Hypothetical: How many games would the Wolves have won running it back this past season?

[urinesane]

This came up in the talk about Gobert and what it would take to make people OK with the trade.

Basically, let's say that the Gobert trade doesn't happen last offseason and for the most part outside of adding Kyle Anderson/Kessler it's a pretty slow offseason. KAT still missed 52 games with the calf injury (we can't just assume he'd have been healthy and that adds too many variables to the equation).

So the question is, how many games do you think the Wolves would have won last year with the following roster (and KAT missing 52 games):

DLO/PatBev/JMac
Ant/Beasley/Nowell
McDaniels/Prince
Anderson/Vando
KAT/Reid/Kessler/Knight

Keep in mind there are no right/wrong answers because we don't have a time machine and there are too many moving pieces and things that could have changed during the season.

It's the offseason though and the draft isn't that interesting this year for us, so it's a good time to talk about the what ifs.

[minimus]

Yeah, I am thinking about it as well. Honestly I think we would have been this year SAC, at 3rd, 4th place in West. But the real question was long-term solution. And I don't think that keeping all that assets was the best investment. Too many players and only 48 minutes at every position. Role players on short deals had good value, so the timing for trade was good, the implementation was bad. I wouldn't have any problems if we traded all assets for starting star PG like Halibut ton. But unfortunately for MIN there was any on the market

[shrink]

Interesting thread! The number that jumped in my head was 37, but even that might be a game or two too high for me.

First, they get double-whammies for health. Last year, their record was much better than it deserved to be. They were one of the league’s healthiest teams, and this year, losing Towns would make them one of the least healthy (for production lost for $). But it’s double because last season, we had tremendous injury luck with our opponents missing games.

This team also loses ground because their ceiling is lower. For example, I liked Vanderbilt, but he was extremely limited with a one-sided game. Ditto for Beasley, and of course, DLo on the defensive end. To me, all three are one-sided complimentary players. That might be fine if they are complimenting future HOF guys like LeBron and AD, but Ant is a long way from that level (and not great at using compliments), and so is Towns, even if he were healthy. I imagine we might win a game or two more of those disastrous losses against weak teams, but we wouldn’t steal all those wins against contenders because we simply don’t have good enough talent, and perhaps lose 5-8 more of our wins against equal and more talented teams.

Lastly, the fact that so many teams had the chance to make the playoffs this season would keep teams competing late into the year. No Gobert trade may mean UTA is still in the mix, and I don’t see that roster any better than NOP, POR or even OKC. Maybe we win a few more games at the beginning of the year because our team knows how to play together, but at the end, we’re simply not as talented as our competitors.

[shrink]

Btw, my post touched on an issue from Jon Krawcinski’s latest pod, where he mentioned that since Wiggins, DLo, Vanderbilt, Thibs and Jimmy had success after leaving the Wolves, it showed that MIN is making “mistakes.” Why couldn’t they be as successful in Minnesota? What did the TWolves do wrong?

Well, this again falls into a famous theme of Wolves distractors - team results should be applied to individual players. But the situations, and players, are clearly not the same.

Thibs was out of the league for a while, and didn’t have success coaching last year. If we were to try to guess at the biggest source of team improvement, I would point to Brunson joining the team. Brunson didn’t come because of Thibs, so he doesn’t deserve credit for that - he came for family connections, and illegally connecting with the team while playing for Dallas.

Jimmy has been great this season. He was good in MIN, and not so good in PHI. Is the argument then, “if the player is ever good, any season on the future, then it shows the Wolves messed up by trading them, regardless of how long ago?” Ugh.

But the biggest annoyance is making this case for Wiggins, DLo, and Vando. First, note that he omits Beasley, who has really struggled in LA. Second, DLo’s numbers in MIN are virtually identical to his ones in LA. He has had some good playoff games for LAL - he had a good play in game for MIN. But bad DLo was bad enough to get bumped for MacLaughlin last playoffskm, and I suspect something similar could happen to DLo in LA. He just runs hot and cold.

