Timberwolves Links and Notes: Happy with Hummel

Coach Rick Adelman is pretty happy with Robbie Hummel:

"He's a solid player, he just a solid player, he's been that way since the first day of camp. I've said it before, he's always in the right spot, he understands really how to play the game. He doesn't force any kind of thing, kind of stays within himself. He does what he can do and doesn't do anything else, that's why he's effective."

Robbie Hummel: The player who will make us reevaluate the tenure of David Kahn?

The always excellent A Wolf Among Wolves has some interesting things to say about the messages Adelman is sending with this rotations.

Last night ended a stretch of five games in seven days for the Wolves, and Adelman was pleased with how they responded after the loss in Denver and the fatigue:

"Solid win for us. In the second quarter was about the only time we let them back in the game, they played hard. They competed the whole game. I was glad to see us come up in the third quarter and open it up."

"We were just better tonight than we were last night. And guys they pushed themselves through to the team, and did enough to get a good win."

Of course, after two days off, the Wolves embark on another five-in-seven stretch starting in Washington on Tuesday. The next ten games on the schedule include the Clippers, Rockets, Pacers, Thunder, Spurs, and Heat, so that strength of schedule will surge. Hopefully the Wolves can hold their own.

Now that he's shortened the rotation, the mixture of players on the floor always includes at least two starters. This puts significantly less pressure on the bench guys, and seems to be making for better play. In the long term, hopefully Chase Budinger will return intact, and the depth will improve.

Meanwhile, we have, for the moment achieved CH nirvana: Not Playing Any Terrible Players.  It's what we've dreamed of for years, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Nikola Pekovic has completely rebounded from an early season slump, going 31-42 over the past four games. He dominated the offensive glass last night and finished 8-9.

"He was on the boards. He was all over the rebounds; they had a hard time guarding him. Especially hurting his ankle last night in the back-to-back, it was nice to see him come out and play like that."

"He was just being an opportunist." --Rick Adelman

"Pek was great tonight. He's a load down there, especially when our outside shots aren't falling we can rely on him down there." --Kevin Martin

I would like to see them run more stuff for Pekovic as we move along. Several of his opportunities were from offensive boards, which is a big part of his game, but generally good things happen when he gets the ball.

Kevin Martin is a realist when it comes to his shooting:

"It was just me coming back down to earth. I'm not going to be shooting the way I've been shooting all year and I'm going to through stretches like that. I had a talk with my head coach and then everything was fine"

So far, the only thing the team is struggling with that I think they need to do well is defensive rebounding, where they rank 25th in the league, corralling 72.9% of the defensive rebounds. Still, it's worth noting that is only a little over 1% below league average (74.3%).  The spread in defensive rebounding percentage is really quite small generally; last season the best DReb% team was 2% better than league average, and the worst was 2.5% lower. The entire spread was between 71% and 75.5%.

Today's musical birthday is Bob Gaudio of The Four Seasons.

That will do it this morning. This is your lazy Sunday open thread.