4 Thoughts On The Timberwolves' Preseason
As the regular season draws near, we take a look at what, if anything, viewers can take away from Minnesota's exhibition games.
By Derek James is a weekly newsletter about all things professional basketball— from the NBA, WNBA and everything in between. Each week, Derek James will provide you analysis and commentary on the league through nearly decade of covering the leagues. Please subscribe for regular updates.
The NBA season is arriving at the perfect time, particularly for this newsletter. In September, we were in Anaheim and last week was challenging with both my birthday and having to move up my fiancee’s birthday trip. Not only moving it up, but changing the location from Phoenix to San Francisco to see Elton John’s farewell tour and other tourist things, like Alcatraz.
But I am back now and the season nearly is, too. As of this writing, the Timberwolves have one preseason game left on Friday night against the Nets. That game will conclude five games in 10 days, which feels entirely too breakneck of a pace for preseason.
Watching Timberwolves basketball again has been fun, part of that is undoubtedly looking ahead to a season with real expectations. Sure, they are 4-0 heading into Friday’s contest, but Rudy Gobert and Karl-Anthony Towns have played one game each. It’s hard to say that these are truly the Timberwolves with those two significant pieces playing so sparingly.
If the Timberwolves were winless instead of undefeated, would we feel differently about this team? Probably not. Some of these wins are still good; teams have still played LeBron, Anthony Davis and Kawhi Leonard, even if they are not playing at playoff-level intensity. Winning without Towns or Gobert is still good because it’s not likely both guys play 82 games this season.
While we should not read too much into preseason, observations are still welcome. After all, there are roles down the roster up for grabs. Here are some things that have come to mind watching preseason preseason games.
Bryn Forbes is a shooting guard, not a ‘passing guard’ for a reason
Forbes was one of the team’s free agent additions and has been a solid rotation player for teams like the Bucks and Spurs for years. His shot off the bench should be useful, as evidenced by his career 41 percent 3-point percentage over his five-year career. Forbes has taken four 3’s per game this season and drilled 62.5 percent of them.
How many assists per game is Forbes averaging in his four preseason games? Zero point zero.
Watching him helps illustrate the stats. When you see Forbes catch the ball, you understand why 64.2 percent of his field goals and 92.1 percent of his 3’s are assisted for his career. Again and again, we’ve seen Forbes catch the pass and quickly hoist a shot. Complaining about this feels silly when he is so efficient but it is amusing to watch a guy catch a pass and not think about anything but calling his own number.
Now, Forbes could undoubtedly make that extra pass if needed, but he may already be settling into a catch-and-shoot role for this team.
No Towns or Gobert has meant lots of Naz Reid…and that’s okay
I have written about the progression of Naz Reid from undrafted guy to rookie taking his lumps before blossoming into a valuable NBA rotation player. Reid is a valuable part of this team’s depth in the front court beyond more lauded players like Towns, Gobert and Jaden McDaniels.
Reid has had an outstanding preseason, averaging 14.8 points and 8.3 rebounds per game on 58 percent shooting from the field and 42 percent from deep. He already looks settled into this role and being able to adjust so well from coming off the bench to starting — and vice versa — is hard for many players.
Seeing Reid is valuable because when Towns and Gobert come off the floor or take a night off, they have someone who can capably take those minutes. When Naz Reid checks in, you don’t worry about just surviving them and can actually expect him to play well.
Before these last three or four years, this team has not found and developed players like this. Hell, developing their first round picks has been a challenge at times for this franchise over its lifespan.
Who gets the last rotation guard spot?
Backcourt minutes on this team will be hard to come by. We know Anthony Edwards and D’Angelo Russell will eat the bulk of those minutes. Yet, Chris Finch finds himself with a number of other rotation options at his disposal including:
Jaylen Nowell
Jordan McLaughlin
Austin Rivers
Bryn Forbes
As mentioned above, Forbes may have carved out a role already, but the team likely needs a guard option with a more well-rounded game. While Rivers brings valuable veteran experience, it seems likely between Nowell and McLaughlin.
Nowell and McLaughlin, like Reid, are two more examples of recent player development. Both players came into the NBA as rookies in the 2020 season and have grown into viable rotation players.
(Tangent: Reid, McLaughlin and Nowell all came into the league as rookies with Jarrett Culver and Culver is the one who is not here. If you had asked me at the time, I would not have bet on that. The fact they became a playoff team with three players from one rookie class as legitimate rotation players is huge and really shows the value of being able to identify talent later in the draft and in the undrafted market.)
After playing all of 12 minutes in last spring’s playoff series against Memphis, Nowell has shined in the preseason. Nowell is playing four minutes more per game than McLaughlin and shot efficiently within the arc while dishing out a couple assists per game.
McLaughlin has played more sparingly, somewhat surprisingly, but it’s not like his numbers have been terrible. At all. He’s made half his shots from the field and dished out 5.7 assists per game in just 15 minutes per contest (three games, so).
Nowell brings more of that size you want, especially if Forbes is also in the rotation, but McLaughlin has shown to be more of a traditional lead ball handler. McLaughlin may be another smaller guard, but has proven more than capable running the offense. We have seen with the NBA in recent that you cannot have enough ball handlers.
If you’re good, you need non-star players who can help keep things going and McLaughlin fits that bill. Nowell can do do a little of that as well, but could be best-suited for more of an off-ball role.
McLaughlin did not play in Wednesday’s contest against the Lakers, so maybe Finch has seen enough. Realistically, the season is long and there will likely be opportunities for all these guys at some point during the season.
Russell Westbrook and Jaden McDaniels Nonsense
There are some players that just seem irritating to play against. Patrick Beverley and Lance Stephenson are a couple of those guys, but Russell Westbrook may also be in that category. You’ve probably already seen this exchange on your social media feeds:
This is unquestionably stupid. Watching it the first time, it looked like McDaniels just wanted Westbrook to inbound the ball but then you see him kick the ball to Westbrook and realize he’s actually just not having it with him. All things considered, it’s a pretty funny moment.