To remind us why he was drafted #2
by Dumbhead62 on Jul 16, 2010 1:27 AM CDT
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PrintTake a look at this highlight reel. The guy looks like someone that could be a matchup problem at the 3 or the 4. His hands are unbelievably good, and he's very smooth. I'd like to see him play the majority of his minutes at the 3, but to post him up and encourage him to play down low even as the SF. I think I'm actually more excited about him than I would have been about Cousins (and I don't think putting both on this team would have been a good idea). I can see him having a ceiling of a Paul Pierce or a Carmelo Anthony, with a bit of a unique style of play.
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." -- Yogi Berra
by Wile E Coyote on Jul 16, 2010 9:43 AM CDT up reply actions
It was a joke
It’s not too difficult to be first to comment on your own post. Otherwise I never do the “first” thing.
Great Hands
Can you imagine having Beasley on the receiving end of Rubio’s passes on the break…. ummm wow!
He really was a man amongst boys in college
Such a smooth and aggressive player. If he keeps that aggressiveness he’s going to be a nice player. His shot is really nice too as is his feel around the basket. A motivated Beasley could really be a beast for us.
I would love him to pull off SF
We would get all the rebounds. Unfortunately, I don’t know if Beasley carries the team offensively at the 3 and we need him to carry the team
Ya I get now why Love is bummed We got Beasley
Rambis decides to play him at the 4 then Love hits the bench.
by Timberwolf i.e. Albatross on Jul 16, 2010 8:34 AM CDT up reply actions
If he starts to pan out
I can see trading Love at some point this season.
by waldo11teen on Jul 16, 2010 10:01 AM CDT up reply actions
Unlikely
If this team starts showing serious potential and wins around 25-30 games this year with Beasley looking more like star player, then I think Love would have no problem coming off the bench. I really do believe that. Love’s MO appears to be wanting to win, and any frustration comes from the idea of playing somebody in front of him who’s not as productive as Love can be. That’s a fair point on Love’s part. In this scenario, though, Beasley will have proven that he deserves the starting role in front of Love, and more to the point is the winning. If we start winning and Love emerges as a key catalyst off the bench (a la like his idol, McHale), my expectation is that Love will be fine. Or maybe we still start Love at center and bring Darko off the bench as a first sub. Whatever. I think Love will be happy playing 25-30 minutes a night on a winning team, starting or not.
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
by biggity2bit on Jul 16, 2010 10:54 AM CDT up reply actions
I've probably read your opinion on this on another thread and forgot
But what do you think about playing Beasley at the 3? I appreciate the stats that say he’s been better as a PF, but I think his ceiling is higher at the 3, and he already has a lot of the skills that he’ll need to play there. I don’t see any reason why he couldn’t continue to be used around the basket a lot (and against smaller defenders!). I even think that having two good passing big men in Love and Darko makes it a good fit.
The big question is defense. Again, he’s pretty bad on the perimeter right now, but I see a lot more ability for him to guard the Melos and Durants of the NBA than the Duncan/Gasol/Bosh types. I think he has the athletic ability to guard SFs, he just doesn’t have the technique or reps. He’ll have to be willing to be coached up for the SF thing to work on defense.
I really hope we commit to turning Beasley into a starting SF...
I agree that it really seems like the position where he has the most potential on both sides of the ball, and it also makes a lot more sense with our roster.
Then we wasted a pick on Johnson
I know nobody on this site give Johnson any type of love but he can guard most 3’s in the nba plus he can rebound.
I like Johnson quite a bit...
But he is a rookie, and doesn’t deserve the same PT as Love or Beasley. Hopefully he can play the 2, but even if he can’t, Beasley could slide over when Love comes out of the game and Wes can move into the 3, thus still finding a lot of minutes as the SF alongside both Love and Beasley.
I personally think
Wes is the best SF prospect we have on the roster currently, both short and long term.
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
by biggity2bit on Jul 16, 2010 11:38 AM CDT up reply actions
If he can guard most SFs
than he can probably fare well against SGs also. If you can hang with Durant you can hang with Kobe also (Not saying that Durant is better than Kobe nut you get my point). Either way we got all season to figure this out anyways.
I say
play him at the four.
Wait, let me step back a moment – I think we need to let all these guys get out on the court and play for 20 games. I think it will be a lot more clear there what our options are going to be. Wes is going to be good – real good – as a SF in the NBA for quite some time. We need to see what he can do there, and honestly why arbitrarily put Beasley in front of Wes at the 3? If Wes can play the 2, that would be great, but it’s entirely dependent on whether Beasley can guard 3’s, and in that case we have a great litmus test for Beasley’s ability to do that already on the team. Seeing how well he can handle Wes will go a great ways towards informing us as to whether he can guard other 3’s.