But the biggest problem here is that these one-way players joined Hall of Fame players to take on smaller roles! Of COURSE they might do better. Wiggins couldn’t handle being a #1 or #2 in MIN, it doesn’t mean he can’t be a #3 option alongside Curry, Klay and Draymond! And DLo can’t run a show himself .. he says himself he doesn’t identify as a PG .. so it’s easier for him to succeed when LeBron takes the respobility of running the offense, breaking down defenses, and letting DLo shoot wide open three’s.

If MIN has made a mistake, it’s that they didn’t have two Hall of Famer already on the team. If they did, maybe we’d have seen GSW-Wiggins, or LAL-DLo. But if that’s a mistake, (“Dang, I wish I had thought to have two HOF players!”), it’s a mistake that 28 other NBA teams are making as well right now.

[Klomp]

If MIN has made a mistake, it’s that they didn’t have two Hall of Famer already on the team. If they did, maybe we’d have seen GSW-Wiggins, or LAL-DLo. But if that’s a mistake, (“Dang, I wish I had thought to have two HOF players!”), it’s a mistake that 28 other NBA teams are making as well right now.

Well said.

It's a situational failure. Years of drafting/developing incompetence leads to inconsistency in player retention, coach retention and front office retention. It takes years to build that back up.

[shrink]

If MIN has made a mistake, it’s that they didn’t have two Hall of Famer already on the team. If they did, maybe we’d have seen GSW-Wiggins, or LAL-DLo. But if that’s a mistake, (“Dang, I wish I had thought to have two HOF players!”), it’s a mistake that 28 other NBA teams are making as well right now.

Well said.

It's a situational failure. Years of drafting/developing incompetence leads to inconsistency in player retention, coach retention and front office retention. It takes years to build that back up.

True, but it’s worse than that.

The Lakers had several seasons of poor play, but since it’s a destination, LeBron signs there. MIN isn’t getting LeBron to choose them, regardless of how perfectly the organization goes. And ditto for AD, who specifically wanted to be a Laker and play with LeBron.

And if Jonny wants to knock the Wolves organization for their young players succeeding elsewhere, the Lakers deserve just as much criticism. DLo, Kuzma, and Ingram all achieved greater success after the Lakers traded them away.

[Klomp]

It's a situational failure. Years of drafting/developing incompetence leads to inconsistency in player retention, coach retention and front office retention. It takes years to build that back up.

True, but it’s worse than that.

The Lakers had several seasons of poor play, but since it’s a destination, LeBron signs there. MIN isn’t getting LeBron to choose them, regardless of how perfectly the organization goes. And ditto for AD, who specifically wanted to be a Laker and play with LeBron.

Correct. The situation is absolutely exacerbated by the market.

One thing I believe we do have going for us is Ant. Look how people around the league talk about Ant. People gravitate towards him as a player and on a human level. That's so huge.

[shrink]

It's a situational failure. Years of drafting/developing incompetence leads to inconsistency in player retention, coach retention and front office retention. It takes years to build that back up.

True, but it’s worse than that.

The Lakers had several seasons of poor play, but since it’s a destination, LeBron signs there. MIN isn’t getting LeBron to choose them, regardless of how perfectly the organization goes. And ditto for AD, who specifically wanted to be a Laker and play with LeBron.

Correct. The situation is absolutely exacerbated by the market.

One thing I believe we do have going for us is Ant. Look how people around the league talk about Ant. People gravitate towards him as a player and on a human level. That's so huge.

I agree. The Wolves have a slim chance. “Hall of Fame” is an extremely high bar, but there’s a chance he could become one.

But even then, being a lesser free agent destination caps the ceiling. HOF free agents don’t choose MIN. What we’ve seen with Giannis is that a team with one HOF might be able to trade lots of assets for a star player. Getting free agent HOFers to choose your city (BRK, LAL) and come there without giving up trade assets is an almost insurmountable advantage. Hopefully Ant and the Wolves can beat the odds!

(And sorry to urinesane for dragging an interesting thought idea so off track. Hopefully we can go back to answering his hypothetical.)

