The Slide Continues

The last week was not kind to the Timberwolves. Four losses and zero wins since my last post puts their record at 1-6. We're not in Randy Wittman territory yet, but it would be nice to pick up another win soon.

I will give the Wolves some credit for playing the Clippers and Celtics close. They could have even had a shot to beat the Celtics had the referees not given Garnett the star treatment on a big non-foul call. But then, ugly losses to both the Bucks and Blazers soured any moral victories that may have come from the close losses earlier in the week.

As most fans expected, it is already looking like it will be a tough year to follow the Wolves. So far, there are really four things that have hurt the Wolves over and over this year:

• Defense -- This is the big one. I'm guessing this is mostly a factor of the amount of inexperienced players on the team. In last night's game against Portland, the Wolves were way too slow to rotate defenders after a pass was made. Time and again, Portland would swing the ball quickly from one side of the court to the other for wide open 3-pointers. I have to hope that the defense will improve with experience.
• Rebounding -- It is surprising that this has been a deficiency given how well they rebounded last year. True, the absence of Kevin Love of is part of the problem, but there are other factors. Al Jefferson hasn't been pulling down the rebounds like usual, but the biggest culprit I've seen is the lack of boxing out once a shot goes up. That is unacceptable. The Wolves need four, if not all five, men boxing out every time the other team puts up a shot.
• Shooting -- This one is easy to pinpoint. Most of the early season has seen poor shooting by almost everyone on the team. Jefferson has been forcing up bad shots, Brewer has been taking a ton of shots (most of them are open shots, but he just misses them), and role players have been missing the few shots they've taken.
• Offensive Execution -- This is the deficiency that everyone should expect. The players are still learning the triangle offense and they clearly struggle with it right now. You have to hope that the players will eventually just "get it" and start to execute with more precision.

There you have it. These four things trouble the Wolves. Unfortunately, those are four BIG things. If you're optimistic, at least two of those items (rebounding and defense) are mostly functions of effort. Realistically, though, they are also limited by the personnel that is put on the court. So, until Kevin Love returns and the Wolves find a more deadly shooter, things could stay ugly a while longer.