For years, Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Chris Finch has referred to Jaden McDaniels as the barometer of the team's offensive success. What this means is that McDaniels is not an offensive focal point, but someone whose involvement indicates how well the team is moving the ball. As McDaniels has steadily added to his offensive game, it's become clear that he can no longer be boxed into this complementary role.
All offseason long, the Wolves made it clear that they're focused on empowering him in the team's offense. However, after signing Jonathan Kuminga, it felt like a possibility that McDaniels would be forced to take a backseat.
When speaking to Britt Robson of MinnPost, though, Finch referred to Kuminga as the team's new offensive barometer. As such, this shows that McDaniels will be prioritized over Kuminga, and that's clearly the right call.
"The shot piece, the shot selection in the flow of our offense, if it is working — well, it is like we said (in previous seasons) about Jaden: He (Kuminga) might be our new barometer indicating when our offense is where we want it to be," Finch said. "Is he getting enough touches? And when he does get those touches, does he not feel the need or pressure to do something for himself all the time?"
This, paired with Finch previously noting that the Wolves are empowering McDaniels as one of the team leaders and want to lean into his playmaking more, makes it clear that he will play a bigger role in the offense than Kuminga.
"I think now we need his (McDaniels) playmaking anyway, and I think he is a really good passer — he’s one of our best interior passers," Finch said.
"My approach with Ant or with Jaden or with all these guys is, if we’re going to take the diapers off, let’s take the diapers off. Like, it’s your team now," Finch said.
Jaden McDaniels deserves a bigger role than Jonathan Kuminga
Look, Kuminga has some skill as an offensive creator, and if he's having a good night, then by all means he can have a good amount of creation duties. Plus, the Timberwolves are trying to build an offense that focuses on ball movement, which will give Kuminga some clear involvement in the offense.
However, in terms of who deserves more shot creation duties, the answer is clearly McDaniels. Kuminga might have the reputation of being a creator, but he's not an efficient one. That's in large part why his market in free agency was limited.
On the flip side, McDaniels' shot-creation abilities are widely underrated. He's a hyper-efficient three-level scorer who makes good decisions and offers outlier positional size. Last season, he averaged a career-best 14.8 points with 51.5/41.2/83.5 shooting splits. Even so, most of these points came within the flow of the offense, and he showed that he has another level to reach in the playoffs.
For far too long, the Timberwolves have forced McDaniels into a pure complementary role, and that needs to change this season.
According to data from Basketball Index, McDaniels ranked in the 67th percentile for one-on-one shot-making and in the 71st percentile for one-on-one shot-making efficiency last season. Conversely, Kuminga ranked in the 48th and 21st percentiles in these stats. Still, Kuminga had a 23.4 usage rate, while McDaniels posted an 18.5 usage rate.
The Timberwolves must empower McDaniels and have Kuminga adjust to a scaled-down role. Based on Finch's comments about Kuminga becoming the new barometer of the Timberwolves' offensive ball movement, it seems like Minnesota is ready to do just that.
To be clear, Kuminga will still play a meaningful role in the offense; it will just be about play-finishing, not play-creation. His skill set is far better suited for this athletic play-finishing role than a role with heavy isolation duties. When the Timberwolves are at their best, Kuminga will likely have big nights. Still, he'll have those big nights because of collective ball movement, not difficult self-created looks.
The hierarchy of the Timberwolves' offense should be clear: Anthony Edwards, LaMelo Ball, McDaniels, and then Kuminga. Fortunately, this is the direction that things are trending in.
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