Timberwolves coach says LaMelo Ball is taking better shots: ‘He’s deferential here’
· Yahoo Sports
Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Chris Finch said he had a conversation with All-Star point guard LaMelo Ball about his shot selection after the team acquired him in the stunning blockbuster deal with the Charlotte Hornets during the offseason.
“It’s something we talked about coming in. He’s been pretty good, and then when you watch it every day, you see — OK, the one-legged thing, he kind of shoots it like that every time, really,” Finch said ahead of tipoff against the Knicks at Madison Square Garden on Monday. “Some are a little more exaggerated than others, so it’s not too unusual when you see it every day.”
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Ball, the 2022 Rookie of the Year, is one of the NBA’s most polarizing talents at the point guard position. He is a supremely gifted play-maker and scorer who, in Charlotte, had a reputation for taking — and oftentimes making — bad shots.
Finch said that hasn’t been the case in Minnesota by design: With a four-time All-Star in Anthony Edwards plus veteran offensive options across both the starters and bench, the plan is for Ball to move the ball.
At least to start the season.
“He’s been deferential here. He’s not looking just to kind of shoot, shoot, shoot,” said Finch. “Sometimes, we [the Wolves] forget how good of a scorer he can actually be. We’ve been asking him to be way more into play-making for us, and then the out-of-context shots, he hasn’t had many of those.
“And the deep 3s, he makes them. No one complains about Steph [Curry’s] deep threes, [so we won’t complain about LaMelo’s]. And then he gives us a guy we can close the game with. You can put the ball in his hands, and he can make shots from different spots on then floor.”
Finch said the Wolves had an eye on the star guard for some time and had engaged in conversations with Charlotte for a year before Ball became available over the summer. The Hornets sold high on their star guard after finishing ninth in Eastern Conference and losing in the Play-In Tournament. Charlotte appears to be building around Kon Knueppel and Brandon Miller.
“Of course a talent like that doesn’t often come available especially after the year [the Hornets] had,” he said. “So when it picked up speed it was real exciting to think about, and it’s been pretty exciting to watch it play out in front of us.”
Finch said he plans for his All-Star back court to spend most of their minutes on the floor together. He also suggested Ball’s carefree nature has restored good vibes to Minnesota.
As part of the trade to acquire the ex-Hornets star, the Wolves sent Julius Randle to Brooklyn and Naz Reid to Charlotte.
“[LaMelo] is always in a great mood, always comes in smiling. He and Anthony have this shared quality that they’re really hard to stay mad at, and they do some things that you want to get mad at, but they have a reflective joy and I think that’s important,” said Finch. “They tease the joy out of each other as practice goes along, so that kind of adds to the overall spirit of the group which we really needed.
“We’ve referred to ourselves as a moody team at times. We’ve traded moodiness for giddiness, so we’re happy to get back to some sort of equilibrium.”
Ball averaged 20 points, seven assists and five rebounds in his final season with the Hornets.