The Rake Magazine

Tag: Timberwolves small lineup

  • The Three Pointer: Back To Earth

    Copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by Bill Baptist/NBAE via Getty Images)

    Game #70, Road Game #34: Minnesota 86, Houston 97

    Season Record: 18-52

    1. Stubborn Smallball

    Let the record show that Al Jefferson and Ryan Gomes tied for the "best" plus/margin (-4) among the 9 Wolves who played in tonight’s 11-point loss to Houston, that Luis Scola had the Rockets’ only minus at -1 and that Dikembe Mutombo was second-worst among the Houston’s starters at plus +3. Despite all these numbers, you can’t convince me that the Wolves were better off playing smallball versus this Houston team. They were soundly beaten on the boards, 58-38, lost the points in the paint battle by double-digits (sorry, can’t find the numbers for it) and also yielded more second-chance points due mostly to the plethora of Rockets putbacks by the bigs.

    The Rockets’ front line of Mutombo/Scola/Shane Battier finished with 14 offensive rebounds; the Wolves front trio of Jefferson/Gomes/Kirk Snyder had 19 defensive rebounds–a weak plus +5 rebound margin cleaning their defensive glass. And don’t look to the backcourt for bailouts, because these Rockets battle and box out. Randy Foye and Marko Jaric totaled 3 rebounds *combined" while Tracy McGrady had 11 on his own.

    It would have been nice to see Chris Richard or Michael Doleac matched up with Mutombo instead of Jefferson, who shot 9-21 FG and was appropriately pissed that he wasn’t getting enough touches at times in the second half. As much as I love Ryan Gomes, I’d much rather see Jefferson scrapping for rebounds against Scola, the hands-down Rookie of the Year (it’s not close) and one leather-tough hombre in the paint, who snagged a career-high 18 boards going against Gomes. Put Gomes out on his stylistic mentor, Battier, who had a rotten game on paper–3-12 FG, 1-7 3pt, 5 turnovers–and yet played such superb help defense against Jefferson and in deterring penetration and in rotating over that you understand how a team coached by Rick Adelman–a great offensive coach–is doing such a good job limiting points.

    A legit center beside Jefferson and Gomes would kick Kirk Snyder back to the backcourt to split minutes with Marko Jaric guarding McGrady who played like he was in significant pain for most of the night (he was, he has a sprained shoulder and wasn’t even expected to play) but rose to the occasion at crunchtime. More on that in a minute. The point is, Snyder and Jaric and McCants in the backcourt along with Randy Foye. And if you really are trying to win the game, forget about the confidence-depleted, late-season thin man Corey Brewer trying to stop T-Mac, who almost literally shrugged him off a couple of times going up for jumpers. Jaric, who did such a beautiful job hounding McGrady during the nail-biter the teams played at Target Center, was a little less effective tonight, but probably a titch better than Snyder.

    Bottom line, if Mutombo insists on guarding Jefferson, force Battier to run around with Gomes on the perimeter, spot up Doleac for little step-out pops against Scola, or have Chris Richard sealing Scola off the boards.

    It probably wouldn’t matter. In Chuck Hayes and Carl Landry, the Rockets have a couple more sweat-equity ‘tweeners coming off the bench who are better than Richard and Chris Smith (who combined for 2-5 FG and just 2 rebounds in more than 25 minutes of collective action). The string of patsies are temporarily over. You can see how this ballclub could afford to let Snyder languish on the pine without so much as a second or third look.

    Speaking of which…

    2. The Uneven Adventures of Kirk Snyder

    The guy with the Mr. Potato Head nose had a sparkling, maybe even thrilling, first quarter. It was the hackneyed story of the neglected dude traded away and now come to wreak vengeance and expose the traitor traders for their blind stupidity. Even with Battier on him (although Battier wasn’t necessarily making him the top priority), Snyder began by getting to the rim–his shots were layups, dunks, putbacks, and thus some free throws to boot. But better yet, he freelanced from penetration and maintained that drive and kick game he had flashed against the hapless Knicks last time out, doling dimes to Gomes, Jefferson, Foye and Gomes again to finish the tightly contested (23-24) first quarter with a triple double flirtation: 7 points, 4 rebounds (half the team’s total), and 4 assists (out of the team’s 7).

