Preseason officially over?: Wolves to shake up lineup against Kings
Posted on November 7th, 2008 – 4:08 PMBy Jerry Zgoda
Randy Wittman still was playing coy at the team’s morning shootaround Friday at Arco Arena, but you could tell tonight’s starting five from who wore black jerseys and who wore white: Kevin Love, Sebastian Telfair, Mike Miller, Al Jefferson, Corey Brewer.
That’s the lineup you might have envisioned last summer (except for perhaps Telfair instead of Randy Foye) after the team made that draft-night trade with Memphis. But Wittman used the season’s first four games in an attempt to show you have to earn your way on this “improved” team.
That pretense apparently is over, now that Wittman, er, loved the energy Love and Telfair brought when he summoned them in the middle of the first quarter in Wednesday’s double-overtime loss to San Antonio.
Love’s grit, talent, tenacity and potential is too great not to let grow, quickly. Telfair, in just his second game back from suspension, gets the call because of Foye’s lousy start to the season. Love’s size also should help against a Kings team that will get Brad Miller back for the first time this season following a five-game NBA suspension.
Kings star Kevin Martin might be limited, or possibly might not play, because of an ankle injury he sustained in Wednesday’s home-opening victory over Memphis. He did not practice Thursday or participate in Friday’s shootaround.
“He’s a tough kid,” Wittman said. “I think he’ll play.”
34 Responses to "Preseason officially over?: Wolves to shake up lineup against Kings"
Nice. I like that lineup.
Well, Telfair over Brandon Roy, I mean Randy Foye further puts McHale in the position of the biggest Failure in America this side of George Bush Jr.
Starting Love is a great move. Starting Telfair isn’t a horrible move at all.
Having Randy Wittman as the coach, and Kevin McHale still running this team is a crime against humanity, and they should be brought up on felony charges of psychological abuse to anyone that considers themselves as Wolves fans.
The next question is now that that Isaiah Thomas and Matt Millen are out, and Wes Unseld retired… is there a GM/front office in any major professional sport in America that is close to as putrid as Taylor/McHale/Wittman?
The wolves at 1 and 4 running a .250 have played at the Wittmanline (referring to the Mendoza line in MLB)…
How many games into this season before Wittman resigns? He has shown enough heart that he will eventually give up because Taylor and McHale are not men enough to fire him and put him out of his missery (or us!)…
I think it will be game 21. We will be 4 and 17 and Wittman will just walk away.
“The next question is now that that Isaiah Thomas and Matt Millen are out, and Wes Unseld retired… is there a GM/front office in any major professional sport in America that is close to as putrid as Taylor/McHale/Wittman?”
Donald Sterling.
Clay Bennett.
Al Davis.
BC
It wasn’t Wes Unseld, it was Elgin Baylor.
Obviously the rotation is going to be different. Will this also improve the second unit? Does it make any difference?
It’s good to see Love in the lineup. He clearly makes a difference when he’s out there. I’m not writing off Foye yet, I think he can break out of this early season slump. I’d really like to see Miller making more 3’s. I thought that was part of the reason we traded for him???
Trade Foye and a later first round pick for Hienrich of the Bulls.
Let’s get a real point gaurd.
I wander what the performance review is for McHale:
Taylor: You picked Indie Eebee,
Roye than traded for Foye. You didn’t pick Josh Howard over Indie Eebee,
You fired Saunders and Casey who are better than Wittman. The team stinks.
McHale: so do I get a raise.
Taylor: Yes. You get a 25% raise plus a million dollar cash bonus.
I wish people on this board could focus with what we have and how best to use it.
Every blog post half the posts are the same, McHale should be fired, and then recounting all the things he’s done wrong as if we don’t already know it.
Roy was an allstar last year, do you really think 100% of GM’s would now trade foye for Roy. Hindsight is 20/20, it was a debatable move at the time, not so much any more, can we please move on and talk about the team we currently have.
Jama - thanks.
Al Davis vs Glen Taylor… Al Davis wins.
McHale still beats the GM for the Raiders.
Wittman vs the guy currently coaching the Raiders… Wittman is still worse. A lifetime .330 or less Winning Percentage makes him the worst coach in the NBA. I can’t think of a coach/manger in baseball, and I admittedly don’t know a damn thing about Hockey… but you got me good with the Raiders.
I approve of the change. I think it was just a matter of time before Love was a starter, so now’s as good a time as any. He earned the chance against the Spurs.
And I also like Telfair being in there. I’m not sure why you guys are so down on the kid. Ya, he’s not a great shooter and he never will be. But he is a natural playmaker, runs an efficient offense, and posts a very good assist/turnover ratio. And it’s not like we’re hurting for guys that can score.