The thing is I just think that Beasley is miscast as a 3. He just reminds me too much of a Shawn Kemp type but with a better outside shot. Or even of an Amare or Shawn Marion type. Take away the positional signifiers for a moment (he’s a 3, or he’s a 4, etc.) and look at how they play – strong to the basket, aggressive, athletic. Beasley at his best needs to know that the middle is his. Wes is ideal for floating on the perimeter and then going towards the hoop – Beasley is the opposite. That’s why, in my opinion, you play him at what we’d call the 4 position (although my personal suspicion is that Rambis isn’t very dogmatic about positions but more interested in how you can combine various skillsets together).
As for playing Beasley with Love, I think that’s all dependent on matchups. Love isn’t a long term center, but he’s actually not that bad. Yes, he’s better as a PF, but against the right matchups (and most importantly, surrounded by far better talent than he was his rookie year after Al went down), playing Love and Beasley 5-10 minutes a game together with Love as center might work out quite well.
So something like (playing out of position) Love getting around 5-10 minutes at Center, Pek getting 5 minutes at PF, and Beasley getting around 8 minutes at SF. Gets everyone at about the range they should be at (25 min for Darko, 30 for Love, 25-30 for Beasley, 20 for Pek, and 25 for Wes).
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
by biggity2bit on Jul 16, 2010 11:38 AM CDT up reply actions
Fair enough
I do like Wes, and if playing him at the 2 will cause him problems I don’t like that. I also think the idea of evaluating whether Beasley can (or more accurately has the ability to) guard 3s will be very necessary. Personally, I suspect he has the tools, but he’ll need to learn how to use them.
I totally agree that he should play inside first, with his perimeter game being the complement. I just don’t see why he can’t do this as a SF (like you said, I think that we should worry less about position and more about style). Neither Love nor Darko are dominant inside players, so there should be room for him to operate, especially given that Love can hit the outside shot a bit.
I see Beasley as the only guy on our roster with the potential to be a dominant force, and I think he’s better served doing that against smaller players. He will always be overmatched trying to guard the really big PFs, and I think he’ll have a greater advantage offensively taking smaller players inside than facing up against bigger, slower players. I don’t see any physical, or athletic reasons why he can’t be respectable matching up with guys like Melo, Durant and Lebron. Again, he’s probably not shutting any of those guys down, but nobody is. Do you think they’re going to enjoy guarding him on the block?
I’m interested to see how this all works out.
Agreed
At this point this team needs to go out and put it’s first 20-30 games in the books. We need to see what’s out on the floor, how they mesh, what is working and what is lacking. Otherwise it’s just recycled speculation (at least that’s what I feel I keep doing).
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
by biggity2bit on Jul 16, 2010 12:12 PM CDT up reply actions
Not opposed to that perspective...
I want Wes, Love, and Beasley to all get serious minutes. I like all of them. In order for that to happen, we need some combination of Wes at 2, Beasley at 3 and Love at 5 to work. I think the main difference is I am more confident about Beasley at 3 than you, so I am pimping that as the best route to get there. It would be easy to get Wes 25 minutes at just the 3 off the bench and even more if he can play any 2. Start Beasley at the 3 and have Wes as the 6th man… when on the floor with Beasley, Beas would move to the 4 and Love would either sit, or slide over to the 5 (where I agree he is good, but not ideal).
Offensively it's no problem for Beasley and Love to play together
Beasley is taking it inside and Love is shooting midrange jumpers. I think they can figure out spacing to set up constant mismatches (because that’s what coaching an imaginary team during the middle of summer is all about)
by midlife crisis on Jul 16, 2010 10:47 PM CDT up reply actions
Beasely
at least seems to have faced his problem and is trying to distance himself from it. The wolves would seem to be a safe franchise for him and unlike Miami he could be perceived as the star here. The team is not currently good but there is potential almost everywhere.
Can somebody remind me why this guy can't play the 3...
He sure seems athletic enough to guard SFs, and his offensive game looks more wing than big man. When he has the ball, he shoots or takes his man off the dribble for a layup, when he doesn’t have the ball he cuts towards the basket looking to catch and score on the run rather than posting up and muscling for position.
I really don’t see why he shouldn’t be our starting SF day 1.
