Howlin' T-Wolf

After letting the win over Denver marinate for a few days it’s time to post my thoughts on the Wolves win against Denver. Definitely a great win for our beloved Wolves against a pretty solid Denver team that dominated the Wolves in their meeting the week before. That being said I’m really don’t want to go overboard in the praise. Certainly they did the things they needed to do, i.e. show some mental toughness (especially good coming out in the 3rd quarter), win the rebounding battle and most importantly have their shots fall, all of which came along with Denver deciding not to do what they needed to do, i.e. get the ball to Melo in the 3rd quarter. Looking at the four factors however shows that we really only need to look at two things: The Wolves were 7% better in eFG% than their season average, and Denver was 7% worse.

Denver was better on the offensive glass, had more fastbreak points, got to the line 9 more times and turned the ball over 1 less time. So really it all boiled down to the Wolves being hot and Denver being ice cold in the third quarter.

So you’re probably saying well that’s great Patrick but we still won against a good team and we finally looked good. My point is that we shouldn’t get too carried away with this win. Yes it got a huge monkey off our back, but they still have a lot of work to do. One good shooting game doesn’t make this team better than they really are. Case in point would be John Hollinger’s case (ESPN Insider) that the Wolves are worse than the Nets and could challenge for the worst ever based on the fact that the Wolves scoring margin right now is -13.5 good enough for second worst ever. Certainly as Al gets healthy and Love comes back soon their play should pick up but yikes is that bad. Hollinger also makes the case that Rambis needs to use Flynn and Sessions together and also that by giving Ellington and Pavlovic’s minutes to Sessions the Wolves would improve significantly.

So let’s see what they can do against Memphis tonight and if getting the monkey off their back allows them to play well for two games in a row.

Other Howls:

I found this especially interesting from Timberwolves.com’s Jonah Ballow’s practice report:

For the first time in his career, Brewer is working to restructure his jumper. Fans may see inconsistency in Brewer’s field goal percentage but the shooting guard is spending countless hours with the coaching staff. “We believe he can be a very good open shooter,” Rambis said. “With his speed and ability to attack the basket, if you make those open shots then people run at you and then you pump fake, now you can get inside the interior of the defense. It’s those concepts that he is trying to develop and break that habit that he had of always leaning back.”

Brewer is beginning to see the results of a focused approach to shooting, “I’m feeling better, I had a couple of pretty good games, I only had one game where I didn’t shoot it well, so it’s working. It’s all about staying on balance; the balance is the main thing on my shot.”

Really Corey you only had one game where you didn’t shoot well? Which one was that? Was it the 3-14 showing against NJ in the opener? Or maybe the 6-21 against the Clips? Maybe 4-13 against Dallas? Oh I’m sorry you probably meant the 1-11 against the Suns that don’t really play defense. Ah that must be the one game where you didn’t shoot well.

Let’s be honest though and call a spade a spade. Away from the hoop (where you have the green light to shoot lay-ups all day) when you actually shoot the ball rather than lay it in, you’re 33-122 Corey. That’s 27% shooting. I can only hope the coaches get it worked out for you. Because if they don’t I’m bringing back the hot spots chart and no it isn’t pretty my friend. If that fails I can only hope you spend the summer at whatever basketball reform camp Josh Smith went to this past summer.

Know this though, as hard as I’m going to be on you for the abysmal shooting, there is no bigger supporter wanting you to get that shot figured out and start knocking them down with consistency. The Wolves can’t afford to lose another promising draft pick by not living up to their full potential and we need you out there Corey. In the words of the crazy guy (Rob Schnieder) in The Waterboy , “You can do it!”