little too relaxed coming out at the start. It put us behind the 8-ball…it lost us the game. The defense went through the motions…we defended nobody…and we didn’t move the ball like we were capable of doing."

    Nowhere was the subject of smallball included in this litany. And yet as the two teams began feeling each other out in the opening minutes, it was patently clear that the Sonics enjoyed two glaring mismatches: the 6-10 Wilcox on 6-8 Ryan Gomes at the power forward slot, and 6-4 Randy Foye trying to guard 6-9 Kevin Durant at the off-guard slot. If Wilcox hadn’t been cold from the field–he missed some easy looks over Gomes down low–Seattle might have played the perfect quarter. As it was, you throw out Wilcox’s 2-6 FG, and Seattle was a whopping 12-13 FG in the first quarter, and a perfect 11-11 FG inside the three point arc. Durant led the way with an almost casual 11 points on 4-4 FG and 3-3 FT. And Wilcox used his superior height and paint-jousting experience to outrebound the entire Wolves’ ballclub in the period, 7-6

    Things finally began to even out when Wittman subbed in Smith for Telfair with 2:35 to play in the period and the Wolves down 8. To Wittman’s belated credit, we never saw that pipsqueak starting five (Jefferson-Gomes-Brewer-Foye-Telfair) together again, and Wittman discovered that Kirk Snyder was his best stopper on Durant, throwing the gritty Utah and Houston castoff with the Mr. Potato Head nose in for 32:39 of the game’s final 40 minutes. Snyder knew what he was supposed to do, which put him about 4 years ahead of the person he was traded for, Gerald Green, already. Aside from 6 shots (he made 2), the largest number on his stat line was the 5 steals he registered, frequently on strips of Durant as the prolific-scoring rook was bringing the ball up to shoot in penetration. After the game, Jefferson called him a "tougher Corey Brewer" (then quickly amended it with copious praise for the heavy defensive role Brewer is already undertaking as a rookie), but Snyder reminded me more of a taller, perhaps quicker, Greg Buckner, a fine defensive presence who is among the many vets on the roster lost in the youth shuffle this season.

    Bottom line, while you could call this game entertaining and hard-fought, it was not particularly well-played, especially on defense. Minnesota is 20th in the league in points allowed–pretty sorry, considering they are next-to-last in points scored and thus don’t have the excuse of pace like Golden State or Phoenix–and Seattle is 25th. The two clubs combined were 90-173 FG. Snyder may have clamped down on Durant to compel his 4-14 FG shooting after the first period, but Foye and Telfair continued their matador ways with the point guards–Earl Watson shot 6-7 FG and Luke Ridenour went 5-8, for a combine
    d 28 points and 16 assists. Chris Richard, Smith and Jefferson couldn’t prevent Nick Collison from shooting 5-5 FG in the second period. And, in perhaps the best argument against constant smallball and the habits it engenders, the Wolves never could solve Wilcox, who sank 6-9 FG after that cold first period, grabbed a game-high 15 rebounds and was and incredible plus +15 in 42:42 of play, meaning the Sonics were minus -12 in the 11:18 he sat on the bench. With Doleac and Madsen in limbo, Ratliff cut, and Richard a sparsely deployed rookie, the Wolves default enforcement of the paint.

    3. Quick Hits

    Wittman took pains to point out that when Brewer missed the free throw with 10 seconds to play, the Wolves gambled on two steal attempts that enabled Durant to glide for a layup in transition just 6 seconds later to send the game to overtime. And he correctly noted that those types of steal attempts are what you do when you’re behind, not protecting a lead. Point taken. But is anyone else enjoying the tone Brewer (and, when healthy, Jaric) seems to be setting for the entire defense in terms of ambushing the passing lanes. Just a week after falling one steal short of the team-record 17 in a win over Utah, Minnesota filched 14 more last night, including Snyder’s five and three apiece from Brewer and Smith (who stuffed the stat line).

    Folks are fond of blasting Wittman’s end of game manuevers, and I’ve been fond of calling out Foye’s crunchtime ego. So let’s everybody note that Foye properly and conscientiously deferred to Jefferson during that 4th quarter glory and stepped up with two overtime buckets (after registering just a free throw in the 3rd and 4th quarters) when Jefferson was clanking in OT. And let’s note that both Wittman and Foye did everything right on the final play of regulation, when the ball went to Foye, he saw Jefferson covered, and kicked it to a wide open Ryan Gomes near the corner, who flat-lined the jumper off the back iron.

