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Michael Rand started RandBall with hopes that he could keep lies from conquering the minds of the weak. So far, he's only succeeded in using the word "redacted" a lot. He welcomes suggestions, news tips, links of pure genius, and pictures of pets in Halloween costumes here, though he already knows he will regret that last part.
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Posts about Wolves news
Friday (The Wolves need Kevin Love) edition: Wha' Happened?
Posted by: Michael Rand Updated: January 4, 2013 - 9:16 AM
Without Love on the court, the defense (at least in transition) looked better. J.J. Barea took over the offense and various players started making all kinds of shots they weren't making before. There was a renewed energy, and the result was an important 101-97 that kept the Wolves (15-14) from dipping under .500.
The fashionable question last night on Twitter was this: Did the Wolves win in spite of missing Kevin Love (and Ricky Rubio) or BECAUSE Love left the game?
It's a complicated question, but here's how we see it:
For 16 minutes and 15 seconds, the Wolves were a better team without Love on the floor. It was apparent. His missed shots and constant referee battles have become a team-wide energy drain at times, at least when viewed from afar. The Wolves naturally thrive on ball movement; when Love is in the game, there is a (correct) tendency to get him the ball more than others. When he is not making shots, everyone suffers. When he went out, the "best shot possible" theory came back into the mix, with guys like Alexey Shved, Luke Ridnour, Daunte Cunningham and Barea stepping up.
For the future, however, it is ridiculous to say the Wolves are better off without Love. They absolutely need him -- but they absolutely need him to get his head, lungs, hand and whatever else is ailing him back into 2011-12 form. This version of Love is slumping. We're not sure if it's more mental or physical, but he is shooting 35.2 percent from the field, including 21.7 percent on threes. His rebounding numbers are still there. His defense has been atrocious at times, and his slow lopes back to the defensive end -- often after arguing a call or at least being upset -- need to stop. But please don't forget that he averaged 26 points and 13 rebounds last season. If he wants to be here -- and he had better want to be here because it's his only choice for multiple years still -- he is an essential piece toward building a very dangerous team.
All the 2012-13 Wolves need is the 2011-12 Love -- even if Love isn't all they need (hey, how about a real two-guard and a little bit of health fortune?)
Thursday (What is wrong with the Wolves?) edition: Wha' Happened?
Posted by: Michael Rand Updated: January 3, 2013 - 10:08 AM
We only watched the second half of the Wolves/Jazz game last night, but that was enough in a couple of regards: enough bad basketball by the local club and enough to see that the Wolves are in a serious funk right now. After seemingly turning a bit of a corner, they have lost 5 of their last 7 and are back at .500 with a 14-14 record. So what's wrong? Well ...
*Energy: Despite not having played since Saturday, the Wolves were FLAT from what we could see. They've looked plenty flat in other games as well, but not like what we saw last night. Maybe that was the product of missing so many shots, which can be deflating. But it was startling.
*Injuries catching up: Ricky Rubio provided an emotional lift when he returned, but he's been slowed again now and hasn't been the player he was last year even when on the court. Kevin Love still doesn't look right. Brandon Roy and Chase Budinger have missed significant time.
*Love: Speaking of Kevin, it would be too convenient to blame his Yahoo flap for the recent funk. After all, the Wolves won their first three games after that story came out. More likely, it's his uneven play (to put it nicely) on the court of late. In the Wolves' last four losses, Love has missed one of them and shot a combined 9 for 38 from the field in the other three. His body language often looks bad. He needs to get fully healthy and re-focused.
*Alexey Shved is cooling off. Shved was a combined 21-for-45 from 3-point range during a 7-2 Wolves stretch between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15. That's a 46.7 percent clip and it opened up a lot of things. Since then, he is 12 for 41 (29.6 percent), coinciding with this 2-5 slide.
*Better competition: The early schedule was softer; now they're playing better teams, and if the Wolves are not at full strength they are exposed.
*Defensive lapses. The Wolves have held opponents under 90 points 10 times this season (going 7-3 in those games). Nine of those games came Dec. 7 or earlier. They have allowed at least 100 points 13 times this season (going 4-9 in those games). More than half of those games (eight) have come in the last month.
Any other reasons? We left some out for you to chew on in the comments.
