Minnesota Timberwolves: The floor and ceiling of Karl-Anthony Towns

The Floor of Karl-Anthony Towns

It’s difficult to give the Kentucky big man a plausible floor when he’s an All-Star at 23-years-old and has career averages of 21.5 PPG, 11.7 TRB, 2.4 AST, 1.5 BLK, as well as shooting splits of 53.8/38.8/84.1.

Alas, there have been several NBA up-and-coming players that have dominated the league in their youth and fall apart during their expected primes in their mid-20’s.

Before I compare Towns’ to any single player that fell hard from their ceilings, it’s important to point out that Towns is beginning his career where a 7’0″ 250 pound center will potentially be out of the league in ten years because the NBA is so high on small ball lineups.

So it’s fair to assume that Towns would be one of the best players of all time if he started in the early 2000’s. However, it’s also fair to say that his game wouldn’t translate as smoothly, mainly because his dependence on his 3-point shot and his lack of physicality under the basket would differentiate him from the majority of big men in that era – we could hope the post game would fit nicely, but its difficult to tell.

So when giving Towns a floor for the remainder of his career, I can only make this case by saying that Towns will never stop dominating on the offensive end, but it’ll be the lack of necessity for his position that could ultimately lead to his downfall.

Unfortunately, it’s an insanely safe bet that KAT will never win an MVP or an NBA championship, just because of the lack of need for his position and the love for guards in the modern day NBA – even if he can shoot the three, he’s not the point-big man that the league is moving too.

Albeit, I still have two comparisons for the floors of Karl-Anthony Towns:

Keith Van Horn

While they differ in size by a few inches and pounds, Keith Van Horn was one of the best up-and-coming shooting forwards/big men that was in the league during the late 90’s-early 2000’s.

Van Horn’s career statistics during his 4th NBA season (like Towns) was 19.3 PPG, 7.7 TRB, and 1.8 AST, with shooting splits of 43.4/34.7/84.3.

Van Horn only played in 3 playoff games during that four year span and desperately wanted to be moved to more of a shooter position at the wing, which did eventually move his shooting percentages up throughout his career.

But leaving the system that the New Jersey Nets wanted to incorporate with Van Horn, it left him with zero suitors at the age of 30-years-old, with most teams realizing they didn’t need a sharp shooting/defense-less big (swing) man.

And while Van Horn did get to a championship in the last season of his career during the 2006 NBA post season with the Dallas Mavericks, they couldn’t get it done against the Miami Heat to at least finish this underwhelming former No. 2 overall pick’s (1997) career.

Again, the only real floor for Towns’ is his position playing him out of the game and not-so-much his talents.

Amar’e Stoudemire

Amar’e Stoudemire is the closest comparison I can think of for a floor version of Karl-Anthony Towns.

Stoudemire, a lot like Van Horn, saw himself out of the league by essentially 30ish-years-old because of his failure to adapt to the league changes. Amar’e really struggled outside of the restricted zone and that always boxed him in from getting to his insane ceiling comps.

However, Stoudemire’s numbers through the first 4 seasons of his career were very solid with 19.8 PPG, 8.8 TRB, 1.3 AST, 1.4 BLK, and shooting splits of 51.0/18.8/70.9.

And while many will argue that Stoudemire was only the product of his team with hall of famer Steve Nash and the Mike D’Antoni system, he was still an amazing big man ahead of his time.

Towns’ averaging Stoudemire’s numbers – or better – without a hall of fame facilitator and a potential hall of fame head coach does say a lot more for Towns’ ceiling rather than being disappointed in KAT for his floor potentially being Stoudemire.

If you can’t tell, I don’t believe that Towns will hit either of these floors, even though they both are solid. I believe KAT will hit his potential ceiling and possibly higher in the near future.

But what exactly is the Karl-Anthony Towns ceiling?