    Durant’s 25 points don’t compensate for his lackadaisical mien, indifferent defense, and tendency to ball hog. The kid is long, and is going to be a very potent scorer for a long time, but I’d hold off on the superstar jabber, or even rookie of the year talk. Luis Scola over in Houston is proving the Rockets don’t necessarily need the overrated Yao Ming to continue their playoff push. He’s my ROY.

     

  • The Three Pointer: Power Outage

    Copyright 2007 NBAE (Photo by David Liam Kyle/NBAE via Getty Images)


    Game #57, Road Game #27: Minnesota 84, Cleveland 92

    Season Record: 12-45

    1. The Price of Youth

    What a discouraging game.

    Wanna bet that the Cavaliers had a scout at Target Center for the Wolves win over Utah last Tuesday? Coach Mike Brown seemed to set his stellar defense for a team that would deftly move the ball and present probing, multifaceted threats. In particular, Brown, thinking he had 20-point scorers like Foye, McCants and Gomes to worry about, decided to single-cover Al Jefferson with the Luthuanian leviathan known as Z, and let tall, panther-quick cohorts like Ben Wallace and LeBron James scout the horizon beyond the paint.

    That was fine with Jefferson, who was enjoying the elbow room even before Z (surname Ilgauskas) committed one stupid foul by going over the back on a free throw miss, and then another one showing too hard on a perimeter pick and roll in the first six minutes of play. That sent him to the pine, to be replaced by Anderson Varejao, a Raggedy Andy-headed string-bean quite the opposite of the bald Z. He promptly got flattened (half shoulder, half patented Varejao fffflop) for a Jefferson slam. Brown understandably flipped Varejao over to Gomes and so it was Ben Wallace’s turn to guard Jefferson. By the half, Jefferson had hit half of his 16 field goal attempts for 18 points and 5 offensive rebounds (out of 7 total) at intermission.

    Alas, the rest of the team also had 18 points, on horrendous 7-30 FG. The ball movement and constant stabs at penetration–not to mention the silky, visually pleasant teamwork–so much in evidence against Utah was kaput, with a capital dipthong. Just a few quarters beyond his breakout game against the Jazz, Randy Foye broke back in, displaying all the bad habits that caused me to sour on him earlier this season– the ill-chosen, off-balance jumpers early in the shot clock, the running alongside of his opponent’s dribble so he can he can get a better profile on the man’s successful jumper, and the lazy entry passes that, while not usually stolen, certainly give defenses the time to cogitate and react.

    Hopefully the offensive gameplan was for Ryan Gomes to exploit the smallball matchup and take Ben Wallace out on the perimeter, the only justification I can come up with for the normally prudent Gomes chucking it up like the second coming of Rashad McCants, at 2-7 FG in 11:04. Speak of the devil, Shaddy checked in with 2:41 to play in the first quarter and managed to squeeze off three before the buzzer, then added three more in 8:41 of the second quarter. Three and three make six shot attempts and six misses for zero points in 11:22 first half minutes. Foye? Zip for three but a literal bonus point for being allowed to shoot the technical on a defensive three-second call against Cleveland, and thus transform his halftime goose egg into a straight line. After his first quarter delirium, Gomes came back to earth with but one clank in the second, and thus finished the half with 4 points on 2-8. For those of you slow with the abaci (abacuses?), that’s a collective 2-17 FG and a whopping 5 points from the squad’s second, third, and fouth leading scorers in the first half–and because of shot selection and general disdain for the first pass, let alone the extra pass, they collectively deserved almost every miss.

    This is what happens with a young ballclub. They play well and then they don’t, learning painful lessons on the job. Coach Randy Wittman addressed this after the Toronto loss Wednesday, but it is typical young club behavior, the habit of relaxing after a grand victory. The vexing aspect of it was not so much Toronto, however, but this game, after their Canadian clubbing theoretically taught them the error of instant self-regard. They had the contrast–fun and bloody games a la Utah, or belittling suffocation a la Toronto. The irksome thing is that they mentally opted for another bout of belittling suffocation, this time in Cleveland.

