[MUSIC PLAYING] It's the Lock-Dawn Podcast Network, your team every day. Your favorite podcast now has a newsletter, introducing Lock-Dawn daily newsletters for every NBA team. The ultimate team in league coverage delivered right to your inbox. Start your day with expert analysis, game previews, and recaps, news about your favorite team in the league, and the daily fantasy cheat sheet. Plus, links to the most important stories real fans need to read. Sign up for your team newsletter now for free at Lock-DawnDaily.com, the Lock-Dawn Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Lock-Dawn Wolves. Today on the show, the Timberwolves Bench Trio continues to impress, continues to astound. We'll talk about just how impressive the numbers are in any unit that includes the Bench Trio of Nazri, Dante, Devin Chenzo, Nikille Alexander Walker. And also, might the wolves start to play small more often, and could the upcoming trade deadline have anything to do with that? We'll talk about all that more today on the show. Welcome in. You are Lock-Dawn Wolves. [MUSIC PLAYING] You are Lock-Dawn Timberwolves, your daily Minnesota Timberwolves Podcast, part of the Lock-Dawn Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello, and welcome to Lock-Dawn Wolves Podcast, part of the Lock-Dawn Podcast Network, your team every day. My name is Ben Beacon. I'm the host of Lock-Dawn Wolves. Happy Tuesday, everybody. This is the final show of the year 2024, believe it or not. It's New Year's Eve, the wolves take on the OKC Thunder tonight, of course, the best in the West, and one of the very best in the entire NBA, to close out the 2024 calendar year, which has been a ton of fun. And if the wolves weren't in the middle of playing every other day, maybe I'd do a bigger, more grand best moments of the calendar year, maybe I'll do that if they have a little bit of a break here in the next couple of weeks. But it should be a lot of fun tonight, too. We'll talk a little wolves slender toward the end. A lot to get to first, so I want to talk a line-ups today. I want to talk about the bench trio that I've spent a lot of time on recently. But Chris Finch has been trying some different players around those three. We saw a lot of Josh Meine at the other. I shouldn't say a lot more. Josh Meine at the-- we've seen all season on Sunday against the Spurs, and going back to Friday against Houston. And also, Jack Borman and I talked on the postcast the other day about a potential post-trade deadline lineup. If Julius Radle were to be moved in February, or before February, perhaps. But what that could mean, might we see Chris Finch play smaller line-ups here in the short term? So a lot to get to, we'll start with the bench so we'll get into the lineup stuff. And we'll close with some Western Conference stuff and a bit of a thunder preview as well. So a big thank you off the top for making lockdown wolves your first listen every day. Of course, this shows free and available everywhere. You can watch on YouTube. You can also download the lockdown sports Minnesota app on Roku and Amazon Fire TV and watch there. And reminder, we've got a daily newsletter now. You can subscribe at lockdowndaily.com. And it would be much obliged if you would subscribe. And check out that newsletter every day Monday through Friday. It's one stop for ultimate team in league coverage. We'd love to shoot up the rankings in our team newsletters. We're having a bit of a competition at lockdown. So if you do listen to this podcast regularly, read if you don't, be awesome. If you subscribe and much appreciated again, that's at locked on daily.com. Subscribe to the lockdown wolves newsletter. All right. So we did a, I did a couple of shows last week about the two rules bench trio. And I don't wanna rehash, like I don't wanna just straight rehash what I had talked about last week of the week before. But I do wanna reiterate that the numbers continue to just be off the charts, impressive for the bench and also somewhat damning and, you know, not positive, we'll say, for the Timberwolves starters as a unit. And it's been like this all season. And that's kind of how we looked at it last week. But like Sunday was just a, almost an anecdotal, like obviously a painfully small sample, one game sample of what I mean by all of this and what we've seen over the course of the first 31 games so far this season. Sunday we saw the Timberwolves starters come out and get the wolves in a 10 point hole very quickly against the Spurs. The bench unit started to come in midway through actually a little bit later than usual, later into the first quarter and almost immediately right at the ship. They went on a 10-0 run in the second quarter and usually, not usually, almost always, there's at least one starter on the floor with the quote unquote bench unit. Usually it's two because Chris Finch has, for the most part, kept a pretty tight eight-man rotation with an occasional ninth-man, you know, the first few games it was Joe Ingalls