winforlose wrote:Sugarless wrote:winforlose wrote:
I am not sure if your trolling me or if your still half asleep. Giving you the benefit of the doubt I will spell it out for you. Dlo, Beasley, MCD, Vanderbilt, and KAT is your lineup. The offense runs through KAT as it has been the past few weeks. When they double on KAT he passes to the open player. Because they will swarm Beasley as well he will often swing to Dlo for open 3s.
Hahaha. Dude, what are you even talking about? That has absolutely nothing to do with what I depicted on my message, which was Edwards driving against a wall of players and sending the ball out to Rubio at the 3-pt line. It doesn't even have anything to do with what you first replied, which was merely changing Rubio for Russell and Edwards for Beasley in that sequence.
Now you're going on about running the offense through KAT who will be doubled, and then the defense will swarm Beasley as well (how many guys does that defense have, by the way?) who will then 'often' pass to Russell for an open 3.
You can just admit when you're wrong or didn't think thoroughly about something and move on. No need to move the goalposts and waste anyone's time.
I went back and looked at your original post. You are correct that I missed the word Him in the sentence about running the offense. That said, with Dlo instead of Rubio taking the shot it will go in more often. As for swarming Beasley, rewatch the games before the suspension with KAT and Beasley but not Dlo. They were swarming him. They always kept a player ready to switch out or close out on him. Whether Beasley, Nowell, Ant, JMAC, or anyone else drives and kicks I would rather have Dlo take the shot instead of Rubio. It is also true that when Ant and Beasley play together Beasley is another excellent target for Ant to kick to.
Thanks for checking it again.
I would also prefer having a better shooter like Russell catching the ball beyond the 3-pt line instead of Rubio, like I said 5 3PA is too many for Ricky more often than not. But that's the thing, Rubio wouldn't be taking those shots if he was the one running the offense. That's why I said the Wolves are doing it backwards.
As for the conversation of how the offense is supposed to be running through KAT and how it will work with Russell and Beasley back, that's not what happening. That's a narrative that started when Finch arrived and said that's what he wanted to do (of course the first thing he's going to say is what his star wants to hear), and Wolves fans have been happy to go with it without paying too much attention, but these are KAT's numbers this season:
- With Saunders: 11 games, 2.06 touches per minute, 2.10 seconds per touch
- With Finch: 13 games, 1.97 touches per minute, 2.19 seconds per touch
No change whatsoever. Basically the same number of touches (about a tenth less per minute under Finch) and the same time on the ball (about a tenth of a second more per touch). And there's not a big change in the type of touches he's getting, either. It's also all on par with what his career has been so far.
The thing is you can't run the offense through Towns like you would through a guy like Jokic (way more touches per minute, longer time on the ball, more elbow touches which are key in that scheme) because KAT is not as good as Joker handling the ball, passing it, or even using his body to set a screen while handing the rock off to a teammate. He also doesn't have the same offense moving around him, which doesn't help him or the Wolves.
But basketball is not that difficult, and thankfully you don't need to have a historic point-center to run your offense. Since they're going to be the players that have the ball in their hands most of the time, what you need is to have guys that possess:
- Good ballhandling, so they can go anywhere around the court with the ball, including through traffic.
- The ability to read the defense.
- The knowledge to memorize and understand the playbook, and the capacity and willingness to execute it.
- Good awareness, to understand where everyone's on the court and what their options are at any moment.
- Leadership, so they can teach and direct their teammates and correct things whether it's on the fly or while the clock is stopped.
- Good passing skills.
- The BBIQ and presence of mind to take care of the ball.
Every one of those things comes first. Beyond that you want them to be good scorers, hopefully from every spot on the floor (then you have a HOF guy like Nash or Chris Paul).
There are two guys on this roster that fit that mold to different degrees. Rubio and McLaughlin. Everyone else doesn't. Russell is an ok passer but he doesn't have the IQ, the leadership or the willingness to run an offense for his team. He's a me-first player who takes awful shots way too often, he's TO prone and he's a ball-stopper who loves going ISO. This is not debatable, whether you like him or not for his scoring, that's who he is and that's who he's always been. The same reasons why people are not happy with Edwards running the offense are the ones why Russell is not a better option (you can say Russell is a better passer, while he's also worse at driving since he's an average ballhandler and is more athletically challenged).
The Wolves need to stop trying to pamper their scorers and use some common sense for once so they can establish a team-oriented, efficient offense. That's not running things mainly through KAT, nor Edwards, nor Russell or Beasley, even though everyone needs to be involved (KAT needs to be able to post up and attack or pass out of the double team, Beasley needs to work off the ball and be ready to shoot or to drive if he has an open lane, Edwards should get the ball on the move -which he rarely does now- so he can make better use of his athleticism and ability to attack the paint). Just like it wasn't with Wiggins, LaVine, Bazz or Culver last year. They need to use their players to the best of their abilities, and they need to start thinking about the collective first and foremost. I don't care if that's with Ricky (I'm so hoping he gets traded today, and I'm going to be so pissed when he doesn't), McLaughlin or whoever comes next via draft or trade, but at some point common sense needs to prevail if Minnesota wants to stop being the laughing stock of the league and the worst-run franchise in major sports history in the US.