I agree
I hope that Khan and Rambis think the same thing. Put Wes at the 2 and Webster and Brew can come off the bench to sub for these guys. If it doesn’t work then scrap it but you’ve got all season to figure it out so I hope they try both combos a lot.
by waldo11teen on Jul 16, 2010 10:06 AM CDT up reply actions
+1
I also hope they play him at the 3. We’d be a rebounding powerhouse with him and Love crashing the glass. I agree with vjl110, based on the video his game seems suited for the 3. He can handle the ball well, shoot and his first step is dirty. He’d abuse other SF with his power and length.
Either way, it’s GREAT to see the Wolves pick up a highly skilled player that’s still very young. I for one am super excited. This move alone will make the Wolves 10x more fun to watch this year. Welcome aboard Mike!
These are some reasons why he cannot play the three
Kevin Durant
Nicolas Batum
Melo
Trevor Ariza
Rudy Gay
Richard Jefferson
shawn marion
caron Butler
These are guys just in the west that I know he cant defend.
He might have hard time with this guy
Grant Hill
I see what you're saying
But I think he has the ability to be at least an average defender at the SF position. Is he going to be better off guarding a Tim Duncan or a Pau Gasol than a Melo or a Durant? Obviously he’s not going to shut down either type of player, but I’d actually rather see him match up with Melo or Durant. Nobody will shut those guys down, but i think he could be respectable. It won’t be like the time When Love got assigned to Melo (at least I hope not).
As for the rest of the guys on the list, yeah, they may give him a little trouble with their quickness, but can you imagine those guys trying to handle him down low and on the boards? This is why I think if he plays the majority of his minutes at SF, they should still make a strong effort to get him touches in the post. His advantage as a post-up SF is greater than his advantage facing up as a PF in my opinion. I haven’t seen him enough to make any definitive judgements on that, but for the amount I’ve seen him that’s what I’ve come away with.
Also
Playing him at the 3 allows both him and Love to play a lot of minutes, which has been discussed a lot already.
People here on this site do not want to put Klove on the Bench.
I think that Beasley is better offensive player at the 4 then Kevin love. Klove has no post moves and gets his shot blocked at a high rate. defensively Beasley has a slight edge over love because of his athletic ability
Even if you (erroneously) think Beasley is better than Love...
You can’t seriously think that Love isn’t the next best player… right?!? So in that case, why would you be so eager to have the second best player backing up the best player on your team? No matter how you value Love and Beasley, you must agree that having both getting as many minutes as possible is the best thing for the Timberwolves, thus debating between the two is an irrelevant response to Dumbhead’s comment..
Exactly
The issue for me isn’t whether he’s better than KLove, it’s whether he has a higher ceiling as a 3 or a 4.
He just needs to learn Bill Laimbeer defense
He can get one-on-one training for the “clothesline when your beaten off the dribble” defensive adjustment. That way you don’t have to be as big, just much stronger than your opponent.
by midlife crisis on Jul 16, 2010 10:49 PM CDT up reply actions
I honestly would have posted that same list to make the argument for why he should be at the 3..
as Dumbhead said.. he looks a lot better against those guys than he does against starting PFs.
You really think Durant, LeBron and Melo are a worse matchup problem for Beas than they are for anyone else on our roster? Beasley is way stronger and probably quicker than Durant, and has almost as much length. Nobody seems to be able to keep him from scoring, but I bet Beasley will severely limit the number of different ways in which he can score. As for Melo and LeBron, two guys that rely a lot on pushing around the SFs they play against, Beasley is about as good of a fit as I could imagine. There isn’t a guy on that list that I think he would be at a real mismatch against. Add in some of the omissions that play SF like Kirilenko and Odom, and it only bolsters the argument that he is better suited to pushing around SFs than getting muscled around in the paint by PFs.
You could say the same thing
about all the PFs he’s gotta guard to. He’s not gonna fare much better against them.
Gasol
Jefferson
LMA
Scola
Stoudemire
and the list goes on
I’ll take my chances with having power size and length over B-Easy having a bad matchup against one guy.
optimistic
Beasley press conference, Through the eyes of a teacher and someone who has gone through Basic training and the Military, I see a different person In Beasley than two years ago. Anyone else agree? You see the cocky swagger of the young person is gone. The one that says "i need your attention because I am so unsure of myself, The one the young recruit has before basic training or the freshman in high school. you know how people change after going through the military sometimes or even from a freshman to a senior in high school. It looks like Beasley has made that change to me. If so, Beasley could at the very least, be a better teammate. I would like to know if others see this in his demeanor at the press conference?
by mr.sorbet on Jul 16, 2010 10:22 AM CDT reply actions 1 recs
I did.
He seemed humbled and ready to start a new chapter in his life. Hopefully the situation he’s in will motivate him to dominate. We all know he has the ability.