and then there was some brief Josh Dillingham moments. There's more recently it's been Josh Minot and sometimes it was only eight guys. And so usually there'd be two starters with the three bench guys, of course, Nas Reed, Nikhil Alexander Walker and Dante Divincenzo. In this game, it was a four-man bench unit which included Josh Minot and the aforementioned bench trio. And then Julius Randall was that fifth guy who like fit with that unit. Well, and I've been saying for a long time, I'm not the only one, so I'm not taking credit for this, but I happen to say it on the show since the trade that stagger and Julius Randall and Anthony Edwards minutes as much as possible makes the most sense because both of those guys, when they're on the floor, the offense is revolving around them and learning how to play off one another because Julius isn't the catch-and-shoot threat that Cat is because he's not as, I'll call him as smooth of an offensive player as Carl 30 Townes. Yes, he's effective. Yes, he can play bully ball. Yes, he can punish mismatches. Yes, he can shoot the three. He gets the line better than Cat. He can pass better than Cat, even if we haven't really seen that yet in a wolves uniform, it's just less synergistic to try and fit Randall and Ant together than it ever was with Cat and Ant. And by the way, it's not like it was always super smooth with Cat and Ant. It took a while to figure it out, which is yet another reason why it's not surprising the offense has been clunky to put it kindly over the first 31 games of the season. We've seen fits and starts because it is hard to have two guys that want to and need to and are used to being the focal point of an offense played together. So all that aside, it is what it is. We're 31 games into this thing and Randall, it might be a one and done, right? There's always a chance they trade them by the deadline, we'll talk more about that later. There's a decent chance he moves on and for agency in the off season. There's also the JNC picks up his player option. Then the wolves say, look, we gotta try and trade him. Now that he's picked up this option because he doesn't fit into our plans next year, right? So there's a wide variety of things that can happen here over the next few weeks, next several weeks and really next six months-ish related to Julius Randall. But back to the lineup stuff. We've seen the tip wolves try this bench trio with different combinations of additional guys. Let's just look at, as a whole, that three-man bench trio of Dieven Chenzo Reed and Alexander Walker together, all of those lineups through 31 games, 877 possessions. They're a 97th percentile three-man unit. 97th percentile, a plus 14.4 differential in 877 possessions. That's a differential based on 100 possessions, both on offense and defense, according to cleaning the glass. It's a 77th percentile offensive unit with those three and a 97th percentile defensive unit. But the most important number is in nearly 900 possessions. It's a 97th percentile overall unit. I don't really care how they get there. In fact, I even pulled minutes out with Rudy Gobert just to kind of see how it looks. And if you take Rudy Gobert out of the equation, so they played 877 total minutes together. Just over half of that is with Rudy Gobert. But if you take Rudy off the floor, this is still a 96th percentile three-man unit in 421 possessions. The defense is much worse. It's 68th percentile, which still is, that'll play right, 68th percentile. But the offense is 98th percentile. So with Rudy on the floor, this is a defense first unit that is still well above average in the 70s percentile wise offensively. Both Rudy off the floor, which is almost half the time that these three guys are on the floor together, with essentially with Nas at the five and some combination of Julius or Jaden or Josh Minot even more recently at the four. This is a 96th percentile unit and they're doing it with offense. 98th percentile offensively, 124.9. So we'll call it 125 points per hundred possessions for this unit in 421 possessions. And the most used non-Rudy lineup with those three guys is with Anthony Edwards in the back court with Dante and Nas reading the front court with Julius Randall and Alexander Walker at the three. So they could do it in multiple ways, which I think is the takeaway here. They could do it with Rudy defensively with a little bit less pace and more dribble handoff actions, more spread pick and roll with Dante and Rudy and sometimes ants on the floor in these units as well with Rudy and then you're seeing a lot more pick and roll. Or you could take Rudy off the court, they could do it with pace. They could do it with attacking the rim in transition, putting pressure on the defense that way, trail threes from Dante and from Nas and from Randall. Randall attacking with more space with no Rudy on the floor. These three players together have shown the ability to play in a variety of different ways with or without Rudy Gobert, which as