[urinesane]

If MIN has made a mistake, it’s that they didn’t have two Hall of Famer already on the team. If they did, maybe we’d have seen GSW-Wiggins, or LAL-DLo. But if that’s a mistake, (“Dang, I wish I had thought to have two HOF players!”), it’s a mistake that 28 other NBA teams are making as well right now.

Well said.

It's a situational failure. Years of drafting/developing incompetence leads to inconsistency in player retention, coach retention and front office retention. It takes years to build that back up.

True, but it’s worse than that.

The Lakers had several seasons of poor play, but since it’s a destination, LeBron signs there. MIN isn’t getting LeBron to choose them, regardless of how perfectly the organization goes. And ditto for AD, who specifically wanted to be a Laker and play with LeBron.

And if Jonny wants to knock the Wolves organization for their young players succeeding elsewhere, the Lakers deserve just as much criticism. DLo, Kuzma, and Ingram all achieved greater success after the Lakers traded them away.

Keep in mind not only the destination factor (i.e. California weather is much more comfortable than MN weather) the revenue teams generate is a big factor. The Lakers can take big swings, fail, blow it up, and then make another big move (along with filling their roster with vets on decent deals) as many times as they need to.

Same with Golden State. The Wolves cannot due to the weather factor and revenue generated. It takes the Wolves much longer to retool/rebuild due to resources above all else.

It's like F1, there are teams at the bottom that simply cannot compete because their margin for error is so much smaller financially, and pre-hard cap could never wish to compete with the teams that were willing to spend more (and would also make more money).

[Klomp]

Keep in mind not only the destination factor (i.e. California weather is much more comfortable than MN weather) the revenue teams generate is a big factor. The Lakers can take big swings, fail, blow it up, and then make another big move (along with filling their roster with vets on decent deals) as many times as they need to.

Same with Golden State. The Wolves cannot due to the weather factor and revenue generated. It takes the Wolves much longer to retool/rebuild due to resources above all else.

It's like F1, there are teams at the bottom that simply cannot compete because their margin for error is so much smaller financially, and pre-hard cap could never wish to compete with the teams that were willing to spend more (and would also make more money).

This is part of why I'm still on the optimistic side with new ownership. They have shown early and often that they are not afraid to take big swings. This is a continuation of their business ventures as well. I'm hoping that the eventual (hopeful) new arena deal will help the revenue streams as well.

[urinesane]

Keep in mind not only the destination factor (i.e. California weather is much more comfortable than MN weather) the revenue teams generate is a big factor. The Lakers can take big swings, fail, blow it up, and then make another big move (along with filling their roster with vets on decent deals) as many times as they need to.

Same with Golden State. The Wolves cannot due to the weather factor and revenue generated. It takes the Wolves much longer to retool/rebuild due to resources above all else.

It's like F1, there are teams at the bottom that simply cannot compete because their margin for error is so much smaller financially, and pre-hard cap could never wish to compete with the teams that were willing to spend more (and would also make more money).

This is part of why I'm still on the optimistic side with new ownership. They have shown early and often that they are not afraid to take big swings. This is a continuation of their business ventures as well. I'm hoping that the eventual (hopeful) new arena deal will help the revenue streams as well.

Agreed. So many people are mad about the the Gobert trade in a vacuum, but I am more optimistic about the fact that they actually swung for the fences. It shows that they are willing to, which hasn't really been the case in the past.

[TimberKat]

It's an interesting question. The biggest wild card here is do I assume Jazz going to tank or not? I will assume they found another sucker for Gobert (DLo paid me to say that ).

- Factory in parity of this year where the top 7 teams won a total of 40 games less than previous year. Without complicated math, adjusted Wolves win would be winning 40 games.
- Add 5 games for player progression and less win impact with Conley trade.
- Subtract 7 games for Towns missing 51 games.
- Assume we don't tank (like Dallas) and fight until the end for that 10th spot.

