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_{Photo copyright 2008 NBAE (Photo by Steve Yeater/NBAE via Getty Images)}

A few of my faithful readers who also contribute to the most erudite NBA comments page around made a humble request yesterday for a new post so they don't have to comb through the thicket of our admittedly abstruse comment patterns to figure out who has chimed in recently. Since I won't post another trey until this weekend's games are complete--meaning late Sunday/early Monday--I thought it appropriate to accede to their wishes.

But what to write about to prime new pumps and perhaps short-circuit dead-end arguments from the previous post? Well, I didn't see many folks predicting a Wolves season as unsuccessful as last year's. And I know that I picked them to win 30 games--lower than most locals, but still a robust 8 game improvement. So, it is time to fess up on what has happened negatively that we didn't expect. To get the ball rolling, I'll not only give you my prioritized list, I'll add in the places in my NBA picks where I've felt particularly smart or dumb thus far. And I'll finish up with some stats to mull over regarding the Wolves through the first 7 games.

Reasons Wolves Have Underachieved My Expectations

1. Smallball

For all the complaining I did about it last year, and all the warning I voiced about it during the preseason, you'd have thought I would have seen this coming, and factored it in. But then coach Randy Wittman played Mark Madsen quite a bit en route to a 6-2 preseason, leading me to believe that the front office had seen the folly of a Jefferson-Gomes frontcourt tandem and would play Mad Dog in the pivot until Jason Collins got healthy, if only to get Big Al and Gomes accustomed to their more suitable roles and hitting on all cylinders with Collins's return. Notice that I wasn't even expecting much out of Kevin Love in the low post, regarding him as an evolving project along the lines of the past three first-rounders.

Well, I underestimated the braintrust's capacity to stick with what doesn't work. Seven games into the season, Mark Madsen has all of 13 minutes, and Jefferson and Gomes have seen the overwhelming majority of their minutes at positions for which they are relatively undersized. Even more damaging, Craig Smith, a player I was frankly perplexed they re-signed, someone I expected to get mop-up and early foul trouble minutes only, has played 116 minutes thus far, or more than 16 minutes per game. When Smith subs in, Smallball almost always gets smaller. There are precious few power forwards, let alone centers, that the Rhino can adequately defend. And then there were times when it was Smith and Gomes in the frontcourt!

Last but not least, Jason Collins has not been brought back with alacrity. If reports are true that Collins was ready to go against Golden State but was held out because of matchups, I ask who better to guard Biedrins--a guy with absolutely no shooting range outside the paint, a terrible free throw shooter who should have a player who can afford the fouls guarding him, and a guy ranked second in the league in rebounds who needs a player dedicated to boxing out putting a body on him--than Jason Collins? Or why not Collins on Rony Turiaf, who turned the game around for GS in the first quarter when Nellie went big?

But forget Collins. Merely flipping the minutes between Madsen and Smith gets this team a couple more wins, in my opinion. And 3-4 against sub-mediocre competition puts them in range of my 30-52 prediction.

2. Commitment To Defense

I bought the line that the Wolves would devote the entire preseason to firming up their D, and thus emerge much improved in that area this year. Obviously Smallball is the biggest dent in that supposition, so perhaps this should be rated 1a instead of 2. But the perimeter D has likewise been incredibly shoddy and ballclubs once again dribble-drive with impunity. Fact is, this franchise has *never* defended the perimeter well; it's just that KG covered up for that glaring weakness for quite a few years. Well, Al Jefferson is not KG in that regard. And with the exception of Corey Brewer, there isn't a player on this team that should be proud of his defense thus far this year. That's on Coach Wittman, who proclaimed it a priority and is being shown up. And that's on the players, for lacking the pride, discipline and common sense to follow through on the most important aspect of winning games in the NBA--cohesive team D. Or did everyone miss the Celtics lesson of a year ago (if so, they're renewing it now)? 

3. Foye's Uncertainty

Regular readers will know that I had few illusions about Foye's capability to play the point. Put simply, he is not a point guard. But I thought we'd see the Foye of the last six weeks of the previous season; someone who distributed the ball just enough to hold on to the job and also fill the other criteria of a legit combo guard by scoring from various points around the court, from the three-point line to (less often) the paint.