we all know, and I've been pushing this now for over a year. I said this last year. The Timberwolves don't take enough advantage of playing in transition with Rudy's off the floor. When he's on the floor, sure slow it down. Try and get your half court defense set as much as possible and slid on your offense as well to kind of play to those strengths. When Rudy's off the floor, push the pace. You have athletes, you have shooters. These lineups without Rudy on the floor, every single time you've got league average and above shooters. Jayden's the only guy, and you could say, Josh, mine it because we haven't seen it yet consistently. Those are the only two guys that aren't league average or better from three for their career, right? This most used lineup with no Rudy with those three, Aunt Divincenzo, Alexander Walker, Randall Reed, those dudes were all, and Randall had it down your last year percentage wise, but just a couple of years ago, he's 40%. Those are all 38 plus three point percent shooting guys, basically. So you could do it with pace. You could do it with space with Rudy off the floor, or you could play like Rudy likes to play, and you're still a 90, 97th percentile unit with Rudy on the floor, 96 with Rudy off the floor. Overall, when you're taking the thing in its totality, as a three man bench trail. That says a lot about just how impressive those three have been together. I wanna hit on something Jack Borman and I talked about on the postcast. If you watch the postcast on lockdown sports, Minnesota, Sunday night, we went live myself and Jack Borman, who does the postcast almost after almost every single wolves game. And then it's also on the audio feed. So it was before my Monday episode, you'll find it in your audio feed. Jack and I got briefly toward the end. We talked a little, Jack mentioned a lineup that perhaps we see post trade deadline. I wanna dig in a bit more on that and talk about something we could see, something to kind of try and read the tea leaves on here over the next several weeks as we draw closer to the trade deadline. We'll close by talking about the two worlds upcoming schedule where they sit in the West. The pace that they're playing at as a team in terms of their ultimate wind total where that could land them in the West. And we'll briefly talk wolves slender who we'll see play each other tonight in OKC. It's all up coming here next. Today's episode of Locked Out Wolves is brought to us by RocketRx. If you're ready to boost your confidence and take control of the bedroom, RocketRx has the solution. Imagine feeling more prepared and performing at your best. RocketRx makes it simple and stress free. RocketRx offers FDA approved treatments for erectile dysfunction at a lower cost than branded alternatives. No more uncomfortable doctor visits or pharmacy trips. 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It's not really a small ball lineup, but compared to how the wolves have traditionally played with Rudy Gobert in the fold, a potential smaller lineup that the wolves could play, especially if they want to consider what things could look like post trade deadline if Julius Randles indeed moved. Now, I don't want to be a prisoner of the moment too much in the sense that the wolves have won three in a row, the vibes are suddenly much better. They did just lose three in a row, but on the flip side, as Jack said at the end of the postcast on Sunday, don't look now like even with that three-game losing streak, this terrible team is on a much better trajectory than they were, you know, calling a month ago, right? Like Thanksgiving week, they're eight and 10, the sky is somewhat falling, like that's kind of what everybody's thinking, right? Well, they've now won nine of their last 13. So nine and four over the last 13, which is good, not like amazing, but pretty good. And also you look at the competition they've played over that stretch, right? Golden State three times, the Lakers a couple of times, the Clippers a couple of times, the Knicks, the Mavs, Houston, San Antonio a couple of times, that's not like a super easy schedule. Like every single one of those teams is very likely to be a play in team or better. They did lose to Atlanta mixed in. Atlanta is, I think probably gonna end up, I mean, they're right now top five in the East. So really, yeah, I mean, I think that statement holds. They're all playing or better teams, and they go nine and four in that stretch with the booing at home and some of the stuff that happened along the way, that's, you know, pretty good. So with a more macro view, I'm sure, we've talked about this a lot on the show in the wake of the trade, but I'm sure Tim Connolly in the Timwell's front office had eyes wide open with the possibility that the Randall thing really could kind of derail the season. And I'm sure was considering the possibility, hey, we should trade this dude, you know, during the season or by the deadline because he's got that player option, he could opt