All total up to 38 Wins and end up at 11 or 12. In front or just behind Jazz

[Klomp]

A reminder:

Read on Twitter

And since people like to make the Sacramento comparison:

Read on Twitter

[urinesane]

Yeah, I am thinking about it as well. Honestly I think we would have been this year SAC, at 3rd, 4th place in West. But the real question was long-term solution. And I don't think that keeping all that assets was the best investment. Too many players and only 48 minutes at every position. Role players on short deals had good value, so the timing for trade was good, the implementation was bad. I wouldn't have any problems if we traded all assets for starting star PG like Halibut ton. But unfortunately for MIN there was any on the market

You think they would have been 3rd or 4th this last season even with KAT missing 52 games?

[urinesane]

A reminder:

Read on Twitter

And since people like to make the Sacramento comparison:

Read on Twitter

It would be even more interesting to see how many games were missed based on the value of the player to the team (i.e. star, starter, rotational player etc). Since obv not every missed game is equal value to the team between players.

[shrink]

It would be even more interesting to see how many games were missed based on the value of the player to the team (i.e. star, starter, rotational player etc). Since obv not every missed game is equal value to the team between players.

I don’t know if I posted this, because I couldn’t seem to repeat it, but I made a sort on spotrac which had games missed linked to salary of those players. Now salary isn’t 100% correlated to production, but it must be pretty tight - players generally get big contracts by producing.

Anyway, for the 2022-23 season, the Timberwolves were the most injured team, if you gauge it by the amount of payroll a team couldn’t put on the floor.

[urinesane]

True, but it’s worse than that.

The Lakers had several seasons of poor play, but since it’s a destination, LeBron signs there. MIN isn’t getting LeBron to choose them, regardless of how perfectly the organization goes. And ditto for AD, who specifically wanted to be a Laker and play with LeBron.

Correct. The situation is absolutely exacerbated by the market.

One thing I believe we do have going for us is Ant. Look how people around the league talk about Ant. People gravitate towards him as a player and on a human level. That's so huge.

I agree. The Wolves have a slim chance. “Hall of Fame” is an extremely high bar, but there’s a chance he could become one.

But even then, being a lesser free agent destination caps the ceiling. HOF free agents don’t choose MIN. What we’ve seen with Giannis is that a team with one HOF might be able to trade lots of assets for a star player. Getting free agent HOFers to choose your city (BRK, LAL) and come there without giving up trade assets is an almost insurmountable advantage. Hopefully Ant and the Wolves can beat the odds!

(And sorry to urinesane for dragging an interesting thought idea so off track. Hopefully we can go back to answering his hypothetical.)

I'm thankful for this type of discussion, so by all means keep it going. This is what I am interested in more than people calling for heads and fire sales (and suddenly thinking we should have the same expectations as much bigger markets with more historical success).

[urinesane]

It would be even more interesting to see how many games were missed based on the value of the player to the team (i.e. star, starter, rotational player etc). Since obv not every missed game is equal value to the team between players.

I don’t know if I posted this, because I couldn’t seem to repeat it, but I made a sort on spotrac which had games missed linked to salary of those players. Now salary isn’t 100% correlated to production, but it must be pretty tight - players generally get big contracts by producing.

Anyway, for the 2022-23 season, the Timberwolves were the most injured team, if you gauge it by the amount of payroll a team couldn’t put on the floor.

Not surprised at all by that, thank you for the effort. It really makes their playoff appearance this season that more impressive (even if they didn't live up to the lofty expectations forced by the Gobert price tag). It was a frustrating season, but that's because they actually showed they could beat anyone (and lose to anyone), I'll take that over the apathetic crap we've had to deal with most seasons after the All-Star break in the post KG-era.

[minimus]

Yeah, I am thinking about it as well. Honestly I think we would have been this year SAC, at 3rd, 4th place in West. But the real question was long-term solution. And I don't think that keeping all that assets was the best investment. Too many players and only 48 minutes at every position. Role players on short deals had good value, so the timing for trade was good, the implementation was bad. I wouldn't have any problems if we traded all assets for starting star PG like Halibut ton. But unfortunately for MIN there was any on the market

You think they would have been 3rd or 4th this last season even with KAT missing 52 games?

Yes, around 48-52 games. We also would not help UTA and LAL via trades.