“You f****** need me,” Jimmy Butler reportedly shouted in a practice on Oct. 10, 2018. “You can’t win without me,” Butler implored. A lot has changed since that infamous practice. Every player from that practice except Karl-Anthony Towns has left the Wolves. Butler has cemented himself as a star for the Miami Heat. The Wolves let Tom Thibodeau go, and he’s coaching the New York Knicks. The Timberwolves are on their second coach and second GM since that infamous practice, but many Wolves fans and people in the organization can finally say, we can win without you.
With 20 games left in the 2023-24 season, the Wolves are atop the Western Conference with the league’s second-best record. Butler’s comments are a thing of the past. Still, it’s important to ask about the state of the Wolves. Where do they need to improve?
The Wolves have been something of an enigma offensively. They are tenth in the league in field goal percentage (48.7%), second in three-point percentage (38.9%), and 11th in free throw percentage (78.5%). They also shoot a good volume of free throws, ranking ninth (23.7%). As a result, the Timberwolves sit seventh overall in true shooting (59%).
It would be fair to assume that the Timberwolves would be an elite offense due to their shooting numbers. But the Wolves are curiously 20th in points per game (113.3) and 18th in offensive rating (114.6). The discrepancy between those shooting efficiency numbers and Minnesota’s overall offensive rating suggests that something else must be holding the Wolves’ offense back.
The lack of overall success could be due to Minnesota’s slow pace of play, which is 24th in the league (98.07). Minnesota’s slow pace is often a result of its inclination to play more methodically and use multiple sets to get a good shot. However, this does bear out in some of their advanced statistics. The Wolves are eighth in the league in passes per game (290.8), which amounts to 2.97 passes per possession. For reference, the Indiana Pacers have the second-best offense rating (120.1) and pace (102.61) and average the most passes per game (305.1). Therefore, Indiana also has 2.97 passes per possession. Put another way, the Wolves pass at the same rate as the NBA’s elite offenses.
But turnovers are where they break off from some of the more offensively efficient teams. The Wolves rank seventh in turnovers per game (14.6). For reference, the Pacers are 15th (13.4), on 4.54 more possessions per game than the Wolves due to their pace. Minnesota’s turnover percentage, which measures the amount of possessions ending in a turnover, further illustrates this. The Wolves were the seventh highest (14.8%) compared to the Pacers at 20th (13.0%).
While 1.8% doesn’t seem like a drastic difference, the difference between the best team, the Philadelphia 76ers (11.9%), and the worst team, the Utah Jazz (15.5%), is just 3.6%. That suggests that turnovers could separate the Wolves, who have a top-ten shooting offense, from being a top-ten overall offense.
However, the Timberwolves have meaningfully improved offensively in the last ten games. Minnesota’s turnover percentage has improved to 13.4%, 1.2% better than their season average. The Wolves even rank 17th in turnover percentage, which has caused Minnesota’s offensive rating to climb to 12th (114.2) while playing at an even slower pace at 97.63 possessions per game.
That improvement coincides with the Timberwolves trade deadline acquisition of Monte Morris, who has played exactly ten games with the Wolves. In those 10 games, Morris has just two turnovers in 167 minutes. As Morris continues to gel with the team, the expectation would be for Minnesota’s turnover percentage to perhaps improve further. The data suggests that the Wolves’ offensive woes can be directly related to their turnovers.
The Wolves have significantly less to improve defensively. The Wolves rank first in defensive rating (108.0), a full 2.2 points higher than the second-place Boston Celtics. Even looking back to last season, the Wolves rank 1.9 points higher than the top-ranked Cleveland Cavaliers. The Wolves also rank first in opponent field goal percentage (44.5%) and fourth in opponent three-point percentage (34.9%). Minnesota’s defense has remained their identity from the beginning of the season through even the last ten games, where the Wolves rank second in rating at 104.8, 3.2 points better than their already stellar season average.
The Timberwolves should prioritize improving their ability to contest shots. The Wolves allow a league-leading percentage of open shots (29.3%), defined as a shot attempt when the closest defender is four to six feet away. Minnesota also ranks 11th in allowing wide-open shots (23.5%), meaning the nearest defender is over six feet away.
However, this may be by design defensively, forcing poor shooters to be enticed into taking poor shots. That proves out in the numbers. On open shots, the Wolves rank second in field goal percentage against (42.6%) and second in three-point field goal percentage against (32.7%). The same results show in wide-open shots. The Wolves rank first in field goal against (55.7%) and third in three-point percentage against (37.1%).
That would suggest the Wolves play tighter coverage against shooters and looser coverage against non-shooters by design. The fear with this playstyle is that teams tend to have fewer poor shooters in the playoffs. This could result in more players on the court who can make those open or wide-open shots. While this is speculation, it could lead to a hole in Minnesota’s impressive defense.
It took five years and a lot of change, but the Wolves have finally proven they don’t need Butler. Anchored by the league’s best defense and offense, which is improving thanks to a deadline addition of Morris, the Wolves can win without Butler.