in, or you could lose him for nothing in the offseason, or you end up paying him and potentially overpaying him. All three things are possibilities. I think that's the least likely one, the last one I mentioned. I came into this thing thinking it was most likely he left for nothing, but given the way the season's gone, like the other two things are possible too. He may just opt in and be like, screw it, I'll get 30 plus a million to be here next year, or the Timwell's could be like, we gotta get out of the Randall business as soon as possible because of, you know, the booze and all the clips that have gone viral of him and his demeanor around the court, you know, the Timwell's win a close game and he kind of saunters off. That's changed a little bit recently, and also part of that is just Julius. When I did the crossover episode with lockdown next a week and a half ago, those guys said, look, he did that in New York too. Like he just sometimes, he has a Jayden McDaniel's face, except for he kind of looks angrier than Jayden, right? Like Jayden just looks like Jayden and Fair Runfair, Julius Randall has a bit more of a sullen demeanor about him. And doesn't look excited, you know, for his teammates at times, et cetera. So all that's to say, if that's possible, and I would absolutely say it's possible, I'm not willing to put a percentage on it right now, I think it's probably still a little more likely than not, they don't trade him, but it's certainly possible. He's traded by the deadline, which by the way is like the second week of February, we're like within six weeks, I think it might be six weeks from tomorrow actually, or today. So if he gets traded, and maybe perhaps this could be an indicator to look out for if you think that's a possibility, this small-ish ball lineup that the Tim Rulves have been playing around with a little bit. And that's basically, and not basically it is, the starters minus Randall plus Dante David Chenza, which had still got go bare at the five. So it's not a true small ball lineup. McDaniel's is six, you know, eight or nine or whatever he actually is playing the four. But Jayden McDaniel hasn't played the four since the Ryan Saunders year. And the first, very first part of Chris Finch's tenure, he did it a little bit in Finch's first full year when they got the six seed and lost in six games to Memphis, Jayden played some four. But since the Rudy trade, he's exclusively played the three. Like I think he's played a very small handful of minutes. And by that, I mean like 10 or 12 or 15 or something like that at the four. He's been a three because the Wolves have leaned into playing big as their identity. But is this shifty? Is the multiple guard backcourt a thing we're going to see more of? Because the Wolves still, well, they want a point guard on the floor. And I talked about this on Monday show, the post game pod toward the end. Like they still don't have that true backup point guard. It's not rod dealing him. It's not going to be this year. Maybe next year, it's not this year. Last year they traded for Monte Morris that didn't really work out. Although he was okay in a Wolves uniform, it never really Finch clearly was never super comfortable with how that thing shook out. So it's not to Demon Chenzo and it's Nicky Alexander Walker and it's some combination of Ants and Randall running the offense when Connolly's out on the floor and Connolly's struggled. In order to get Dante on the floor recently, it's been Connolly losing minutes. But you still want Mike on the floor as much as you can. So against certain teams, could we see this starting lineup? Minus Randall plus Demon Chenzo. So you essentially have a three guard backcourt with Mike, Demon Chenzo and Ant and McDaniel's on the wing and go bare down low. That's still a pretty long lineup, albeit not tall with Ants at the three and Demon Chenzo and Connolly together in the backcourt. But it's a long lineup and it's a defensively active lineup. And it still could be a, it would be a very good defensive lineup. And depending on the opponent, probably better as a defensive lineup than one with Julius Randall. Because you have the point of attack, defensive capabilities and the ball pressure that Connolly and Demon Chenzo and Ant as a trio can provide and McDaniel's. Like with that lineup, you can put Ants on, you know, like it depends on the matchup because as I've noted before, it's no secret Ant gets up for high usage star caliber type defensive assignments. He's better defensively when you put him in one of those spots than if you try and hide him or not hide him, if you play him off the ball. It's a, it's a, it's a bit of a catch 22 because you play him off the ball to conserve energy and to not get him in foul trouble, whatever. They tried that in the playoffs some. But then he doesn't, he's, he's a negative off the ball cause he doesn't usually cause the focus isn't there. The, the full court awareness isn't there. He tries to kind of take some plays