    At the half, Hanny and Pete were marvelling about how nice it was to shoot only 32.6% and yet be down a mere four points at 36-40. But from the time the Cavs’ Devin Brown opened the game by waltzing down for an easy jumper and Randy Foye followed that matador D with a travel, until the time McCants rang the garbage time dinner bell by nailing his 4th quarter treys, there was not a single moment when I seriously thought the Wolves were going to win this game.

    In the second half, Mike Brown took a gander at the stat sheet and decided Big Al needed a double team after all. With Z and Big Ben–and isn’t it ironic that Z is much bigger than both Big Al and Big Ben?–taking turns as the primary matchup and sometimes tag-teaming, with a little guy flashing over to boot, Jefferson had 4 points and 3 boards in 20:36 of the second half after going 18-7 in 20:39 of the first half. With all this attention focused on the undersized center, the undersized power forward, Gomes, managed to sneak outside for a 7-point flurry in 71 seconds to knot the game up at 51-51 midway through the third quarter. But by the end of the third Foye and McCants were a combined 1-14 FG and the Wolves were back down by 7.

    When it was mercifully over, Foye was 1-9 FG for 4 points, two assists, and three turnovers in 33:32, not a good line for a point guard or off guard, even one given a fistful of free passes for making a ginger transition from one-and-a-half to two good knees. McCants had a totally deceptive double-digit night–six of his ten points came on meaningless three-pointers in the final minute of play–but to his (small) credit he did register a team-high 3 assists while finishing sixth in minutes-played at 27:37.

    With just 1:22 to go in the game, the Wolves had amassed but 75 points and visited the free throw line 10 times. For the game they shot 39.1%. Young players or not, it is worrisome that the ballclub, which ranks 29th among 30 NBA teams in points scored per game, can be so inept offensively despite the fact that three players perceived to be cornerstones–Jefferson, Foye, and to a slightly lesser extent McCants–are all much better offensively than they are on defense.

    2. Management Follies

    About the only good thing about owner Glen Taylor’s halftime "interview" with Tom Hanneman tonight was that it spared us the cheerleader report and Sweetwater Jones. As infomerical entertainments go, it was somewhere between the Victoria Principal/Susan Lucci testimonials and the somewhat clownish guy walking around with all those question marks on his suitjacket. Actually the latter wouldn’t be a bad analogy for the current state of the Wolves.

    Taylor let it be known that he is really enjoying this team, especially compared to the underachieving teams of the previous two years. He knows, in other words, that this 12-45 team is not underachieving, but likes the job coach Randy Wittman is doing–Kevin McHale and the rest of the front office are not discussed. He says he has many people telling him and writing him that they like this team better than other recent editions too, and would like to invite still other folks to come out and decide for themselves. And, oh yeah, the new Timberwolves season ticket packages for next year are about to go on sale soon. If Taylor was this subtle in his wedding invitation business, the fancy, script-flowing marital announcements would go out complete with a picture of a the father of the bride holding a shotgun between the groom’s shoulder blades.

    In very much related news, the Wolves have bought out the contract of Theo Ratliff and would very much like to do the same with Antoine Walker. The spin that dumping Ratliff will open up more playing time for rookie Chris Richard is about as disingenuous as the earlier spin that Ratliff’s
    return would enable the Wolves to see how well Al Jefferson plays with a shot-blocking center. Richard got a whole 3:21 worth of burn tonight (his plus +1 led the team, of course), which is approximately how much Ratliff and Jefferson played together after Theo’s return.

    For quite some time now, it has been apparent that Wittman prefers Jefferson at center and Gomes at power forward. Smallball. Game by game, it has worked out much better than I would have imagined. Tonight, for example, the shrunken banshee lineup battled to a 40-40 draw on the boards with the top rebounding team in the NBA. Wittman likes to spread the floor with his small unit and give Jefferson room to operate down low. He also likes the other players utilizing this spacing and their quickness to crash the boards and outhustle as much as outmuscle opponents for position under the hoop. Perhaps this lineup is giving Jefferson experience getting his shot off against the tall timber, and hopefully learning how to survey the floor and dish back out when teams pack the paint to defend him.

