Exploring the Minnesota Timberwolves’ defensive rebounding problem

The Minnesota Timberwolves have put the onus on Karl-Anthony Towns

Karl-Anthony Towns is a fantastic player. An All-Star, an All-NBA talent, and so on.

He’s also a top-flight rebounder. In 2018-19, his last healthy season, Towns finished No. 9 in defensive rebound rate and No. 11 in the NBA in total rebound rate. He’s consistently among the league-leaders in rebounding, and yet he still does far more in the other areas of the game than any of the big men who manage to finish ahead of him when it comes to cleaning the glass.

Based on that, it’s fair to surmise that the Wolves could give a little back at the 4 in the name of some offensive firepower, switchability and versatility on defense, or both.

Hernangomez is the attempt at an offense-first answer. Layman, and now Josh Okogie, are the supposed match for the second quest.

But what about Towns’ backup at center? It should only work out to be 12 to 15 minutes per game, so perhaps some more ground could be given up there, too.

The Wolves tried that by using Naz Reid as the primary backup at the 5 in another offense-first decision. Reid has actually played fairly well in short stints as Towns’ primary backup, but he’s struggled mightily when relied upon in an expanded role in Towns’ absence.

Still, with or without Towns, Reid hasn’t held up his end of the bargain in the rebounding column.

So far this season, Reid’s rebound rate is just 10.8 percent — behind Hernangomez and Jarrett Culver and just No. 6 on the team. Reid has played the majority of non-Towns minutes at center, even when he ceded the starting spot to Ed Davis.

Watch this play from Wolves-Spurs. This was the game that Minnesota won with Towns unavailable.

Reid gets a solid contest on the shot, but instead of turning to get to the glass he gets off balance and causes Hernangomez to slide in and try to help D’Angelo Russell check LaMarcus Aldridge. But that means that as soon as both Russell and Hernangomez committed to Aldridge, Trey Lyles is free to get an easy put-back dunk

Yes, this is emblematic of the Wolves’ larger communication issues on defense and isn’t solely on Ried. And yes, it would have been a lot to ask for Reid to contest and get back to grab the board. But Naz has to get in the mix in the paint and can’t simply float 10 feet from the basket.

Now, Reid’s rebound rate of 13.8 percent from last season is at least palatable, so perhaps this is more a case of a poor showing in a limited sample size. The Wolves front office obviously counted on him to get his hands on more boards than he has so far this season.