    Alas, the thing Snyder had the most of after that whirlwind first period was turnovers–5 of them, to total six miscues for the game. He also added a mere 5 points, two rebounds and two assists in the final three quarters (in which he played 18:13 to Brewer’s 17:47 after going all 12 minutes of the first) to finish with a respectable line, if not exactly the triumphant payback he’d hoped. But the numbers aren’t usually the story anyway with Snyder. He seems to play with a little bit of mean streak, and I vacillate between liking and frowning at that side of his makeup. On the one hand he makes the hustle plays that we all want to pin gold stars on Brewer for accomplishing. In the first half tonight, he had enough juice and foresight to hightail after Marko Jaric after Jaric had made a steal and subsequently blown the contested layup (big surprise, eh?), slamming home Jaric’s too-strong finish. Conversely, there was a play during Snyder’s second half turnover spree where, after the faulty pass, he flew down the floor trailing a Rockets’ 3-on-1 drill, and it took two nifty bits of execution–a feed back from T-Mac under the hoop to a driving Scola, who double pumped under Snyder’s flying block attempt to lay it in–to prevent him from making a glorious recovery.

    Coach Wittman clearly likes Snyder’s game, but also knows the downsides. The other day he likened Snyder to McCants, in that both can do stupid things due to overweening aggression, but since the vice and virtue of it are so close together, you have to accept the whole package. And after the Wolves had failed to score for about two and a half minutes early in the third period, we saw the vice and virtue collide as one–Snyder took the ball right up the gut and challenged Mutombo with an audacious slam-dunk attempt. The shot was missed–Snyder left his feet just inside the foul line–but he drew the foul on Mutombo even as he was driving his forearm into Mutombo’s jaw.

    Maybe everything that happened after that looked more soap operatic than it was–it’s hard to know watching on television. But the 41-year old African, who had been honored at halftime for his amazing humanitarian work building hospitals in his native Congo and other countries, didn’t take kindly to the shot in the kisser and began jawing at Snyder from his spot in the lane as Snyder shot the free throws. And right there, Snyder went back to being the contemptible scrub, called out by the distinguished vet, in the eyes of his former teammates. He missed the second free throw and began to get picked on–McGrady and Battier both went at him when he was playing D, and at the other end, his passes were getting picked off more frequently. But whether or not there was a little extra emotion out there, it’s unimpeachable that Snyder already has delivered more dividends–and the promise of more still–than the man for whom he was traded, the immature Gerald Green. But it is also true that, unlike the Wolves, Houston has a lot of guard-dog athletes that made Snyder reasonably redundant.

    3. A Few More Quick Things

    Randy Foye played his worst game in quite awhile and simply seemed mentally out of sorts the entire contest. He chucked his first ill-advised jumper 14 seconds into the game, and, aside from a really pretty reverse back to either Gomes or Jaric in which he dribbled left and then spun and tossed it back to right elbow, h
    e had the sort of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey shot selection reminiscent of Troy Hudson, both in shooting quickly on the shot clock, turning down some good looks, and taking a heat check after one basket (and that one was a lucky bounce that went way up and fell through the hole). He finished 2-8 FG, with 4 assists and 5 turnovers and but one rebound, far below his recent averages. No, this is not a call for Foye to be labelled a bust at the point–he had a bad game. Just as I needed two or three good games to bump me off the notion that Foye is overmatched running an offense, I’ll need this lack of court instincts reprised a couple or three more games before the serious doubts creep back in.

    Rashad McCants likewise had a mostly off-kilter evening, until he finally rediscovered his stroke early in the 4th quarter, exploding for 7 points in the first 2:27 of the period to cut a 60-69 deficit to 70-72 with 9:33 to play. The comeback was doomed when Shaddy chose to try and make incidental contact into a whistle, awkwardly chucking a long airball, which Houston converted into a McGrady jumper on the next possession. Once again we have a situation where McCants rallies the ballclub partway back. He has a knack for turning potential blowouts into more engaging defeats–and no, that’s not a compliment. It is always fun to watch him stroke the long jumper or negotiate the thicket on a drive to the hoop–he leads the team is visually pleasing points by a huge margin–but this 1-7 FG through 3 followed by 5-8 FG in the fourth is something we’ve seen before. What we haven’t seen, aside from a very early win over Sacramento, are that glittering stroke and those creative treks to the rim spelling the clearcut difference between a victory and a defeat.

    Only caught a little of the Phoenix-Celts game, but what a different enviroment for Kevin Garnett. Like everyone else, he abused Amare Stoudamire’s matador D and banged in 30 points, but can anyone imagine him playing more than 30 minutes without a single defensive rebound while here in Minnesota? Or that his team would win by 20 over one of the supposedly elite NBA teams?