    But I can’t embrace it. Anyone who watches Jefferson knows he’s a classic power forward that, even by the standards of the "new" NBA, with its paucity of dominant big men and anti-hand checking rules, is best suited to operate beside a center precisely like Ratliff, who can help out on defense, is laterally quick around the hoop, sets a good example by showing hard on peimeter pick and rolls and doesn’t need the ball. Even if we all know Ratliff wasn’t part of the future here, isn’t that kind of pivot man something this franchise should be manuevering towards? Shouldn’t we get Jefferson and Gomes ingrained in those habits now, in their formative stages? Do we really need Jefferson playing 69% of the center minutes for this ballclub and just 5% of the power forward’s minutes? (According to the 82games.com web data.) And do we really need the Wolves’ 8 most popular 5-man lineups to feature Jefferson as the center–especially when the most popular 5-man lineup that doesn’t feature Jefferson as a cetner puts Mark Madsen in the pivot instead?

    Perhaps there is guerrilla tanking going on here. A Timberwolves team with Jefferson and Ratliff playing beside each other for most of the season would be very close to 20 wins by now, in my opinion, which would vault them ahead of another five teams in addition to Miami. Perhaps that’s a little too close for comfort on losing that Clips’ pick this year for the Jaric deal.

    Then there is the money angle. Taylor himself acknowledged (in the newspaper, of course, not the infomercial) that the buyout would save him a chunk of the remainder of Theo’s $11 million contract this year–on the order of the $3 million or so that he had remaining. Meanwhile, consider that Ratliff has missed 45 games–officially more than half of an 82-game regular season. Consider that with his injury history there is a possibility that he is insured against loss of play due to injury. When I tentatively asked around, through a member of the communications staff, about whether the Wolves were getting any insurance money due to Ratliff’s injury, the staffer reported back that he couldn’t find out. Now that Ratliff is gone, I’ll be a little more aggressive and ask the question myself to Taylor or GM Jim Stack or some other team representative. And I wouldn’t mind if a daily beat writer traveling with the team beat me to it.

    3. Silver Linings

    Not all is amiss and awry in Wolves land tonight, and amid all the dolor, I thought I’d save the best for last. First off, Sebastian Telfair has begun to improve his shot much as he hiked up his court vision and sense of command in prior months. For the past 8 games, Bassy has shot 48%, (12-25) from beyond the arc. He has scored in double figures in 6 of those 8 games, along with running the offense far better than Foye or Jaric or McCants in terms of pace and proactive passing. Let’s face it, he’s the only point guard on the roster. That said, I wouldn’t go so far as to label Telfair a reliable shooter. Tonight, after hitting some big shots in the 3rd quarter and clearly establishing himself as the second-best Timberwolf behind Jefferson, he got a little too happy with himself and clanged a pair of stupid shots that were crucial to helping the Cavs pull away. On the second of these, McCants was literally pointing down toward Jefferson in the paint as Telfair drew iron with a trey. I understand Bassy is feeling–and sort of thriving on–the heat of competition for playing time with Foye, McCants and Jaric (the current short straw man, logging just 6:26 tonight). But excitability is his enemy.

    By contrast, Corey Brewer seems forever excited and unruffled at the same time. The rook’s work on LeBron James tonight was as staunch as one could hope for against a player who wound up with 30 points and 13 assists.(And if we’re talking about real silver linings, that would go to everyone lucky enough to see James’s monster dunk midway through the fourth quarter, when he tried to thread his way through two or three Wolves and stumbled around the foul line, losing the ball a little out in front of him, only to grab it as he stumbled a bit and rise up with literally incredible speed and elevation to slam it home. "That is a different look than anything I have ever seen in my life!" Petersen claimed, rightly going batshit. "TV doesn’t do it justice." Perhaps, but even on TV it looked like somebody hitting the fast forward button on a dude who disappares behind players for a second only to emerge as if jumping on a trampoline to slam it home.)

    Whatever is said about Brewer, and I’ve been pro and con, the guy is dogged and he plays the game like he’s memorized the handbook. Tonight he racked up 15 points (5-10 FG) and 4 steals, but it was his simple foot movement and determination to stay in front of LeBron that was most impressive. Meanwhile, if you want a half full/empty glass, think about how shrewd Brewer’s shot selection is–the ex-Gator almost never shoots outside the flow and rhythm of the offense and hustles hard enough to put himself in many great positions to score. Now consider that despite taking such an inordinately high percentage of good shots, Brewer is still making less than 35% of them. Blame it on his youth, and cross your fingers.