off here and there and I'm not like guys do that, right? But you put him on the ball and he's literally one of the best on ball defenders in the NBA. I, I truly believe that. So you have the option there with hand, you could do either or you could put more likely, you put Mike on the least threatening guard or wing for the opposing team. McDaniel's and Devin Chenzo handle the point of attack. You have Anton Mike on the wings and go bare obviously, either guarding a big or doing the roaming thing like he does when he guards so hand or, you know, most recently we saw that against the Spurs where he could basically just kind of guard the paint and play off of the non shooter, the non offensive threat for the other team. So what you like, how often have we seen this lineup? This, this smaller lineup with McDaniel's at the four. Well, including the Spurs game, according to cleaning the glass, only 18 possessions this year. Conley, Edwards, Devin Chenzo, McDaniel's and go bare. 18 total possessions. So the sample size doesn't matter or I should say that. Sample size matters, which means these numbers we can take with gigantic grains of salt. However, I do want to point out in those 18 possessions, they're 100th percentile unit, 68.1, a plus 68.1, 100th percentile offensively, 100th percentile defensively. I think basically all of them, nearly all of them, came in the Spurs game on Sunday. So we can't read too much into that. Jack noted in his notes from Sunday's game that that five man unit played for six minutes together in the second quarter. So actually that is probably about the totality that those five have played together this season. They played together for roughly half that second quarter and they were a plus eight, they won those minutes, 17 to nine over the Spurs. And they were awesome defensively. Remember the Spurs were stuck on seven points for most of the, or nine points I guess for most of the second quarter. So it's been a positive lineup. If we start to see that more, I think it's in part because of the improved play from Dante Devin Chenzo. He now looks like the Dante from the Knicks versus the Dante from October, November of this year. And it could, it might maybe suggest hint at possibility that Chris Finch is, or that Tim Connolly is saying, "Hey, Chris, "you know, the Randall trade is a real possibility." So like start thinking about what, what a smaller lineup could look like depending on what we get back for Randall. 'Cause if this is how we're gonna get Conley and Devin Chenzo on the floor together, we gotta try this out. And then if Mateo's in fall trouble, you could try the Josh Mine. I think I meant to talk more about Mine today. Didn't get into it, but there will be plenty of time. And I have spent a lot of time on Mine out, but Mine out is also the McDaniel's foul trouble kind of security blanket there too with this unit. I don't think he takes anything away from you offensively. I actually think if given the opportunity, he'll be a better offensive player than McDaniel. He's not quite as good defensively, but the help side blocks, the rebounding, I think could be better. The activity's better off the ball than it is with McDaniel. So you lose a point of attack defender a little bit there. I shouldn't say lose. Mine out's a good point of attack defender. He's not quite McDaniel's, but he's a better off ball defender. So that just kind of shuffles who's guarding the ball, right? Like Ants, it might be more Ants Dante or then Dante McDaniel's in that case, right? But that five man with Mine out in place of McDaniel's in some instances, I think will be pretty intriguing. All right, let's close by talking about the standings where the wolves sit in the west, the pace they're playing at win-wise and then we'll talk about wolves thunder who we'll get to see tonight. We'll do all that here next. (silence) Today's episode of Lockdown Wolves is brought to us by our friends at Rocket Money. Did Rocket Money help you find any subscriptions that you forgot about or maybe that you were paying for twice? That's definitely happened to many folks. 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They're a full game behind the Clippers for sixth, which, of course, takes you out of the play in the West. And so far this year, the wolves have already beaten the Clippers twice. So if they were to tie with the Clippers, as of now, they've still got-- let's see, do they play them twice more or once more? They actually only play them once more. So they already have the tiebreaker locked up against the LA Clippers. So they're one game behind the Clippers. But if they tie the Clippers, they win that tiebreaker. They're a game behind the Lakers. They're two and one against the Lakers. They have that tiebreaker, too. So they're really only a game back of a five spot is another way to look at this. Which obviously gets you clear of the play in. It gets you in a matchup, it gets the four seed, which, in this case, is Dallas, which isn't