    The San Antonio tilt is not televised except for League Pass and I’ll be out of town on another assignment during the Sunday home game against Utah. I’ll throw up an open thread for Sunday evening for those who want to chime in.

  • The Three Pointer: Flat

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

    Game #59, Home Game #32: Charlotte 109, Minnesota 89

    Season Record: 12-47

    1. Getting the Message

    It is just early March, with more than a fourth of the season’s games still to play, but the Minnesota Timberwolves are counting ping pong balls a lot more assiduously than they are counting victories.

    Is the team "tanking"? No, not in the blatant, Mark Madsen will chuck up three pointers, or Kevin Garnett will suffer an injury sort of way. But the situation feels uncomfortably similar to this stretch of the season last year, when it became pretty obvious that the best five-man team the Wolves could put on the floor was KG and a bunch of young kids, yet Randy Wittman and the front office stubbornly played the stinking vets like Mark Blount and Ricky Davis with Garnett, all the while trying to convince would-be ticket-buyers that there was a "Blueprint" in the offing that would spell wins down the road. It just so happened that part of that blueprint was losing enough games to keep the draft pick instead of sending it to the Clippers.

    Flash forward to this season. The Wolves have just lost consecutive home games to a Seattle squad that had won just 15 games all season, and now a Charlotte team that had lost nine in a row on the road and triumphed only once–in overtime, yet–in the entire month of February. In both games, Minnesota played quarter-assed defense (half assed is too much praise) and didn’t step up when it mattered most. In the postgame press conference Wittman stated the obvious: "Tonight we tried to have a nonaggression pact with the other team…it was happening from the first play of the game to the last play of the game…I think we are worrying too much about what is happening at the offensive end and not enough about what is happening on defnese…we had 3 free throws and 2 offensive rebounds in the second half–that’s nonaggression.

    All true. But the part that perked up my ears was when Wittman mentioned, twice, at different points in his harangue, that Ryan Gomes was doing a noble job of fronting power forward Emeka Okafor, denying him the ball, and then–and here Wittman said it, twice–he went to his "big lineup" and the person on Okafor guarded him from behind and let him shoot. And that’s when it hit me: The "big lineup" Wittman was criticizing to the inferred plaudits of Gomes and the "small lineup" consisted of Al Jefferson at center and Craig Smith at power forward. But that "big lineup" was the front line I was criticizing as a "small lineujp" earlier in the season before Wittman went smaller still with Jefferson at center and Gomes at power forward. And the reason it is now the de facto "big lineup" is because the Timberwolves braintrust thought it would be a good idea to cut Theo Ratliff loose.

    If your idea is to be as competitive as possible and win as many games as possible, buying out the remainder of Ratliff’s contract made absolutely no sense. If your idea is to groom Al Jefferson at his natural power forward position and get him used to playing with a defensive-oriented, shot-blocking man in the pivot who would be the perfect complement to Jefferson’s skill set, than buying Ratliff out makes no sense. If your idea is to see how the existing centers who are either young and unproven (Chris Richard) or signed relatively long term (Mark Madsen) do paired with Jefferson, the buying out of Ratliff does have some logic–but obviously that is not the Wolves’ intent. Richard got a whole 5:53 worth of burn tonight, bringing him up to 29:38 over the past six games–he played 25:17 in the December 14 game against Seattle alone. But even when the coaches deign to play Richard, it is almost always *replacing Jefferson at center*; the two rarely if ever play together. Meanwhile, Madsen hasn’t played since a token appearance against Toronto February 10, which was ten games ago. And Michael Doleac has logged a grand 2:25 in the last six games.

    If Wittman wanted this ballclub to care more about defense than offense, he should have kept Ratliff, who I daresay would have made Okafor think about turning and shooting even playing behind him. Ditto Doleac, and probably Madsen. Richard and Okafor were on the floor at the same time for less than two minutes tonight.