I get the feeling that Wittman is going to be at odds with McHale over this. He seems to favor Telfair, even last season when Foye was healthy. McHale seems to favor Foye because it was his pick and trade. Any truth to that Jerry? If it is a conflict of interest, I’ve got to say I side with Wittman. Telfair is a point guard, Foye is not. It’s as simple as that to me.
Anyway, I wasn’t happy with the Roy/Foye trade either, but I can’t complain much, since neither was the guy I wanted to draft that year. I was all about Rudy G.
Sean,
Ok, doing things your way…
A starting lineup of
Telfair, Miller, Brewer, Love, Jefferson
A set rotation that only flexes when needed… that Foye comes in at a certain time, that Gomes, and McCants come in at certain times.
That the playbook is set so that when Love and Jefferson are in it’s not the same plays that would be in with Gomes and Smith!
Run fewer plays, and make plays that work…
This coaching staff has to utilize it’s talent, and they have not proven that they know how.
Foye is a 6th man that can shoot a little, pass a little, and defend a little
McCants is a 7th man that can score, and is completely 1 dimensional… outside shooting (Craig Hodges with an attitude problem). He has no defense, and is a lousy passer.
Madson is a joke
Craig Smith is a backup 4/5 that can only play under the basket and is at his best in 4-5 minute spurts, but is a defensive liability.
Gomes is a great team ball player, and I would start him over Brewer except that no one else in the starting lineup can play defense so Brewer has to be put in to slow up PGs, SGs, and SFs… Gomes can play some defense, is a good shooter, and can rebound.
Love is still young so he’s going to be a headache like all rookies are. He will average 16 points, 8 boards and 4 assists by the end of the season, and that’s not horrible
Jefferson can’t pass the ball, is a mediocre defender, and while he could be a great shot blocker at the 4, he is stuck in the 5 so he is not able to utilize his best ability defensively. He is a great rebounder, and a top 10 inside scorer in the NBA.
Telfair is the perfect backup PG… problem we don’t have a good starter. He can’t shoot much, he’s fast as hell, and he is starting to show over the last 50 games of his career that he can pass the ball like they thought he could out of high school.
Mike Miller is a scorer that wants to be the team player, and while he has the savy, and the talent to do it, we need him to shoot the ball until his arms hurt, and get love and Jefferson crashing the boards until they drop the double teams on Jefferson and respect the outside. Miller is going to need a 40 point night to get that kind of attention… Foye, and Jefferson are too selfish to allow that to ever happen.
Brewer is a great defender, very instinctive, there is great improvement in his game, but he is still not ready for the offensive side of the NBA. In all honesty he reminds me of Cooper from the Lakers back in the good old days… and Gomes reminds me a bit of AC Green. Too bad we don’t have anyone that reminds me of Magic Johnson!
So basically put the guys on the court for a 10 game streak… use the same rotations, and the same plays until this team has them down, and if the players aren’t putting it together after a 10 consecutive game streak where they all know their roles… then make a decision…
But I still say Wittman is gone at game 21 this season which will give McHale another excuse as to why his team isn’t in the playoffs rather than looking in the mirror, and realizing he is the reason.
Bryan, I was a Rudy Gay guy as well.
I think Foye will actually do better coming off the bench. He’s got less pressure on him now and more freedom to be a scorer. I can definitely see him flourishing in a Jason Terry ind of role.
I agree with the sentiment that Sebastian Telfair is great backup point guard. I love him for 17 minutes per game, but not 31.
I’m not as much of an alarmist as some folks on Randy Foye-I think he’s a good ballplayer. I just don’t think he’s a good point guard. I mean, he could be a great Derek Fisher-type starting PG on a team that doesn’t rely on its PG to initiate the offense. But for the Wolves? I think he’s out of place.
By the way, speaking of out of place, it seems Sergio Rodriguez is begging for a trade of Portland. There’s your Magic Johnson, BC. That man has INSANE assist numbers and phenomenal assist-TO ratios in each of his seasons. But McMillan doesn’t trust him in the half court because he plays too fast. Seems like Randy Wittman wants to run.
I say we take a run at Spanish Chocolate. In fact, I’d like to see everybody start buzzing about it until it officially becomes a rumor.
Who’s with me?
I’d be interested, although I’m not sure what Portland is looking for. They exercised the option on his contract, so they either are intent on keeping him or are looking for specific kinds of players in return.
But I think Rodriguez would be a good fit here. He’s not my first pick (ironically, my first pick is his junior teammate in Spain, Ricky Rubio), but he’d definitely be an improvement in my opinion.
Also, is it just me, or has Spain turned out high quality guards like clockwork?