great. But like Houston's only a game up on Dallas for the four, I think you'd rather play Houston than Dallas. If you're the wolves, matchup wise, I don't think there's any question, pedigree wise, in terms of the playoff experience and everything, you'd rather play Houston in the first run. It's silly to be talking about first-round matchups, 31 games in, but I'm just pointing that out with the way things are currently. They're one game ahead of Golden State, who's a ninth. They're a game and a half ahead of San Antonio, they're two and one against their intent. And Phoenix is two games back of the wolves, and they're in 11. So there's still only two games clear of missing the play in altogether. Which I don't like, it's obviously a thing that could happen, but it's not realistically a concern. But this, you know, little three game winning streak and nine wins in 13 games has been great for Minnesota to kind of stabilize in the West. And they're playing really well against good competition. Right, they're 14 and nine in the conference. They haven't played OKC yet, they haven't played Memphis yet. They've split a pair against Houston. They've lost to Dallas, or they beat Dallas the other day. They're two and one against Lakers, they're two and oh against the Clippers. I think they're one and oh against Denver. So they're doing well against the good competition. It's the teams below them. They've struggled with a little bit. Obviously Portland being the most obvious one. They've lost to the Spurs, they've lost to the Warriors. And they haven't yet played Utah or New Orleans, but that's gonna change soon. We'll talk more about that. Actually, let's talk about that now. Upcoming, you have OKC and Boston this week. Of course, OKC's 26 and five. Cleveland is still 27 and four with the best record in the NBA, which is still nuts to me that they're, they've been that good. And then they get Boston. So the Wolves get OKC and Boston this week. And then the schedule finally lightens up a little bit. Now, Detroit is currently in play in position in the East. They're 14 and 18. They've struggled a little bit more lately. Obviously game the Wolves should still win. It'll be the first game they've played against a sub 500 team in quite some time. Like you got to go all the way back to, I'm assuming San Antonio wasn't the last time they played him. You got to go all the way back to Toronto, who they lost to. The Thursday before Thanksgiving. Unless I'm crazy. Atlanta's over 500 still. Yeah. I don't know, like that's even, I knew this. I prepped this and like I didn't stick out to me that that was five weeks ago. They haven't played a team below 500 since Toronto on November 21. They get that with Detroit. This coming Saturday at Detroit where the Wolves have generally, of course, played well over the last few years as they should. And then it's the Clippers next week at home. And then you go at New Orleans at Orlando, which is obviously a tough game despite their injuries. They're 20 and 14. And then home from Memphis, which is tough. Then at Washington. So you at least get New Orleans and Washington over the next two plus weeks, or actually exactly two weeks. And but everything else, and they're still tough. Like it's still a really tough schedule for Minnesota. So for them to have won nine and the last 13 is pretty encouraging. And honestly, a split between at OKC and home for Boston this week would be great. And then hopefully winning your next three with Detroit LA and New Orleans heading into Orlando and Memphis would be awesome too. Let's talk briefly about tonight and the matchup against the Thunder. Jack and I did a quick preview at the end of the postcast on Sunday as well. The Thunder are 16 and 2 since the Chet home grid injury, which is crazy. Isaiah Hartenstein, of course, missed the first part of the season with an injury that he had in preseason. And they're overall now. The Thunder are still despite the injuries 26 and 5. I don't think Chet Hartenstein have played together at all. They've kind of filled in for each other admirably. The question at the start of the year was how would those two mesh and play together? That's still a question that hasn't been answered. And Chet will be back later this season. So that will be kind of the next test, I guess, to overcome for OKC, which seems like, you know, if you get back a guy like Chet Holmgren, it's not a bad thing. But there could be a bit of a, you know, like what came back from the cafeteria a couple of years ago, there could be a reintegration. Or in this case, I guess, integrations that haven't actually played together a period there for the Thunder. But Hartenstein's had the most opportunity of his career. He's been great. He's averaging a double double and 30 plus minutes for OKC. He's never had that kind of runway in terms of playing time. And the key for Minnesota, of course, is just putting as much pressure as you can on Chet Gildes Alexander trying to force the ball out of his hands