The Minnesota Timberwolves prematurely broke up their core, and they’re now paying the price.
After making the Western Conference Finals just one season ago, the Timberwolves made quite an interesting move and traded Karl-Anthony Towns in favor of Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo. The move isn’t totally paying off quite yet.
Through 16 games, Minnesota holds an 8-8 record. They haven’t been a great team, nor anywhere close to where they were just one season ago. Moving on from their core was a long-term financial move, though it’s messed with the chemistry quite a bit.
The Timberwolves have taken a couple of straight losses, but their recent loss against the Toronto Raptors is the worst of the two.
One big reason the Timberwolves were so good just one season ago is because superstar Anthony Edwards played well off the two big men — Rudy Gobert and Towns. With Towns being the best shooting big man in the NBA, he was able to space the floor.
With Gobert being more of a traditional archetype, that’s not necessarily in his arsenal, which is how the two complemented one another.
Randle doesn’t exactly bring the same impact. He takes a bit more time getting to his spots, and he requires spacing to do such, as he uses his big frame to get into the paint.
There was on particular play, with the Timberwolves tied with the Raptors with five minutes to go in the fourth quarter of that game, where Randle was dribbling looking for an isolation situation. Gobert had his defender sealed under the rim, and he didn’t receive the ball. In a mini protest, he took his time to get out of the lane, which led to a three-second call and turnover.
The Timberwolves were fuming. Edwards took offense to the situation. However, they were able to clear the air and they did so publicly at practice ahead of their battle against the Celtics — which was an eventual loss.
With no media being at the game and the Timberwolves unable to address the situation publicly because of such, they went ahead and did so at the next available opportunity. ESPN’s Tim MacMahon has the details of the situation, but he also has his opinion of the matter.
“It was a bad look,” MacMahon said. “Nothing got addressed until practice on Saturday in Boston. So it was kind of lingering and floating.
“Now, after that practice, Gobert basically owned it and said, ‘Hey, that was not good by me.’ Paraphrasing, and I pride myself on being a good teammate. That was a bad example. Randle owned it, he came over and said, ‘I didn’t throw him the effing ball.’”
McMahon noted that Randle said such in a joking manner, making light of the situation while ensuring he knew his issues in the matter.
“…They both said they didn’t have any issues with each other, but that was a bad chemistry moment,” MacMahon continued.
It was a bad look, but maybe it was the moment the Timberwolves needed to right the ship and build some chemistry with the new-look squad.
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