Despite notching their first playoff appearance in 14 years, there are plenty of things the Minnesota Timberwolves need to fix over the summer.
While the Timberwolves won 47 games and were likely to land a top-four seed in the Western Conference until Jimmy Butler‘s late February knee injury, there are still many holes that Tom Thibodeau and the Wolves front office need to fill.
From specific roles to organizational structure and direction, there is plenty of room for improvement, and May is a great time to talk about those steps.
Let’s get into it with a fairly obvious one.
#1 – Find 3-point shooting
This isn’t going to surprise anyone, is it?
On the one hand, the Timberwolves shot a respectable 35.7 percent from beyond the arc during the 2017-18 regular season — good enough for 19th in the NBA.
But they were dead-last in both makes and attempts, which isn’t exactly a recipe to keep up with the league’s true contenders in 2018 and beyond. And while Minnesota’s offense still finished with the fourth-best offensive rating in the league, the idea of keeping pace with the likes of the Houston Rockets in the postseason is fairly far-fetched.
To be fair, Thibodeau was reported very interested in bringing in J.J. Redick last summer, but Redick took one year and much more money on a “prove-it” type of deal from Philadelphia. Jeff Teague is obviously a better 3-point shooter than Ricky Rubio. And Jamal Crawford had recently shot the ball well from beyond the arc and was the sixth-man option that Thibs brought in last offseason.
But the scheme doesn’t lend itself to many long-range attempts, and while virtually everyone in the Wolves rotation is an adequate 3-point shooter, there just weren’t enough shots getting up towards the rim. So this need is as much a slight adjustment to the offense as it is the need to acquire a true sharpshooter, which the Timberwolves still don’t have.
#4 – Add to wing depth
Jimmy Butler and Andrew Wiggins each averaged north of 36 minutes per game during the 2017-18 season. That meant that there was precious little time for their backups to see the floor.
It ultimately led to a small, three-guard lineup that was used with some positive results in the five playoff games against Houston, featuring three of Jeff Teague, Tyus Jones, Jamal Crawford, and Derrick Rose. Crawford is unlikely to be back in a Wolves uniform, but it does seem somewhat likely that Rose will be back in Minnesota next season.
Such a diminutive lineup will not work in heavy minutes, and it typically requires either Butler or Wiggins to play the small-ball four.
Once Shabazz Muhammad was exiled from the regular rotation (and, eventually, from the roster altogether), Marcus Georges-Hunt was the only wing this side of Crawford who saw minutes — and his playing time dropped considerably after the calendar flipped to 2018.
The Wolves need to find something resembling a “3-and-D” backup wing to spell Butler and Wiggins for a 15-18 minute stretch on a nightly basis. Minnesota flirted with the idea of trading for C.J. Miles last summer and had interest in a variety of veterans either on the trade block or bought-out all the way into the season, but never pulled the trigger.
Of course, Thibodeau would actually need to give meaningful minutes to any additions, but it starts with making the effort to acquire the talent. And playing Butler north of 36 minutes a night in his age-29 season isn’t the ideal solution when it comes to filling out minutes at the two and the three.
#3 – Have a plan at backup point guard
Many Wolves fans have already answered this question for Thibs and are ready to flip to the next item on the list.
Tyus Jones, amirite?
Well, sure, you are right. Jones is the answer, as it’s fairly clear that he was the NBA’s best pure backup point guard during the 2017-18 season. From my review of Jones’ season:
"Jones did finish seventh among all point guards in ESPN’s Real Plus-Minus (RPM) metric at 4.77, just behind Russell Westbrook and ahead of the likes of Jrue Holiday, Kemba Walker, Ben Simmons, Kyrie Irving, and Ricky Rubio. He also posted more win shares per 48 minutes than Teague and a better box score plus-minus, according to Basketball-Reference. While it would be foolish to take RPM (or any other metric, for that matter) as gospel, it’s notable that Jones ranks highly in a number of categories. Clearly, the impact he had on the court in his 17.9 minutes per game was positive, and given the rest of the bench unit he was playing alongside, it’s even more significant."
