Minnesota Timberwolves Player Review: Gorgui Dieng

Gorgui Dieng is the third player we’ve reviewed in our Minnesota Timberwolves player review series following a season that saw him drop from third on the team in minutes in 2016-17 to ninth in 2017-18.

When the Timberwolves brought Taj Gibson into the fold last July with a two-year, $28 million contract, it was clear that the’d step into the starting lineup and eat into Gorgui Dieng’s minutes.

What we didn’t know was that his minutes would nearly be cut in half, from 32.4 in 2016-17 to 16.9 this season. Of course, this was also the first year of Dieng’s four-year, $62.8 million contract he signed prior to the 2016-17 campaign. (If we want to play this game, Dieng was paid $10,586.91 for every minute he was on the court this year, and he still played in 79 of the team’s 82 games.)

Dieng went from being a key member of Tom Thibodeau’s heavily-taxed starting lineup to the third big man in what was mostly a two-man rotation.

While the idea of having a flexible big man like Dieng, who can play both the power forward and center positions, is awesome, it was often short minutes at the end of the first quarter spelling first Karl-Anthony Towns and then Gibson before both starting big men returned early in the second frame.

Dieng was still useful when on the court, seeing an uptick in rebounding rate, 3-point rate, and, somewhat surprisingly, free throw rate. He also shot more mid-range jumpers from beyond 16 feet than ever before but hit on a career-high 45.5 percent of those attempts.

Dieng largely played on a second unit that saw Jamal Crawford as a primary ball-handler, and while there was clear chemistry between the two, they were clearly more comfortable operating in a pick-and-pop than with Dieng rolling to the rim.

There was a lot of this:

And not enough of this:

Dieng scored just 0.9 points per possession (PPP) as the roll-man in the pick-and-roll on the season, which was tied for 35th out of 88 players that played in more than 50 games and used more than 10 percent of their offensive possessions as the roll-man. This is down from 1.06 PPP a year ago, when he was tied for 19th out of 91 players with the same criteria.

The biggest factor here is that Dieng played the majority of his minutes with Ricky Rubio in 2016-17, and playing alongside a ball-dominant Crawford and limited minutes with Tyus Jones. There’s an obvious difference in style of play, as well as both willingness and ability to pass, so it’s hard to blame this one on Dieng.

All things considered, Dieng played his role well enough this year, and his dip in field goal percentage can largely be attributed to a decrease in shots at the rim. After attempting 39 percent of his career field goal attempts within three feet, he shot only 25.5 percent of his attempts from that range in 2017-18 — that’s enough to put a dent in anyone’s shooting efficiency.

Don’t be surprised to see Tom Thibodeau and general manager Scott Layden shop Dieng this summer, although it would likely take attaching the No. 20 draft pick in this year’s draft or a future pick in order to move the three years and approximately $48 million remaining on his contract. Dieng is already 28 years old and his current contract will effectively take him all the way through his prime.

This is a classic case of Dieng being more valuable — even at the current hard cap cost — on the team than as a trade “asset” that must be combined with another asset in order to move it. Dieng is one of the better backup big men in the league, and his contract looks far worse because of his head coach’s reliance on the team’s starters.

Next: Unpacking the upcoming Timberwolves offseason

It’ll be an interesting offseason, to be sure, and one that could see the longest-tenured Timberwolf find his way to a new city.