A simple question but not necessarily a good prediction might be: if a player played during the season as they did during these two preseason games could they be effective? Using position adjusted wins produced for 48 minutes, I wanted to find out. Because for one thing, I wanted to know for example, if Rubio went 1 out of 4 shooting but did those other things how would he and the timberwolves fare? So I put the data in a wins produced spread sheet adjusted for position and last years defensive data.

Here is how the players ranked in those two games in descending order with the score: Love 1.00 (one win per 48 minutes) Rubio .53 Lee .249, Wes .210, Pek .192, Barea .138, Milicic .060, Williams .040, Beasley .030, Ellington .012 Ridnour -.043, Toliver-.161 Randolph -.544. all told this produced 1.58 wins in two games.

Some other questions I asked after looking at this data. Will Ridnour be affected by having had to care for his sick daughter much of the off season? Also, will any of the new players really help us right away? My answer to both questions is that it appears possible even probable. Rubio and Lee both look pretty good right now so we will see. Also, Milicic could be a net positive (even if small) by using him as Adelman used him. Pek could help this year. There is other data from previous years that Barea likely will help. What do you think?