I don’t know, I liked Foye against San Antonio, he looked a lot more relaxed…not defensively but…he looked a lot more poised than he was in the first game. I think he’ll work his way back into the starting line up
What is everyone ripping Randy Wittman for? It’s not his fault McHale game him a brutal squad. He has his team playing hard every night, which is all you can ask of this squad. This team wasn’t meant to win.
Anyone see else see that Chris Richard was taken first in the DLeague draft?
I’m happy for the guy, but at the same time, this is going to make it a lot harder to get him back on the team. The next team that needs a big man will look at him first.
I wish we had just bought out Booth and kept Chris. Calvin has done nothing so far, and I don’t really think he’ll do anything the rest of the way either.
I agree with plugging in Telfair at point. Foye needs to sit down for a bit and calm down, he still looks way too out of control right now despite his mild step forward against the Spurs.
Love on the other hand still hasn’t earned his way into the starting lineup defensively and is coming off of a Spurs game where he played pretty poorly offensively. So I don’t know what’s going on there beyond Randy smacking the panic button already.
wow…the wolves really can’t afford to have Al in foul trouble…the wolves line up is small…and boy do I mean small at the moment…Bassy, Foye, McCants, Smith and Love
now gomes in for smith
Wolves need to start playing Defense…so far they have not played any
I posted two days ago this:
“We need to move on to an actual pg, I think Bassy and Miller in the back court should be our lineup as much as possible and see what you can get for Foye, bring in Ahearn or Dj Strawberry for another guard and let Bassy and Ollie split minutes with MM at SG, brewer, Gomes/Love, and Jefferson. They probably won’t get rid of Foye because it will be admitting failure which we already know, but I would at this point, package him and one of our first rounders for a better point (felton) or better Center (Brad Miller) to let Jefferson move back to PF”
If Randy W needs any more help with rotation or defensive schemes, he can just let me know.
I wonder what the value around the league is for a player like Foye right now. He has an ideal spot for him to assert himself in Minnesota with the franchise trying to give him every oppoturnity to succeed but he can’t stay healthy and is an inconsistent contributor.
Someone like Brad Miller has to be wishful thinking. I could see for someone like Adam Morrison, or Darko, not the most attractive of names, but Foye isn’t that attractive either.
yes, ^^^ I like this guy, not many people are realistic on this blog, too many die hard homers, the wolves just aren’t that good again and a team like Miami might come a calling by the end of november for the once coveted Mike Miller. Darko might be worth a look for a second rounder now that Marc Gasol is playing more for the Grizz.
Starting line-up of Telfair, Miller, Brewer, Love and Jefferson is moving the ball a lot better and may need to be permanent starting line-up. Further, shows that Roy/Foye trade was a disaster. Brewer needs to start hitting these midrange jumpers.
T-Wolves have talent, but if they don’t start winning some games. Wittman needs to go and Taylor/McHale should hire Avery Johnson. He’ll get these guys to play some defense.
Even if you forgive McHale for drafting Brewer ahead of Al Thorton or for drafting McCants ahead of Danny Granger or for drafting Ebi over Josh Howard, the Foye/Roy trade is unacceptable. Keeping everything else the same…wouldn’t you rather have this starting team:
PG: Telfair
SG: Roy
SF: Miller
PF: Love
C: Jefferson
Bench: Brewer, McCants, C. Smith, Gomes,
we also need to start hanging on to some guys, (Beno Udrih, Chalmers, Billups, I’m sure there are more that aren’t coming to mind now) However minnesota is good at making other teams champions, Boston with Garnett and David Ortiz.
Agree TWFinLA - except if the Wolves had kept Roy, there’s a very good chance they don’t trade Garnett. I’m not saying Roy-Garnett wins anything, but I’m sure the “brain”trust would have made the move. Roy would have been a perfect compliment to Garnett - can get to the line, not afraid to take a big shot. But that’s not reality so from now on, I propose we call Roy TPFPWSNSO (the player from Portland we shall not speak of).
Oh by the way, I am glad we got rid of Gerald Green, he just had a big dunk, a three, and jumper while getting fouled, and a block/tip in less than 1 minute, but he wasn’t going to work out so thats good we got rid of him - me being sarcastic
When I said not sure if they win anything, I’m not sure they win a championship - most likely are at least in the mix though.
I think, but am not sure, that many lists were ranking Foye ahead of Roy before the draft. I remember Foye being compared to Dwayne Wade and Ben Gordon. The only thng that got me during the draft was when Jay Bilas insisted that Roy was the most NBA ready player in the draft. Other than that it was not an obvious choice except to not make Foye a PG.
Every team missed on Josh Howard! Look at a history of draft picks in the 20s and many are throw aways. Ebi may have been a bad pick but high school picks had a good track record and it was purely a hope for him to turn into something.
We can’t change the past and we can’t fire McHale so we don’t need to keep bringing this stuff up all of the time.