  • The Three Pointer: The Best Yet This Season

    (AP Photo/Jim Mone)


    Game #55, Home Game #30: Utah 100, Minnesota 111

    Season Record: 12-43

    1. The Beauty of Teamwork

    It’s been a long time–certainly a year, maybe two–since fans of the Minnesota Timberwolves have seen this kind of 48 minutes from their ballclub. There have been some really nice wins thus far this season: The roaring final 3 quarters that produced the 131 points versus Indiana, the two convincing wins over Phoenix, and the solid rousting of Philly just last week. And there have been enjoyably well-played losses to Boston (the one on the road), Atlanta (the one on the road), and San Antonio (last week). But Indiana and Philly are sub-mediocrities, the style Phoenix plays is prone to their occasional pratfalls, and the losses were ultimately losses, after all.

    Tonight the Wolves beat a very good team–19-4 in 2008 heading into this game–by mixing aggression and sound judgment, tenacity and tact, and, above all, a full-fledged sense of selflessness for the sake of the ballclub. Such teamwork is harder to describe than witness–it’s always easier to isolate what’s wrong with a car than why it works so well from ignition to muffler–but worth the effort if only to savor it. There are all the little things. Randy Foye jumping right in the middle of the paint to set a pick for Al Jefferson. Rashad McCants diving toward the hoop wide open and not receiving the pass, yet diligently circling back out to probe for other ways he can extend the play. Ryan Gomes rotating over to deter penetration and cover for his late-arriving teammate, then sliding to the other side of the lane to box out his own man after the shot goes up. Corey Brewer scrambling to the sideline and backhanding the ball in to save the possession, then getting back in time to tip in the subsequent shot less than two seconds later. Foye scrambling back hard enough in transition to be able to set his feet for a charge.

    Utah is a physical team, charter members of the Frequent Foulers Club, expert in rubbing out obstacles with back-door picks and other traffic-jamming Xs and Os designed to sap your spirit and bruise your muscles. They wait to seize the lapses that are the byproduct of fatigue. But the Wolves beat Utah at their own game. Wittman threw new man Kirk Snyder on Utah enforcer Matt Harpring and Snyder, who practiced against Harpring often his rookie year after being drafted by Utah, went shoulder to shoulder, toe to toe and more than once joined him on the floor in their mutual mania for the round orb. Theo Ratliff took the measure of another bench bruiser for the Jazz, Paul Milsapp, and, although it required 5 fouls in 12:31, helped flummox the second year player. By the third and early in the fourth period, many Utah shots were banging front iron.

    Muckers like Craig Smith and Ryan Gomes mucked, but so did Foye and McCants and Telfair, and Big Al. They gave little away for free to Utah, staying with their men by wedging themselves over picks or switching off smartly, alert to the entire court, vertical and horizontal, the breakaways and the back-door cuts. They kept their heads on a swivel and their hands up for deflections, grabbing 16 steals (one short of the franchise record) and disrupting at least that many other possessions. Utah did not execute poorly–the Jazz shot 46.4% and had 26 assists–but the Wolves also forced them into a season-high 24 turnovers. Three Wolves–Jefferson/Foye/McCants–had three steals and Telfair and Gomes had two.

    The offense was even more fun to watch. It brimmed with minor decisions that made already good possibilities just a little bit better. Telfair led the team with just 4 assists, and two big men off the bench, Smith and the newcomer Snyder had 3. McCants would have an open look for his jumper but see Jefferson sealing his man and already anticipating the double team, so he’d dump in the entry pass, watch Jefferson spin one-on-three into the lane and draw the foul. McCants gets the glow of feeling unselfish; Al the gusto of barging into the teeth of Sloan’s boys in the paint, a Jazz player is that much closer to foul trouble and Jefferson nails the free throws (he was 8-10 FT overall). Another time down, Jefferson has the ball and is crab-dribbling into the double until he push-passes a final dribble into the hands of McCants, swinging over five feet behind him and getting his feet in position, even as Jefferson becomes the de facto screen on his two men and the other McCants has just rubbed off him. Shaddy nails the open look (8-17 FG), Jefferson drops an easy dime (one of two tonight) and Utah knows there are legit threats being wielded at either end of this two-man game.