Weekend Links with Jon Marthaler: NHL alienating its hard-core fans
Posted by: Michael Rand Updated: December 22, 2012 - 11:32 AM
Jon Marthaler bakes up a delicious batch of links for you every weekend. Other times, you can find him here. Jon?
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Merry Christmas to all! When you think about it, Christmas is probably the closest thing we have to a universal day off; few people work the day, with the exception of essential services, some gas stations, and (at least in the movies) Chinese restaurants. It's the one day of the year that virtually everyone expects to have a chance to spend with their families. Even Scrooge gave Bob Crachit the day off on Christmas Day.
The one exception to this rule seems to be sports, where the NBA has no compunction about ruining Christmases far and wide. The league has a quintupleheader scheduled for Tuesday; you'll be able to watch basketball from 11 am to midnight, should you so desire. It's one thing for the home teams, who theoretically will get a chance to have Christmas morning and/or Christmas dinner fit around their schedules, but those five games have five road teams, all of whom are away from their families this holiday. The Celtics, Knicks, Rockets, Thunder, and Nuggets - sorry, guys. You're spending your Christmas on a plane and in a hotel room.
Speaking of the players is to say nothing, too, of to the thousands of other people who'll miss Christmas thanks to these games. Stadium staff, team personnel, TV crews, team beat writers - all of these folks have to give up their Christmases as well, thanks to the league's desire for holiday hoops. Spare a thought as well for a few college football teams - the Gophers among them - that have Christmas Day scheduling issues.
The jokes all say that most people can't wait to escape their families on Christmas, but the truth is that most of us relish the chance to get together and celebrate. This year, though, I'll be thinking about all of those people who give up that chance as a blessing to the rest of us - not just nurses and doctors and firefighters, but Kevin Durant and James Harden, and all of the ESPN announcers, and the Staples Center staffers, and all of the football players across the country who'll eat Christmas dinner in a team lounge. Merry Christmas, everyone. Thanks for giving up your day to make it better for the rest of us.
On with the links:
*I want to print out this Steve Rushin column about hockey, and hand-deliver a copy to every owner, possibly by stapling it to his forehead. If somebody wanted to dump a hundred thousand copies on the houses of Jeremy Jacobs and Craig Leipold, I'll start buying printer ink. Dear NHL: You're not alienating casual fans now; none of them now exist. You're alienating your actual fans, and we're a disappearing breed. You're on your way to second place in CANADA, and if you lose Canada you might as well fold up shop.
*This three-part interview at The Classical with the guys behind Fire Joe Morgan was absolutely delightful. Here's Part 1, here's part two, and here's part three.
*Brian Phillips of Grantland heads to the rodeo finals in Las Vegas, and the whole thing becomes a wonderful mishmash of one part stranger-in-a-strange-land diary, one part Vegas travel journalism, and one part elegiac rumination on his lost Oklahoma childhood. It's tremendous.
*And finally: not only am I now convinced that squash should be an Olympic sport, I'm also convinced that it is the greatest sport ever invented.
RandBall Q&A: Broadcaster Kevin Harlan
Posted by: Michael Rand Updated: December 19, 2012 - 3:04 PM
Kevin Harlan, the voice of the Timberwolves from their inception through the late 1990s, now does NFL games for CBS as well as NBA games for TNT. He is slated to call Thursday's game between the Wolves and Thunder for TNT -- the last Wolves game he can recall announcing since Game 7 of the 2004 Western Conference semifinals -- and in advance of it we chatted with Harlan about the past, present and future of the Wolves:
RB: What do you remember from those early years calling Wolves games?
KH: Different people, probably. The games, while they were new and exciting for the area, the fans were so into it. And it was so exciting to see the franchise get off the ground. I remember all the people I work with . We were given a clean slate and able to do and construct the kind of broadcast we wanted. I’ve always had enthusiasm, and I think that’s what attracted the organization to me. They wanted someone to sell the league. … They’d always say to develop some personality. With Tom [Hannemann], it was so easy. We got to be very good friends …. They enjoyed the laughing and kind of stuff we did. And when Kevin McHale got involved, that’s when all hell broke loose. It was me, Hanny and Kevin, and then Trent [Tucker] picked up when Kevin left off. When you look at the people we had on TV: Jesse Ventura, Jimmy Jam Harris. … Jim Dutcher … the Wolves really thought outside the box from a broadcast standpoint. There were many, many, many mornings when I would wake up and say, “What did we do? What did we say? I’m going to lose my job. What will I tell my wife?' We’d make up fictional characters, dogs unearthing tapes of old Minneapolis Lakers games, all kinds of stuff. But then they got Garnett and they got good … and it became a serious business. We had fun, but it was a different kind of fun."