Easy enough, right? Well, let’s consider the facts, which point to Thibodeau loving the impact that Rose had on the Wolves team down the stretch in March and April. To be fair, Rose did have a positive influence when on the floor in the playoffs, but to what end? His defense is far inferior to Jones’, and his ball-dominant ways don’t necessarily fit with what the Wolves need out of their second unit.
Jones is also one of the Wolves’ most tradeable assets, due to his contract, age, and level of production. A world in which Thibodeau flips Jones for another asset and brings back Rose on an affordable deal is not a world that I would rule out as of late May.
While many would firmly believe that Jones is the answer at the backup point guard spot and the Wolves’ trade assets and cap space are better used elsewhere versus a scenario that jettisons Jones in favor of Rose, the reality is that we have no idea what Thibs is about to do. And whatever it is, he needs to make a decision sooner rather than later and not let these questions hang over everyone’s head in the meantime.
#2 – Figure out the payroll situation/find cap room
The Timberwolves will operate in 2018 with Andrew Wiggins as their highest-paid player. And it isn’t close; Wiggins will pull in nearly $5 million more than Jimmy Butler during the 2018-19 campaign.
In a vacuum, it’s of course crazy that Wiggins will out-earn his superior teammates, but it’s just how the system works. Here’s what I wrote after the extension was signed:
"Yes, this extension is the right move to make. In today’s NBA, teams must pay for future projected performance. (That’s virtually always the case anyways, one could argue, but it’s especially true for players coming off of rookie contracts and signing their first extensions.) Very, very rarely are players stars when they’re first eligible for a contract extension — and yes, Karl-Anthony Towns is absolutely the extension to the rule. Andrew Wiggins is not a star. Will he be a star? Maybe. He has the physical tools. That’s the most important thing. He’s also produced from a scoring perspective, albeit inefficiently."
Alas, Wiggins treaded water once again in his fourth NBA season, and even regressed in some areas. It’s reasonable to assume that the front office will at least have a conversation regarding the possibility of trying to trade Wiggins over the summer, although the poison pill provision would make moving him until the start of the next league year problematic.
Wiggins could be attractive to another organization for the same reasons that the Wolves decided to extend him, as cited above. But he could be a tough asset to trade for exactly those reasons as well.
Karl-Anthony Towns obviously isn’t going anywhere, and you can bet that Thibodeau is going to do everything he can to sign Butler to an extension before he hits free agency in the summer of 2019. That essentially means that either Towns or Butler will have to take less than the maximum (unlikely), or Wiggins will have to be moved.
Thibodeau, Scott Layden, and Co. have no doubt had this discussion, but they need to have a plan in place as early as possible.
#1 – Don’t overthink the offseason (you don’t have to make a splash)
Year One of the Tom Thibodeau regime saw the Timberwolves stand pat. They made zero trades and only made fringe free agent signings, although the Cole Aldrich contract ended up being fairly expensive for how he’s been (not) used.
Last offseason, however, Thibodeau got to work. He acquired Jimmy Butler via trade and signed Taj Gibson, Jeff Teague, and Jamal Crawford in free agency. Undrafted free agent Marcus Georges-Hunt ended up seeing some minutes at backup wing, too.
The team jumped from 31 wins in 2016-17 to 47 wins and a playoff berth in 2017-18. While it’s all felt largely unfulfilling to many fans, progress is progress. And since the entire makeup of the team shifted last year, it would make sense that Year Two of this lineup and Year Three under Thibs would see significant improvement.
Remember, Butler missed 20 games and Towns made a leap from star to superstar, landing his first All-Star nomination and an All-NBA Third Team nod. If the defensive makes a marginal improvement and some of the aforementioned adjustments are made to the roster and the rotation, this is surely a 55-win team.
Next: NBA Draft: Timberwolves mock draft consensus
It’ll be interesting to see what happens in the next few months. It seems more likely that nothing major goes down, but it wouldn’t be a complete shock to see Thibodeau go off script and do something significant.