    Except that it’s a five man game. The three-headed monster Wolves fans have been pining for–Jefferson, McCants and Foye–all take their closeups, damn well linger in it, maybe for two or three possessions in a row if the matchups are right, abetted by the other four teammates in the little ways described above. But then, for one of the few times this year, the emphasis moves before it has to. Foye’s hot, but cedes to Shaddy, or Al, who goes and gets some, but doesn’t mark the territory for pecking order purposes. In the first half, Foye has 9 shots, Jefferson 7, McCants 8; for the game Foye has 16 shots, McCants 17, Jefferson 17. Jefferson and McCants tie for the scoring lead with 22, Foye a whisker behind at 20.

    And 20 from Ryan Gomes makes it only the second time in the last 10 years, and the first time since January 2004, that four Wolves go off for 20 points or more. Gomes, of course, is different. He is the best individual barometer for this team, because his game is glue, everything geared to teamwork, meaning his perceptive movements without the ball will get him a bushel of sly, easy looks at the hoop if others notice and feed him. Tonight he was 7-15 FG and grabbed team highs in rebounds (11) and offensive boards (4). When the Wolves play this unselfishly, he is probably the most emblematic, and will likely be among the most obscure, especially in relation to his contribution.

    2. Coming Out Party

    Hey, it’s Randy Foye, circa January or Feburary 2007. Those who have been counseling us Foye critics to wait until the guy was back in game shape can gloat a little off this performance. Too often in his first 11 appearances this season Foye wallowed in boom-or-bust mode, bent on arching up treys or taking his shakey wheels for a traipse through the lane. Tonight he threw in the deceptively tough stuff, the midrange game, the runners and the pull-ups and the dish on the move. It made a huge difference both in making the treys and the lay-up tries more unpredictible and in fostering the ball and player movement so much on display tonight. As I mentioned earlier, and am anxious to repeat, Foye, McCants and Jefferson passed the baton fairly regularly tonight. There were three go-to guys and nobody bitched/sulked/malingered or otherwise acted out if one of the other two was bogarting the crayons in the sandbox. And while Foye is not a point guard (16 shots, 2 assists), he is a buffer against the idea of either/or between Jefferson and McCants.

    "We’ve said we have to be patient with Randy," an elated Wittman cautioned after the game. "There’s probably going to be another down before there is another up."

    And when there is, I’ll describe it and probably criticize it. But tonight’s effort gave credence to the "still recovering from injury" feeling about Foye; there was physical confidence in this "up." Yeah, Foye missed a chippie or two, but the shot selection was light years better than the chuck-fests he showed previously. Maybe this won’t be so much of a "limbo" season for Foye after all.

    3. In Praise of Wittman

    With ten m
    inutes to go in the game and the Wolves clinging to a one point lead, Randy Wittman opted out of his big lineup, subbing in Ryan Gomes and Craig Smith for Ratliff and Jefferson, with Foye, McCants and Snyder filling out the rotation. For those breaking out the slide rules at home, that’s no player above 6-7 (if you believe Craig Smith is 6-7). As a stalwart big lineup guy, I sharpened the poison pen.

    But Wittman had noticed Utah coach Jerry Sloan sitting his best players, Carlos Boozer and Deron Williams, limiting the Jazz’s options on offense. And he knew a front line of Okur (6-11), Harping (6-7) and Millsap (6-8), might have trouble defending a quicker team in the 4th quarter.

    Boom. Foye nailed a trey off a feed from Gomes. Harping tried a jump-hook over Smith on the baseline that didn’t go. Foye missed another trey attempt but Gomes got the board. His shot was blocked by Millsap but Smith got the board. His shot was blocked by Harpring, but Smith got it back, and laid it in. Millsap missed a jumper from the side of the key and Foye rebounded, leading to a neat layup by Gomes on an assist from Snyder. Sloan hurriedly called timeout and got Boozer and D-Will back in the game, but, in just 1:54, the smallball Wolves had bumped a single digit up to 8, permanently changing the complexion of the game.

    Had it gone exactly the other way–smallball giving the Jazz a quick seven and swinging the tide–the anti-Wittman venom from me and others would have been righteous. Because he’s got a lousy won-loss record, he’s fairly bland, he stunk up the joint in his coaching stint last year, and he enjoys the support of McHale, Taylor and some others who have been incumbents of the downfall. We’re quick to criticize and slow to praise.