and make other people beat you. Now, other people can beat you, as evidenced by the Thunder's incredible record this season. But if you can make somebody besides Shea do it, like, thank you, tip your cap. Right, T. Williams is averaging 21 points a game. So he's not chopped liver. He's shooting 48% from the floor. He's 36% from three. He's a good player. But without him, it's Hartenstein. And it's a bunch of guys who have reached double, or excuse me, single digits per game. Like, Lou Dort is the next highest score. And he's under 10 points, 9.6 points per game. If you can make Lou Dort beat you and try and make him do stuff besides shoot threes, I mean, 3/4 of his shot attempts, roughly 3/4 of his shot attempts are threes. If you make him put the ball on the floor, try and beat you in other ways, that's best case scenario. Now, the Thunder turn teams over more than anybody else in the league. They're number one in turnover rate as a defense. The Wolves still turn it over way too much. The Wolves also foul way too much. OK, so he actually doesn't get to the line all that often, which shocks me. But it's because SGA averages eight free throws a game. Nobody else is above three and a half free throws per game, except for Chet, who's out and has only played in 10 games. He averages five free throws attempts per game. Jaylen Williams is next most with 3.3. So if you can avoid fouling SGA like crazy, they're not going to get to the line. So if you can defend SGA as much as you can without fouling, make somebody else beat you, they're not going to draw fouls with anybody else. And for the Wolves, it's going to be really hard to not turn the ball over against the team like OKC. And given the problems that Minnesota has had turning the ball over this season, but that is the biggest thing that if they can do that, that they can keep this thing to a reasonable number of turnovers, they can legit win this. I actually don't mind the matchup with OKC. I'm not dumb. I know they're really good. But matchup wise, like they match up better with OKC than they do against like Dallas, or at least certainly than last year's Dallas team. I'm jury still out a bit on my take on this year's Dallas team. But I do think the Wolves OKC matchup is a good one. It's not terrible for Minnesota. We saw these teams last year play a bunch of really good games. Of course, the Wolves knocked him out of the play in two years ago. But SGA is with no chat, especially even with chat. It's all about SGA. What can you do to slow him down and force Jalen Williams and all the other guys to beat you? Of course, this team with with, you know, all the all their depth that they have. And Alex Caruso hasn't played. And that's obviously a huge injury too for them. He's a big part of what what they do from a defensive standpoint, from a flying around and making your life miserable standpoint. But actually don't hate the match of overall for the Wolves. So that is Tuesday night. We'll have the live postcast for you. It should be our guys, Luke and Minajak Borman again live on lockdown sports Minnesota on YouTube after every Tim rules game. And then I'll have that audio for you right here at lockdown wolves. And then I'll be back on Wednesday with the post game podcast. After wolves thunder, I was just looking. There's actually no line on Fandel yet for this one either. So go check that out on Fandel as well. You know, here, I'm sure after Monday night's games, there'll be a line. So go check that out. And then we'll see over at lockdown sports Minnesota for the postcast following the game. And then back here for the post game pod on bright and early on Wednesday. Yeah, maybe not that early. It's New Year's Day. But Wednesday morning, for sure, you'll find that here at lockdown wolves. A big thank you for making lockdown wolves your first list in every single day. Of course, this shows free and available everywhere, including YouTube, as well as all of your favorite audio platforms. You can also watch in the lockdown sports Minnesota app on Roku and Amazon, Fire TV and a reminder that you can sign up for the daily newsletter over at lockdowndaily.com. It's one stop for ultimate wolves coverage, ultimate league coverage. So you'll be right to your inbox daily. Again, lockdowndaily.com. Of course, lockdown wolves podcast is part of the lockdown podcast network. Remember, the lockdown network is your local experts on all the biggest stories. Once again, I'm Ben Beacon. This is the lockdown wolves podcast. And we'll catch you next time. A prime member. You can listen to this lockdown podcast and free on Amazon music. 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The Minnesota Timberwolves play differently in lineups with and without Rudy Gobert, and the bench trio of Naz Reid, Donte DiVincenzo, and Nickeil Alexander-Walker is awesome in every situation. Ben Beecken (@bbeecken) evaluates the differences, plus, might we start to see Chris Finch deploy smaller lineups with more frequency?