RB: It's pretty clear this is the best team they’ve had since KG. Your thoughts?
KH: I see all the earmarks -- it's the best combination of what it was like those first couple years with the freshness and newness – wonderful fan involvement – and the Garnett coming of age years. It’s a nice mix of those two events. Kevin Love is obviously one of top 10 players in the world. Ricky Rubio coming back has lit the fuse to what is a fun, dynamic, ascending team. They are an ascending club. I’ve just seen bits and pieces. I can’t wait to get up there and see the arena. Lot of familiar faces. I’m as curious to see what this team has come up with. … They took their shots over some of the picks, but sure enough it looks like they knew what they were doing.
RB: How do you define the Rubio factor?
KH: He represents a unique kind of player who has a flair but it seems to me – and I’ve not met the kid – what I hear and read is that he is a good teammate and the guys like playing with him … and he has that charisma. There is an overall athleticism for guys who can dunk, and the wonderful smooth shooting style like Durant, but there aren’t many guys like this guy. There are guys that try, but maybe don’t have that DNA to pull it off – to make it so routine “for him.” He doesn’t even blink while the rest of us are saying 'Oh my goodness did you see that pass?' That’s what makes it even more compelling. It’s like he’s been designed to do this. If it seemed like he was doing it for showboating … but this is what he is and what he has been.
RB: You're doing the Thursday game with Reggie Miller and Chris Webber -- do you remember Webber's broadcast showdown with David Kahn a couple years back? The Darko "Manna from Heaven" moment?
KH: I had forgotten about that! (Laughing) … I am going to be all over [Webber] about that. ... Reggie is a basketball junkie, so he has been following every step they’re taking. The unique perspective to me is Webber, and this will be one of the big focuses. …. The sense I get from scouts around the league is there is the flair with the Wolves that those Webber-Divac teams from early 2000s had. What I remember so clearly is the commish coming out and saying “that is what we want the NBA to be.” Flying up the court, circus passes, team play, all those things.
RB: Much is being made about last year's double OT Wolves/Thunder game. There is a danger that this one might not live up to the hype, but it seems on paper to be a pretty fun one, yes?
KH: Oh yeah. It’s not like they’re playing San Antonio. … They’re playing a team of similar age, still with a chip on their shoulder, lot to prove. They’re still very much in the prove mode. The trade changed them a little, certainly, and they’re off to this great start. I’m really excited to get up and see that.
Wednesday (The debacle of the Lakers) edition: Wha' Happened?
Posted by: Michael Rand Updated: December 12, 2012 - 9:41 AM
"And in this scene, nobody plays a shred of defense. ... Action!"
We went through it here from 2009 to 2010 with the Vikings, then again from 2010 to 2011 with the Twins.
And it very well could be happening to the Lakers right now. There are seemingly too many good players for it to be happening -- even with Steve Nash out for a while and Pau Gasol temporarily hobbled -- but it is going south nonetheless.
It started with a winless preseason; it continued through a listless start that cost Mike Brown his job. And even with a change in coach and system, it is getting worse. Mike D'Antoni is now 4-8 since taking over, his four-year contract (three with a team option) at $12 million total looking more ill-advised by the day considering Phil Jackson, the one man who might have pulled the franchise from the abyss, was interested.
Magic Johnson is ripping the team. D'Antoni is snapping at reporters who question the team's utter lack of commitment to defense (video on that link). They have lost five of their last six games, giving up at least 100 points in all of them. They are 9-13 overall, and if the season ended today they would be in the lottery instead of the playoffs. Maybe it's too early to write them off, but it's also not crazy to think they will continue to be a sub-.500 team all season -- an aging group with the wrong mix that collapsed collectively.
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