Minnesota Timberwolves Starters: 2023-24 Regular Season Report Card

Minnesota Timberwolves Starters: 2023-24 Regular Season Report Card

It took 81 games, but alas, my thesis for the 2023-24 Minnesota Timberwolves is confirmed: this is a sequel team.

The Timberwolves finish the regular season with their second-best record (56-26) in franchise history, and even though I was just a young pup watching the ‘03-04 season, this season is easily the most fun I’ve ever had watching a basketball team. From beatdowns in Abu Dhabi to Naz Reid towels at WrestleMania; from beating the then-undefeated Boston Celtics and Denver Nuggets at home to 41 straight sellouts; from Anthony Edwards’ dunks to game-saving blocks — this season has reignited a burning passion for NBA basketball in the state of Minnesota.

And now, like any good sequel, the Timberwolves will enter the final act of their season facing down their arch-nemesis — the only team they could never really find an answer for —the Phoenix Suns. There are plenty of theories as to why this Suns team presents such a unique challenge for the Wolves. It could be their brand of small-ball with elite-to-generational shooting that creates defensive mismatches. It could be their mid-range mastery that can punish the drop coverage of a defensive anchor. It could just be the mental advantage of Phoenix defeating Minnesota in 13 of their previous 15 matchups (including 10 in a row when Devin Booker plays).

Whatever it is, the Suns will take the Target Center floor on Saturday afternoon with the swagger of a team that got their ideal matchup in the playoffs. In sequel terms, they are Darth Vader waiting for Luke Skywalker before the final duel at Cloud City.

“The force is with you young Skywalker, but you are not a Jedi yet” is the basketball equivalent of “your regular season was exciting, but you are not a contender yet.”

Is this bad news for the Timberwolves? Well, we know how that particular duel went for Luke Skywalker. But, unlike a movie, and perhaps contrary to NBA conspiracy theorists’ belief, the script to their season is not yet written; the Wolves still control how their season will end.

The sequel continues on Saturday, but before then, there is plenty to celebrate about one of (if not the) greatest regular seasons in Timberwolves history. Let’s get to the grades.

For almost the last time this year, a few brief reminders about the grading system:

1. These grades are roles-based, so the stats I’m looking at for each player are different.
2. Roles on the team can change as the roster and playing time changes—I will alter or add statistical categories throughout the season as needed.
3. The below stats are split into three categories – first semester (the first 41 games), second semester (the last 41 games) and regular season.

Mike Conley Regular Season Grade: 90% (A-)

Back into familiar territory for Minnesota Mike. The 17th-year pro continues to play his role on this team to near perfection. He’s your floor general, off-court leader, and wily veteran who continues to show that he still has gas left in the tank. When looking back on this season, I’ll not only remember the clutch corner 3s and lobs to Rudy Gobert, but I’ll also remember the moments of him talking to Edwards on the bench and coaching/hyping up his teammates.

Here’s the only worrying sign: the last 41 games (even more specifically the last 20) is his worst assist-to-turnover ratio stretch since I started tracking stats last season. It’s a big enough sample size now that it’s hard to push aside as just statistical variation. He’s been looser with the ball. From the eye test, good teams are definitely doing a better job of taking away the lob threat to Gobert and pressuring passing lanes on the perimeter which is leading to more scrambling from the offense as a whole.

Phoenix in particular is using this strategy against the Wolves. And it’s working. The turnover numbers in the first-round series will be important to watch, and while Conley is never going to be the biggest culprit, he has to set the tone of valuing each and every possession.

Anthony Edwards Regular Season Grade: 91% (A-)

This is one of those grades where I do worry that the system is missing the forest for the trees. My pre-season criteria for an “A” grade for Edwards was this: An “A” grade would mean that he made the leap from All-Star to All-NBA, and the early returns make it seem quite likely that he’ll be at least a Third Team All-NBA player, if not a Second Team All-NBA player. He had a top-15 season this regular season — how is that not an “A”?

I can’t fault anyone for grading him higher, but I’ll use a “Finchism” here – this season was the next step we all wanted from Edwards, but there’s still some meat left on the bone.

The meat left? More consistent shooting (he finished the season in a slump), a bit more consistent defense (specifically off-ball matchups) and becoming a more efficient end-of-game player (he’s the most important offensive piece for this team, and we are all aware of the team’s end-of-game scoring struggles).

Ant is 22 years old, is going to represent the United States of America in the 2024 Paris Olympics with some of the greatest to ever play the game, and has a postseason ahead of him in which to make a scene for the third straight season. Quite simply, the best is yet to come for the two-time All-Star.

Jaden McDaniels Regular Season Grade: 81% (B-)

The place to start with Jaden McDaniels is on the defensive end. He had his best defensive box score +/- of his career, was in the 90th percentile according to defensive estimated +/-, and he kept himself on the floor by committing the least amount of personal fouls per 36 minutes in his NBA career. He took another step forward and is in the conversation for an All-Defensive Team once again this season.

It’s the other side of the ball where McDaniels’ regular season got choppy. He finished this season tied for his worst offensive box score +/- for his career and his second-worst season shooting from behind the arc (33.7%). Jaden grew as a defensive player, but the numbers will tell you that the growth curve either flattened or that he regressed on the offensive end.