    So give the man his due for the smallball gambit–it’s not like that quintet had ever played a minute together before, and it may have been the difference tonight. Wittman also chose this game to showcase Kirk Snyder, who doesn’t know all the team’s plays but logged an effective 24:09 tonight because Witt liked matching him up with the beef of Harpring and Kirilenko at the small forward slot. He probably also knew Snyder had that stint in Utah and Sloan doesn’t change spots that much. Snyder, anxious to make a splash and mindful of his impending free agency, was the right feature at the right time. There was also the fabled Wittman discipline, but lower-keyed and effective this time. After the Wolves raced out to an 8-2 lead, Utah scored the next ten points, leading to a no-nonsense time out from Wittman. Smart move whether he said anything or simply broke the prevailing momentum–the Wolves scored the next seven points.

    PS–City Pages writer Jonathan Kaminsky has a nice, long, profile of Al Jefferson up on the citypages.com site. Worth reading.

     

  • The Three Pointer: 4th Quarter Blues

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by David Sherman/NBAE via Getty Images)

    Game #54, Home Game #29: Dallas 99, Minnesota 83

    Season Record: 11-43

    1. Really Kidding

    As someone who was contemptuous of how much the Dallas Mavericks gave up to secure Jason Kidd, let me sheepishly report that the clearcut MVP of tonight’s game was…Jason Kidd. Believe it or not, his line of 17 assists (versus 3 turnovers), 4 steals, 12 points and 7 rebounds doesn’t do him justice. The dimes were doled with numbing regularity (the period totals were 6-4-4-3), but the most memorable were in the second half, especially a pair to center Erick Dampier early in the third, both touch passes as Kidd was falling out of bounds getting a rebound and receiving a feed near the hoop, respectively. All Dampier had to do on both occasions was lay the ball in (in fact he was 4-4 FG and every hoop was gift-wrapped by Kidd on a silver platter). This helped push the Mavs to their first double-digit lead, one they eventually lost as the two ballclubs matched quarter scores for three straight periods–a tie at the end of every one.

    With 5:10 to play in the 4th and Dallas up just 4, Kidd–who’d been penetrating and turning down makeable shots all night for the sake of ball movement–started sinking nails in the Wolves’ coffin. First was a driving layup that few, including Telfair, expected him to finish. Then a 20-foot jumper relatively early in the shot clock. Then a feed to a driving Jason Terry and, following a Nowitzki jumper and 1, a transition layup off a steal that yielded his own three point play. Just like that the lead was 14 with 2:41 to go, and after doling out a relatively pedestrian 17th assist to Josh Howard, #2 from Oaktown was done for the night. Ditto the Wolves.

    Those of us who fancy ourselves "students of the game" will always marvel at how Kidd’s court vision makes basketball intelligence a thing of beauty, and cherish him because of it. But here’s the rub: The Kidd who performed tonight was a very different player than the Kidd manning the point for New Jersey earlier this month. That Kidd was indifferent to the point of laziness on defense, made the competent passes but not the ones that get teammates excited about moving without the ball, and comported himself like a man with a heavy burden. Ironically, that New Jersey team also sported Vince Carter, a player whose admitted tanking in Toronto so offended us "students of the game" because the beauty of his play was so raw and physical, the near opposite of Kidd’s cerebral gambits. But the evidence of our eyes in the way Kidd rejuvenated his game for Dallas tonight–with nearly a third of his 17 assists of the eye-popping sort, 4 steals, and a skipping gait that shows the burden lifted somehow–is that Kidd was tanking in Jersey perhaps no less than Vinsanity withheld himself in Toronto. So, does being "smarter" give Kidd immunity on being slacker?

    2. Jefferson + 4 = -1

    Al Jefferson is getting better in a hurry. He denied any difference in commitment and attitude when I asked him after the Spurs game if he’d rededicated himself to anything going forward from the All Star break, but elements of his game that do not affect his personal point total–passing and defense–have both noticeably sharpened. Whenever Jefferson has blown a defensive assignment in the past three games, he’s either slapped his chest or, if the play is quickly in transition, held up his finger as a sign of taking responsibility. He is much more aggressive about going for the block or the foul when opposing use dribble penetration. And his passing has helped foster some of the best ball movement the Wolves have executed this season.