I thought he looked like a guy
who needed some confidence, or more specifically he needs to know that his coach and FO has confidence in him. He seems like a guy who just wants to belong, and I don’t get the sense that he meshed all that well in Miami with Riley and Wade. I also loved how candid he was – in my experience that speaks volumes. He wasn’t throwing it in people’s faces, he wasn’t making fun of it, he seemed like a guy who’s aware of it all and accepts it and is looking forward. Kind of reminded me of Al after his DUI just owning up to it and moving on.
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
by biggity2bit on Jul 16, 2010 11:11 AM CDT up reply actions
I also thought: he could be happy again
He was having so much fun in college, I hope he can get some of that back on the Wolves.
It’s basketball, man, baskteball. It should be fun.
In the pros you just have to do all the hard work and the little things in practice, so that the game can be fun.
Regarding Beasley guarding 3's/4's
Can anyone help me out with updating this depth chart of Western Conference teams? I got it from ESPN but I know there has been some player movement. I was thinking that if we can look at who they’d be matched up with it might be clearer whether you’d want Beasley as a 3 or Wes as the main 3 (or put another way, how many times would you rather Beasley as your starting 4 vs. Love as your starting 4 based on matchups).
You should be able to edit it if you click on the link.
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
I am glad you are doing this...
I thought about doing the same thing last week and gave up after 15 minutes or so, largely because a lot of situations are really hard to call. Example: Utah, is their starting 3/4 Kirilenko/Millsap, Miles/Millsap, Kirilenko/Jefferson? I would say if it is the first situation we answer with Beas/Love, second response would be Wes/Love and third would be Beas/Love, but you could also see Miles/Kirilenko and they certainly will put that out there for X minutes a game, in which case I would go Wes/Beasley… It is a really difficult task to decide which matchups are important to consider.
I think the best way to address the question would be to take Beasley and go down the list of top 15 or 30 SFs and the top 15 or 30 PFs and identify how many on each list would be a advantage vs. a disadvantage for Beasley… then do something similar with Wes against SFs and SGs and with Love against PFs and Cs.
I am excited to see a serious analysis of this question, and given the body of work you have posted to CH, I’ll trust your judgment as to the best way to go about it.
I am glad you are doing this...
I thought about doing the same thing last week and gave up after 15 minutes or so, largely because a lot of situations are really hard to call. Example: Utah, is their starting 3/4 Kirilenko/Millsap, Miles/Millsap, Kirilenko/Jefferson? I would say if it is the first situation we answer with Beas/Love, second response would be Wes/Love and third would be Beas/Love, but you could also see Miles/Kirilenko and they certainly will put that out there for X minutes a game, in which case I would go Wes/Beasley… It is a really difficult task to decide which matchups are important to consider.
I think the best way to address the question would be to take Beasley and go down the list of top 15 or 30 SFs and the top 15 or 30 PFs and identify how many on each list would be a advantage vs. a disadvantage for Beasley… then do something similar with Wes against SFs and SGs and with Love against PFs and Cs.
I am excited to see a serious analysis of this question, and given the body of work you have posted to CH, I’ll trust your judgment as to the best way to go about it.
Doesn't take into account GSW and PHO trades..
Randolph out, Lee in for Warriors.
Childress and Turkoglu in for Suns (though Hill may start over Childress, dunno)
We've speculated a lot
already about line-ups and one that seems great on the offensive side that could lead to some defensive mismatches is something along the lines of
Flynn-Webster-Johnson-BEasy-Love, or Flynn-Johnson-BEasy-Love-Darko
Does anyone see us playing more zone next year? I think it could mask some of the defensive deficiencies of lineups with Beasley and Love in. Maybe just for the 5-10 minutes that they play together? (especially with the Darko line-up). When playing zone it helps to have a 7 footer protecting the rim
For defense
Brewer/(Ridnour or Jonny) – Martell – Wes/BEasy – BEasy/(Love) – Darko
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
Addixt
The only thing that would concern me more than any basketball ability is a concern over whether in fact he is an addict??? Is his stint in Rehab for depression? Or is he addicted to the “juice”? I only say this from the heart & personal experience. As a recovering addict myself, he could from what I have seen skill wise, be as good if not better than any Big Time player in yje league. But if drugs or alcohol are a factor, we will never truly see what he is capable of! I have No idea if this is really a concern, just what I have read!!
Thoughts??
by PURPLEPUSSYEATER on Jul 17, 2010 3:35 AM CDT via mobile reply actions
Didn't think there was any drug/alcohol abuse
Certainly could be there, but I thought his issues were mostly mental.
"Styx might be the mullet of bands."
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