    At the end of the exhibition season, I was genuinely looking forward to the time when the Wolves could trot out a front line of Ratliff, Jefferson and Corey Brewer; I remember writing at the time that it had the potential to be a very good defensive trio. I was also looking forward to a shared backcourt of Foye and McCants with that front line. Yes, Ratliff would have been gone next year anyway, but he would have provided some defensive stability and attention to that side of the ball this year; he would have hopefully helped develop a habit of talking to each other and taking pride in one’s defense. I saw a team with Ratliff, Foye and Jefferson winning between 20 and 30 games. Now injuries certainly intervened. But it’s funny; just when that unit had a chance to finally get together, the Wolves’ braintrust pulled the plug and let Theo walk, saving owner Glen Taylor perhaps $3 or $4 million–and, not incidentally, putting them in a better position to let the likes of Seattle and Charlotte convert more than half their shots en route to road wins at Target Center.

    "Let’s build it together," is the new "Blueprint For the Future." It feels very familiar: A hard, aggressive public relations campaign while Theo gets his buyout and Antoine Walker–another vet who is highly respected in the locker room and has been a solid citizen up until the trade deadline, and is still straining to be a solid citizen now–sits in street clothes, spared the indignity of not having DNP-CD next to his name. But who’s to say ‘Toine couldn’t have provided a spark tonight, spread the floor a little bit?

    Don’t think the players on the roster don’t notice these things. The talk around the league is how the Lakers got Pau and the Mavs Kidd and the Suns Shaq. Then there are teams that are positioning themselves for next year. Minnesota is in the latter batch–for the third straight year. And for the third straight year, losing games means more to this squad than to most, because the difference is not just a better position in the ping-pong ball chase, it is the difference perhaps between having a pick and forking it over to the Clips.

    Every year about this time, I get into long involved discussions with people who think it best to inadvertantly tank, by "playing the young kids," or simply figuring out ways to move up in the draft. I understand the logic of the argument. But I hew to a simpler logic: Fans who pay good money to watch a pro NBA team deserve to see a team that is doing whatever possible to win now and win later with the personnel they have. And everyone in the Wolves locker room knows that the personnel moves made in recent days–be it the dumping of Ratliff or the mothballing of Walker–are not about winning now or later with the current personnel. It is about making sure another high draft pick comes to this ballclub. That’s not exactly a motivating force.

    There is no doubt in my mind that if Theo Ratliff were still around and Antoine Walker was still getting some rotations that overall morale would be higher, and the defensive effort would be more rugged. I get the math of the draft picks. I get the "we’ll see who really wants to step up and play these last few weeks of the season," speech. But when Glen Taylor goes on television and talks about how much more fun this season has been than the last two, because you can really see how the young kids are coming together and ho
    w there is a plan in place and how the future is brighter–well, some of that is true and some of that is fairly intolerable bullshit. This team is currently playing uninspired, demoralized basketball–they just handed a game to the pathetic Sonics and got impudently spanked by a team that couldn’t beat anybody in regulation during the entire month of February–you know, the month that ended four days ago. It’s not fun. It feels a hell of a lot like the previous two years, when it was hard to tell which was worse: If the front office knew what it was doing or if it didn’t. It’s a Twilight Zone, and that’s exactly how the players are responding to it.

    2. Muddied Waters

    Meanwhile, the jury is out on exactly how meaningful these last six weeks are going to be. Let me offer a few examples.

    Point guard: The competition is between Randy Foye and Sebastian Telfair. The recent plan has been to start them both in the same undersized backcourt and then go "big" by swapping Bassy out for a bigger player than kicks Foye over to the point. Management obviously would prefer that Foye blossom into a quality point guard and settle the matter, consigning Telfair to back-up point status and enabling Rashad McCants to glide in as sixth man and shooting guard, or bump Corey Brewer back to the 2 when the Wolves really do want to go "big."

    If this really is about players stepping up and making claims for their time, no favorites considered, then Telfair is doing his part. Wolves fans don’t even blink twice when they read a line like Bassy’s 9/1 assist to turnover ratio tonight. He’s got 141 assists versus just 33 turnovers in his last 22 games. The knock, of course, is that he is an unreliable shooter.

    But Telfair is ever so slowly but surely improving that facet of his game. Tonight he sank 6-11 FG for 12 points, the 7th time in 10 games he’s cracked double figures, despite having his minutes cut some since Foye’s return. More significantly, he’s begun stroking the j without mentally checking himself, a crucial confidence threshold that he needs to maintain to have any shot at becoming a bona fide point guard in this league. Tonight in the second quarter he clanked a wide open look from about 13 feet, and had the ball bounce right back out to him. The Bassy of earlier this season would have looked around for a pass and, if not seeing one, brought the ball back out to set up a play. Tonight he got the rebound and realized he was in the exact same position as before–wide open for a 13 footer. After the quickest of glances to see if anyone was cutting for the hoop, he rose up and stuck the jumper. In the third quarter, a double-teamed Jefferson dished it out to him and Telfair nailed the jumper (inexplicably, no assist for Jefferson). Then there was the play where Bassy came down, did a quick dribble between his legs, faded right and sank a long two-pointer. And the play where Telfair sped down the court looking for a fast break, only to have no one keeping up. Finally, he hit the trailer Smith, who promptly dished it right back to him. Open again, Telfair let it fly–swish. All of which led to a play in the fourth where the ball went out to Telfair and Charlotte’s perimeter D started to close out on him. Telfair promptly zipped a pass to Smith beneath the hoop for a layup.