    Jefferson gives the Wolves something elemental–a big man constantly at threat to score in the low block. Yet an increasingly vexing problem as the season has progressed has been finding him a worthy partner, a relatively potent and consistent player who can score and dish on the perimeter to create space and synergize the offense. Unfortunately, the quartet of candidates being seriously auditioned thus far have varying degrees of skill in terms of commanding the floor and shooting the ball, ranging from the "pure" point Telfair to the point machine McCants, with Marko Jaric close to Telfair and Randy Foye closer to McCants in skill sets.

    At the beginning of the year, Foye was the obvious choice, and remains the most likely to grab the role, if only by default thus far. Further complicating matters is that Foye is a combo guard just as Jefferson is a combo big man–the Wolves would like to see them grow into the point guard and pivot positions, when in fact they seem most at home at off-guard and power forward. Whatever you want to call him, Foye took a small step backward tonight, nailing but one of six shots and delivering a lone assist against two turnovers in 25:04. "He’s going through some ups and downs right now and has got to get his confidence back, which will help everything," Wittman said after the game.

    But with just 28 games to go, the possibility grows that this is a "limbo" season for Foye, much as last year was for McCants; any judgements, pro or con, on what he can and can’t do are occluded by the injury. That’s almost worse than a definitive yes-or-no answer for a franchise that will have a very good pick and two high second-rounders in the draft.

    When the Wolves got the pou pou platter for KG during the off season, Wittman specifically said the squad was looking for two or perhaps three or four of the glut of young’uns populating the team to emerge as potential stars. As expected, mission accomplished for Jefferson. On the winnowing out end of things, Gerald Green has left the premises. But anyone who can say with any confidence that they know how Telfair, Foye, McCants, Brewer and Gomes are going to turn out is kidding himself–not a good sign

    I understand that this is hardly a startling insight for folks following the team, but tonight’s checkered play by the checkered players and the realization that the season is over in 8 weeks seems to throw it into sharper relief. Telfair continued his recent uptick in shooting accuracy but was frequently overmatched by Kidd’s length and rejuvenation. McCants poured in 17 points in 28:08 but continues to epitomize the "different drummer" cliche with a playing rhythm and inherent decision making that is silk for him but often off-kilter for his teammates. Jaric, a rare known commodity, shows why he could be an 8th or 9th man on a playoff contender by assembling one of his 7 point-6 rebound-5 assist games with a little disruptive D thrown in for good measure. And Craig Smith, who was absolutely blistered by Dirk Nowitzski in an obvious mismatch situation earlier in the season, defended Dirk as well as anybody on the team this time out and had me biting my tongue on the lack of Ratliff-Jefferson tandem play that’s occurred since Theo’s return.

    Wittman felt the game turned sour when his team held Dallas without points for seven straight possessions but couldn’t convert themselves. Not surprisingly, Jefferson wasn’t on the floor at the time. Wittman also correctly explained that the difference between the Wolves who shot 71% in the second quarter (to be 59% at the half) and the Wolves who shot 26% in the fourth quarter was aggression, not settling for jumpers, and moving the ball. Not incidentally, Jefferson was 4-4 FG in the second period, 0-3 FG in the final stanza, and mightily pissed over his lack of touches and the team’s inability to score without him. "We lost our composure with each other a little bit and got frustrated," Wittman conceded. No feuds, and nothing specific, just general angst.

    Telfair, Jaric, Foye, and McCants. Is there is a legit partner in that crew for Big
    Al? The longer there is no definite answer, the answer is no.

    3. Smallball Update

    Wittman explained that he doesn’t want to bring Ratliff back too quickly against smaller lineups, so he played sparingly alongside Jefferson at the end of the first and third quarters. Okay, but why bring back Chris Richard if he isn’t going to get any burn? And why does the coach enjoy smallball with this personnel so often? Despite shooting a higher percentage than Dallas (49.4% to 45%), the Wolves were outrebounded 43-35 and got to the line only a third as often as the Mavs, 9 to 27 FTA. Jefferson’s FT totals in the three Dallas games have steadily declined, from 14 to 8 to 4. Does Kevin McHale want only one smashmouth big man barging around?