One thing is certain after the previous Phoenix matchups; he is going to get a lot of open looks with the defense loading up to stop Edwards. He has an opportunity this postseason to change the narrative around his offensive regression. The Timberwolves are going to need an upward trending shooting stretch from McDaniels to survive the coming onslaught of the Western Conference playoffs.

*A quick note: Since rebounds+assists was a stat meant for the final quarter of the season when KAT was out, I’m not weighing it very heavily in the overall regular season grade.

Karl-Anthony Towns Regular Season Grade: 82% (B-)

Here’s another grade that worries me about missing the forest for the trees since we are ultimately talking about an All-Star season for the Kentucky big man. But let’s lay it all out. First his offense:

1. Towns continues to be a generational talent when it comes to outside scoring and even with a statistical category that’s tilted up for his overall talent, he still finishes in the “A” range.
2. The turnover ratio is a five-alarm fire when it comes to his offensive effectiveness. He finishes this season as the sixth-worst overall player in NBA turnovers when you factor in usage and games/minutes played. Three of the other top-six players are rookies. This is buoyed by being the player to commit the most offensive fouls in the league, despite playing only 62 games.
3. Can I add here that two things are true: Towns gets a highly unfortunate whistle – it is hard to watch other big men on the national stage, and not say, “What if Towns got that kind of respect?” He also has limbs that flail wildly when he drives to the basket that consistently tilt 50/50 calls away from him with how unusual it looks.

Now to the defense. All of this may age poorly as his playoff matchup is either going to be chasing Grayson Allen around or being asked to guard one of the greatest offensive scorers in the history of the league in Kevin Durant. But without forecasting ahead, I’ll continue to argue that Towns is under-appreciated for what he does on that side of the ball.

Some numbers: This season he set a career high in defensive win shares, defensive box box score +/- and defensive rating. While it may not surprise much since these are team oriented stats, there was something that really caught my eye the last quarter of the season.

When Naz Reid stepped into the KAT role, he saw his offensive estimated plus/minus soar up (no surprise), but he also saw his defensive estimated plus/minus plummet despite the team defending at a relatively consistent level.

This helped me appreciate the difficulty of the Towns role; not only are you defending a bit out of position at the start of the game, but you then play a large amount of your minutes when Gobert is on the bench, and now you have to transition from wing defense to guarding the biggest player on the floor. It’s a constant swap of defensive style and strategy that changes every game based on players and matchup.

It hammers home the difficulty of what I’ve said all season about grading Towns — he’s being asked to make the most and hardest adjustments of anyone on the floor since the Gobert trade. His willingness to sacrifice and change his game are a big reason that this team won 56 games this year. But that narrative isn’t going to matter if he doesn’t value the basketball and make quick decisions with it every time it’s in his hands. Every unselfish sacrifice he makes is marred by a carelessness with the basketball unbefitting a nine year veteran.

Rudy Gobert Regular Season Grade: 96% (A)

While Rudy Gobert anxiously awaits the results of the DPOY voting that would tie him for most all-time, I’m here to announce an award that is just as prestigious: He is the winner of the second annual roles-based MVP award from Canis Hoopus.

The stats above tell the story of a player and team whose defined role and results came into perfect alignment. After this season, he’s going to have an argument for being the single greatest defender in NBA history, but finding his fit in Minnesota with the team, and fans, has been a journey.

It is fitting that Gobert released his excellent Players’ Tribune article this week (if you haven’t, make sure to check it out). He speaks out about the feeling of being misunderstood; a struggle with feeling accepted that goes way beyond basketball. The article is a great opportunity for us fans to understand Gobert as a human in his own words.

As far as the basketball court goes, Gobert needed to acclimate to this Minnesota roster and its fans. After the trade, Utah Jazz fans would post on Timberwolves Reddit about how much Gobert does on the court and how, despite accolades, the average NBA fan doesn’t really appreciate the work he does on a night-to-night basis. Then the 2022-23 season happened, and while there were glimpses of something great, the overall narrative was more about a trade overpay, a lack of fit with the roster and Gobert potentially being a n injured 31-year-old on the decline.

Then, the 2023-24 season began, and things have been so different. This Chris Finch quote from December points to something fans felt from the preseason on: “His mindset coming into the season is about as focused of a player I’ve ever been around… it just takes some time when you’re traded. It just does, we underestimate that part… He’s on a mission, he wants to prove to the league, he wants to prove to his teammates and the fans here that he was certainly worthy of the trade and worthy of being here and he’s on a mission to win a championship.”

This season has been a coming together of players, teammates, coaches and fans – everyone understanding each other just a little bit better, everyone being just a little bit more flexible with schemes and deferring to others. Minnesota fans understand what fans from Utah had been saying since the trade, and Target Center has responded with chants of “Rudy! Rudy! Rudy!”

Gobert anchors the best defense in the league, raises the floor of your team on a night-to-night basis and puts you in position for home-court advantage in the playoffs. A recent Finch postgame interview said it best so I’ll let his words close out this section: “Rudy is the reason why we don’t lose.”

As always, if you are looking for some more Timberwolves content during the playoffs, check out the Dunks After Dusk podcast on both Apple and Spotify.

This week, we did a bit of a palate cleansing episode following the Phoenix loss where we counted down the 10 best moments in the regular season and how they might impact the Phoenix series. Later in the week, we’ll play a little bit of trend/mirage while looking at alarming stats from the previous games against the Suns. Then we’ll be back after each game to break down the game, hand out awards, and process everything that took place.