Here are the lowlights from the game
After what started out as a promising game Minnesota was outscored in the 3rd quarter 33-13. Ryan Hollins was not productive at all after grabbing 1 rebound in 19 minutes. I have said it before but I will say it again; “You cannot be a 7 foot center and grab less than 4 rebounds per game!” I am glad Coach Rambis has given Hollins a shot like I suggested but it is not looking good for Hollins in the long term. Since his first three starts in which he scored 19, 16, and 15 point respectively, Hollins has scored a grand total of 16 points in his past 4 starters.
What I have noticed and do not like is the lack of minutes given to the starters during the losing streak compared to their minutes during the winning streak. And yes before you start saying “this joker knows nothing about basketball……they were losing badly………..idiot!” I understand they were getting blown out but that is no excuse for Big Al and Corey Brewer to get less than 30 minutes. They are much more productive with more minutes and I hate the message it sends when Kurt just gives up. I understand he doesn’t want them to get injured in a blowout loss but c’mon let them play!
The other thing I have noticed both during the winning and losing streaks is Big Al continues to only play (by play I obviously mean play like big Al and not Ryan Hollins) one half per game. Last night he scored 12 points in the 1st half and 2 in the 2nd. He is supposedly the go to guy on this team. They will not win without his consistent production throughout the entire game. I know he is not fully recovered from his injury but he still has to find a way to come up big in games or else he needs to take a backseat to Kevin Love.
Now speaking of the “Beach Boy” Kevin Love, he snapped out of his mini slump with a 22 and 15 performance off the bench. He is the best player on this team and continues to prove he is a force no matter how many minutes he receives, or whether he comes off the bench or starts. He is making an impact in wins and losses while improving his overall game each week.
Jonny Flynn on the other hand needs to make an impact. During the four game win streak Jonny was a productive playmaker. In the past three games he has a total of 10 assists to 9 turnovers. For those of you who are bad at math that is a 1.1 assist to 1.0 turnover ratio. If you are asking what that means? It means bad. That is almost as bad as the Tampa bay Bucs QB to rest of the team ratio under Jon Gruden. Jonny Flynn has to play better. I continue to question whether or not he can indeed be the future PG of this franchise or if he is better suited as a scorer off the bench.
Now moving on to the defense; the Wolves continue to be outrebounded badly as well as continue to struggle against teams with athleticism. Yesterday I identified Charlie Villanueva, Austin Daye, Rodney Stuckey, and Tayshaun Prince as players who would be tough matchups for the T-Wolves. It was proven to be true as they each scored roughly 10 points apiece. The other athletic player who I actually thought we would be able to contain was Jonas Jerebko. Jerebko proved to the one player who they could not stop as he dropped 21 points on Minnesota. The biggest reason for this is the inability to play transition defense which is mostly due to the lack of athleticism on the Wolves roster.
I guess we have spent enough time on this game. Tonight is a new night and it is against a team in the middle of a transition. Hopefully Washington trades Antawn Jamison today and he’ll be one less player to deal with.