The NBA season is finally here. Minnesota Timberwolves fans have been anxiously awaiting getting a chance to see their new-look team in action in the regular season, and they got that opportunity on Tuesday evening. Unfortunately, the game did not go quite as planned for the good guys.
Minnesota was upset by the Los Angeles Lakers, 110-103. Of course, this is far from panic territory, as the Timberwolves lost their season opener last year, and even fell to 1-2 through three games in 2023-24. But the more concerning part of Tuesday night's outcome was the play of Julius Randle.
Replacing Karl-Anthony Towns as Minnesota's new starting power forward, Randle got his first go at playing in a meaningful game with his new teammates. His box score numbers look decent from a glance, but the eye test is where he truly fell short. Julius routinely made mistakes and looked lethargic in the Wolves' first game of the season.
It is still far from the time to panic, but we can safely say that Tuesday night was not a big encouragement. The Timberwolves fanbase obviously took note of Randle being a liability at times, but so did some of the players on the court. Lakers wing Rui Hachimura had some blunt words about his competition after the conclusion of the contest.
Rui Hachimura was pretty, uh, direct in why he was so aggressive on Tuesday.
— Jacob Rude (@JacobRude) October 23, 2024
"We talked about Julius Randle, He sometimes is just standing and stuff. So we talked about, we got to kind of use that. I know I can be the screener. I can be in the corner to kind of attack the rim.”
Rui Hachimura gave his honest thoughts on Julius Randle
"We talked about Julius Randle, he sometimes is just standing and stuff," Hachimura said. "So we talked about, we got to kind of use that. I know I can be the screener. I can be in the corner to kind of attack the rim.” It is far from surprising that the Lakers players picked up on Randle's tendencies. They are professionals who are the best at what they do, so of course they took note of a guy who looked lost on more than one occasion.
But the more shocking part is that Hachimura would voice something like this out loud. The Lakers must have really though Randle was in a funk for them to choose to call out his play like this. Ideally, this situation serves as something of a wake-up call for Julius.
Getting called out by your opposition for your effort in game number one is not the best look. We can also consider that Randle is coming off shoulder surgery and has not played in an NBA game since January. Those things likely led to his lackluster showing in his Timberwolves debut.
Either way, a call-out like this should light a fire under Julius Randle. Timberwolves fans can expect him to bounce back in a big way against the Kings on Thursday.