    As has been true for the past couple weeks, Foye was more inconsistent, alternately better and worse than his competitor. Tonight he came out smokin’ with 9 points and 4 assists in the first quarter, including some midrange penetration that often yields his running banker on the right lane. He followed that up with 1-1 FG but two turnovers in 5:59 of the second period, then a gruesome second half in which he went 2-5 FG but produced zero assists and two more turnovers, plus 5 personal fouls, in 14:39. The Randy Foye of the 1st quarter deserves the starting point guard position. The Randy Foye who has a 0/4 assist to turnover ratio and 5 fouls in the last three periods must be given the "injuries take time to heal" waiver because the Wolves invested a lot in him both in terms of his draft position and his being acquired for the reigning rookie and the year and current All Star, Brandon Roy. It also of no small concern that both Telfair and Foye were just awful on defense, along with just about every member of the ballclub.

    Power forward not named Jefferson. With Walker bumped aside, the meaningful competitors are Craig Smith and Ryan Gomes. I’ve always felt like the Rhino is easy to overestimate because he’s the archtypal gritty underdog people love to root for as an undersized second-round draft pick with an uncanny knack for scoring in the paint. Consequently, I’ve probably underestimated him this season. He and Gomes share a proclivity for occasional breakout games–they are two of three Wolves to have scored 35 or more this season–and more frequent disappearances. But lately he’s had another boomlet, and what’s especially pleasant to see is how much he is moving without the ball, making him an excellent partner for Telfair–and, increasingly, Jefferson, who is looking for him near the hoop as often as he looks to the perimeter when the double coverage comes. The other things that distinguish Smith are superb hands–that aforementioned bullet pass from Telfair was partially screened by defenders and not an easy catch–and a knack for footwork and body control that create space versus taller opponents, which, along with a nice touch with the arc, gets him hoops that are improbable to say the least.

    Smith is not a very good defender, however, with an admirable frequency but low success rate at attempting to draw charges, and a ‘tweener curse that makes him too short versus large power forwards and too slow versus quick power forwards.

    Gomes is a more versatile glue guy, and not just because he can play the 3 too. He has more range on his jumper (but is less accurate than Smith overall), and is a better passer (‘tho Smith is improving), dribbler, and defender. Wittman’s comments about the defensing of Okafor tonight notwithstanding, however, Smith generally is better able to guard low-post oriented players, and so if Minnesota truly wants Jefferson to be the center in their future, Smith’s odds of being resigned in Minnesota go up. Another relative plus for Smith: He will be cheaper than Gomes.

    Those are just two thumbnail comparison sketches, and what they dramatize for me is that the sample size remains incredibly small and there are so many contingencies that folks–probably including the front office–don’t even know what the parmaters of comparison or the needs of the ballclub are going to be. A part of me yearns to see the same kind of decisive handicapping that had the Wolves not offer an extension to Gerald Green and then unload him at the trading deadline. They saved time by deciding that he was never going to be an answer. Rather than give Kirk Snyder all kinds of burn, or continue to fiddle with McCants/Foye/Telfair without a clear sense of what you are looking for(due top draft uncertainty, I understand), it would be nice to know what each player needs to accomplish or resolve in order to raise his stock. Hopefully, an emphasis on improving defensive prowess is on everyone’s criteria list.

    3. Sign of Progress

    Let the record show that Jefferson had two assists to night–as I mentioned earlier, I saw three, perhaps even four. But for the first time this season I also saw something equally exciting for Wolves fans. When Jefferson was being double teamed in the fourth quater and the Wolves ran their bread and butter play with a baseline cutter going past Jefferson on the left block, he was able to create space for himself by feinting the pass, then spinning for a relatively uncontested layup. The better he can dish, the easier he can score. It was a rare optimistic moment.