This year? Foye has occasionally looked lost. He allowed his two-game, 3-24 FG performance to affect other aspects of his play, including dishing and defense. And his surreal pretense that nothing is wrong and that he's fundamentally a stud at the point who can do and get pretty much whatever he wants with the ball in his hands has to be really grating on his teammates, who are dependent upon him at least being the barely-adequate distributor he was last season--and scoring besides.

I think Foye will improve. But his standing on the team, and, I'd bet, in his heart of hearts and his own psyche, has been diminished. And that's not good news.

4. The Stubborn Style of McCants

Again, I didn't expect McCants to suddenly become Manu Ginobili or Stephen Jackson or somebody else who scores in bundles but still manages to do his job in other large and small ways on the court that connote leadership. I didn't expect McCants to be a leader, if for no other reason than the franchise has never treated him or cared about him in remotely that capacity. But I did think McCants would take a breath and survey the future of his career as he came upon a pivotal season for him. I thought we'd see better defense, more conscious passing, and less totally tunnel-visioned offensive spurts, where opponents can feel safe triple teaming him on his way to the hoop, secure in the knowledge he lacks the handle, the peripheral vision and, most of all, the wisdom, to dish it to the open man. Again, as with Foye, I thought we'd at least see the McCants of a year ago, and probably someone taking another step in this, his 4th year in the league.

On to the NBA.

Stupidest Prediction

Clips in the playoffs. Man, what a credibility-crusher that has turned out to be. Don't know why I stupidly figured Baron Davis and Marcus Camby would make it through the season uninjured. On the other hand, how the hell is a team with Camby and Kaman ranking last among all 30 teams in rebounding differential? And the games in general have been blowout after blowout? At this rate, newly promoted Mike Dunleavey is in the crosshairs of the Elgin Baylor loyalists inside that franchise. If the Wolves think they have problems, check out the Clippers, the worst team in basketball sharing an arena with the best team in basketball.

The other things that have gone awry are less egregious. I still think the Spurs will pull it together enough to make the playoffs and can at least take credit for saying their time as legit contenders was fading if not extinguished. I underestimated the resolve of both the Lakers and the Celtics to remain the class of their conferences, and it looks like I might have undersold the Jazz (I had them 4th), who blitzed out of the gate even without Deron Williams. And once again, I underestimated Reggie Theus and the Kings, who for the second year in a row are making me look dumb for calling them the worst team in the West. And Mike D'Antoni may in fact win 35 games with the Knicks this year, a notion I ridiculed.

Looking Smart So Far

I don't most folks were shoveling dirt on Dallas with quite the same vigor as I was to start the season. Now they're 2-6 and it turns out that Avery Johnson wasn't the problem after all. I also was less than enamored with the trendy pick of the Sixers as legit Eastern Conference contenders, figuring they'd make the playoffs but not much further. I had Washington's nonstop injuries finally taking their toll this year, and they have. I thought Mo Williams would be the best teammate LeBron ever had in the backcourt, and he has been. I said a few other things right, but most of it was conventional wisdom.

Wolves Stats

One commenter in the last post noted that Minnesota was ranked 2nd in the league in assists, and near the top in fewest turnovers, and wanted to know how they were losing so often. Well, the answer is defense, and a lot of it is due to Smallball. The worst raw number is 105.57, which is how many points this ballclub is yielding per game, and that, folks, is the worst among all 30 NBA teams. So why is this happening?

Minnesota ranks 27th out of 30 teams in opponents FG%, watching 47.5% of enemy shots fall through the hoop. Given that their 3pt FG% allowed is only 20th in the league (36.4%), that means they are getting housed inside the arc. In fact, if you consider the ppg allowed and all the dribble penetration we've seen, plus the Smallball front line D, I'd imagine that the Wolves have yielded more points in the paint than any other ballclub by a wide margin.  And Smallball also has put them 26th in the league in rebounding differential. Throw in the fact that they're 24th in steals, and it doesn't matter if they drop a lot of dimes, don't turn the ball over much, and are in fact 5th in points scored. It still adds up to 1-6.

Okay, before turning it over to the commenters, one brief note: For those of you who have signed on for my "Twitter" comments, be patient. I'm not remotely close to being competent with this stuff, or in even understanding how much fun and enlightening it must assuredly be. Fact is, the site manager is behind the Twitter push. Any maybe in the near future I'll grasp the technology completely and play along. But don't bet the mortgage.