WAC
Minnesota Timberwolves
PG - Ricky Rubio, Goran Dragic, Isaiah Thomas
SG - Marcus Thornton, Kyle Korver
SF - Chandler Parsons, James Johnson, Marcus Morris
PF - Kevin Love, Ersan Ilyasova
C - Sam Dalembert, Josh Harrellson, Hamed Haddadi
Positive Thoughts: Well balanced team, good symmetry, and well put together. Of the logical 9-10 man rotation, has very good bench players at all 4 spots (Dragic/Korver/JJ/Illy), good potential on the bench as well in Isaiah Thomas and Marcus Morris. Also, love Haddadi, should go ahead of Harrellson, who sounds more like a guy who would be friends with Jake Busey (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000998/).
Negative Thoughts: Never been a believer in Marcus Thornton as a starter on an elite team, and its tempering my expectations here. Although, I do love that he’s playing next to a 6’4 PG who can D-up 2’s. Dalembert is an upgrade over Milicic or Pekovic as a defensive force, but I don’t think that he’s ‘the answer’ next to Kevin Love. Very raw, young team who collectively haven’t won a thing in their professional careers.
Immediate Success: Fringe playoff team that will beat teams people think are ‘better’ on a regular basis, but will drop some games against teams that are clearly ‘worse’ pretty frequently as well. It’d be a mid-40’s win team in an 82 game season. They’re a talented young team, that goes with the territory.
Long-Term Success: Contender long-term, and should be in the running for TOTF. They’re a legitimate blue-chip center prospect away from locking it up for certain.
Pick-Two Success: Improved the already improving T-Wolves just by adding Thornton and Parsons (two legitimate positional starters at the 2/3, with Parsons already proving he can bring the defense and the rebounding with the Rockets.
Immediate Success:
Thunder
T-Wolves
Blazers
Nuggets
Jazz
Long-Term Success:
T-Wolves
Thunder
Nuggets
Blazers
Jazz (note: honestly Nugs/Blaz/Jazz are interchangeable)
Pick-Two Success: [/u]
T-Wolves (easiest diff)
Blazers
Nuggets
Jazz (toughest)
Thunder
IP TP for you for the unbelievable effort! Really happy with your evaluation of the T-Wolves overall. I gave this a lot of thought and that might be because outside of picking the Celtics, I got to build this around 2 of my favorite players in the game. I don't think Love gets nearly the hype or credit he deserves and that I think comes from who he has to play with currently and in the past. That is what my goal was, build a complimentary, well-balanced team around Love that will be fun to watch, and compete now and for many years to come.
Rubio was an easy choice and is what this team needs, a big (6'4"), young, still improving PG who thinks pass first and is more than capable of scoring and playing D.
Next step was to get Love the 5 that I think he has been missing throughout his career. When it came time to make that choice the pool of players had already grown thin so although not the perfect fit we went with Sammy D as the best fit for a defensive minded center who can allow Love to play his in and out game. Sam is going to start most nights for this team but you will see Love playing the 5 quite a bit as well.
Next up was getting a wing that could put the ball in the bucket and who could get out in transition with Rubio. Marcus Thornton is doing both of those pretty well and is only going to get better, he's only 24. His defense isn't his strongest point but he is far from bad at it with 1.5 steals per game and ranking 155 in ppp (pts per possession). His defense actually improves as he plays against SF which allows a lot of flexibility with Rubio, Korver and Thornton.
Getting more size was key to the next pick and I went with Ersan Ilyasova who is going to be the first big off the bench. Given the chance to play more recently he's been showing what he's capable of with a game of 29 pts and 25 reb followed by 15 & 15 in his next game. Most of the time he will come in as the PF and Love will slide over to the C. To date Illy's D is about avg but he ranks #4 in post up D ppp. Being 6'10" allows him to help on post up D against most C's in the league. Again he's only 24 and still has room to grow.
After that I went with Korver and Chandler to fill the middle/wing positions. They both know how to play team D and are capable at the other end as well. One brings some vet leadership and the other more youth. I was extremely happy to land both of these guys because they add more flexibility with the ability to play multiple positions.
From here it was all about getting more of the same and choosing bench guys who were team players and could step into the game for the players ahead of them at their positions and get the job done. I loved getting both Dragic and Thomas as my backup points, both young and growing with a focus on distributing the ball and playing both ends of the court. Johnson brings athleticism, more youth (just turned 25) and flexibility (SF,PF) and plays with a lot of energy and an improving shooting touch. Our backup bigs, Harrellson and Haddadi will not see a lot of regular time. They will probably split 15-20 minutes a game tops. We like them for their size and their youth. The hope would be to let them get some minutes and grow into a spot where they could take over for Dalembert in a year or two or at least remain as servicable backup bigs for years to come. For now Morris will be our garbage timer but he has been kicking it in the D-League lately and showing that he has the skills to develop into an NBA regular with time.
This team was built as a
team and I think will surprise most others in the league. Although we're young and don't have a lot of playoff experience I would love to see this thing simulated somewhere to see just where we fall out. We're balanced and don't have the headcases you'll find on most other teams. That's the kind of team I want to watch.
America's team has been built, now we just need the rest of you to jump on the bandwagon, LET'S GO T-WOLVES!!
Topic: IP Ranks The Pick-Two Teams By Divison (All Divisions Are Up) (Read 108523 times)