It is your sole responsibility to understand these restrictions prior to making or placing any bets on the third-party services provided. Please be sure to understand the sports gambling and betting laws governing your country, state, or local area as they do vary. That's natural, given his age and the fact that he's no longer on a roster that was tailored to fit his game.īut for a player who can't shoot, create his own shot (with the exception of offensive rebounds, which is an underappreciated form of playmaking) or create for others, even slight regression in those areas can devastate overall impact.Disclaimer: Any and all information found on this site is for entertainment purposes only. And while he's still trying to check all those boxes, he might get more of a B in each. If we're going back to grading, Gobert would've earned A's for all of the above over the last several seasons. He averaged double figures with hyper-efficiency and took hardly any usage from the perimeter players. He was a willing screener and pulled opposing defenders into the paint with hard rolls to the rim. He was the game's best back-line defensive insurance policy. When he was with the Jazz, that's exactly what Gobert did. Ideally, a player making max money lifts everyone around him. Just having another big body (Naz Reid is out with a wrist injury) available for the non-Towns minutes would've helped.īut hoping for more point forward play from Towns and counting on Gobert to beat reserves already feels a bit like grasping at straws, especially when we're talking about a 30-year-old who's set to make over $40 million in each of the next three seasons. His true shooting percentage was slightly better without the big man too. It was plus-2.7 when Edwards played without Gobert. Minnesota was plus-1.4 points per 100 possessions when he and Gobert shared the floor. In October, Anthony Edwards told The Athletic's Jon Krawczynski, "The smaller we go, the better it is for me."Īnd with a season-long sample size in place, it looks like Ant may have been right. And this ill-fitting core seems largely locked in place. More importantly, assuming it won't move KAT or conjure up some taker for Gobert's contract out of thin air, Minnesota doesn't really have any moves to make. And they had to claw through the play-in tournament to make the postseason. They got Gobert's straight right to Anderson's chest. They got serious questions about the fit between Gobert and Karl-Anthony Towns. Meanwhile, the Timberwolves got 13.4 points, 11.6 rebounds and 1.4 blocks per game from their new big man (Gobert's lowest average since his rookie season in 2013-14). Beasley and Vanderbilt went to the Los Angeles Lakers as part of a deal that landed the Jazz another first-round pick. Utah wound up waiving Bolmaro, but it turned Beverley into Talen Horton-Tucker, who averaged 18.2 points, 6.0 assists and 5.1 rebounds after entering the starting lineup for his last 19 games. Including the rest of the assets makes it almost unthinkable. Trading the two straight-up isn't something that would make sense for many teams, given Gobert's contract (which runs through 2025-26 and will pay him $46.7 million if he picks up the player option for that season) and Kessler's age (22 in July). They also sent a 2026 pick swap.Įven now, reading that causes sticker shock, especially in the wake of Kessler finishing above Gobert on the aforementioned leaderboard for estimated wins (the cumulative version of Dunks and Threes' estimated plus/minus, one of the most trusted catch-all metrics in basketball). The last of those first-rounders, in 2029, is top-five protected. 22 pick Walker Kessler and four first-round picks to the Jazz. The Timberwolves sent Malik Beasley, Patrick Beverley, Jarred Vanderbilt, Leandro Bolmaro, No. In his first big move after taking over the team, former Nuggets executive Tim Connelly unloaded his new franchise's trove of assets for Gobert in July. This season, Gobert lost a three-year streak of being named an All-Star, the team traded for Mike Conley to help integrate the big man (something that actually seemed to work), Gobert punched teammate Kyle Anderson during the regular-season finale (something Anderson says is behind him) and Walker Kessler (who was sent to the Utah Jazz for Gobert) led all rookies in estimated wins.Īnd of course, he wasn't all Minnesota gave up for its starting center. But that may not be enough to change the report card.
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