The Official Rudy Gobert Thread

[winforlose]

My Jazz heart hurts seeing Rudy in a Wolves jersey.

KG in Boston was the same for me. It gets easier.

[Klomp]

Fun fact: The Utah Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup on January 3, 2015. His first career start was at Target Center.

[winforlose]

Fun fact: The Utah Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup on January 3, 2015. His first career start was at Target Center.

If the Timberwolves season opener is at home, then his first start for his second NBA team will be as well

[minimus]

Rudy has really KG like body, long, yet super strong.

[stitches]

Fun fact: The Utah Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup on January 3, 2015. His first career start was at Target Center.

Fun fact. The moment the Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup is the moment he became Jazz' best player, an honor he never relinquished, no matter who his co-star was on the team - Hayward, Mitchell, Conley... It's also the moment the Jazz started winning games.

Listened to some podcast that was recapping the Jazz' run and they were like "And the Jazz took a step forward into the playoffs when Hayward came along"... umh... NO! Not at all. The Jazz had a top 5 pick when Hayward was our best player. It's when Gobert showed up that the Jazz became a perennial playoff contender/team. It was literally over night. You can pin point the exact date when the Jazz started winning 55-60% of their games, compered to winning in the 30s before that - it was the day the Jazz traded Kanter and put Gobert at starting center!

[Klomp]

Fun fact: The Utah Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup on January 3, 2015. His first career start was at Target Center.

Fun fact. The moment the Jazz inserted Rudy Gobert into the starting lineup is the moment he became Jazz' best player, an honor he never relinquished, no matter who his co-star was on the team - Hayward, Mitchell, Conley... It's also the moment the Jazz started winning games.

Listened to some podcast that was recapping the Jazz' run and they were like "And the Jazz took a step forward into the playoffs when Hayward came along"... umh... NO! Not at all. The Jazz had a top 5 pick when Hayward was our best player. It's when Gobert showed up that the Jazz became a perennial playoff contender/team. It was literally over night. You can pin point the exact date when the Jazz started winning 55-60% of their games, compered to winning in the 30s before that - it was the day the Jazz traded Kanter and put Gobert at starting center!

Yep. 11-22 before that game; 27-22 from then on

[Klomp]

Read on Twitter

[Klomp]

Read on Twitter

I love this!

Finch said the Wolves will give Gobert everything he can handle. The more he shows them he is capable of doing, the more empowered he will be.

“I think we can maybe free him up a little bit, trust him a little bit more,” Finch said. “We start with a clean slate, and that’s how we start with all of our players. We give them a very wide spectrum of things to try to see what they can do within the flow of our offense.”

But he also made it a point to say that Gobert’s arrival should not bring the assumption that all is immediately fixed with the defense. The Wolves can’t just depend on Gobert to cover up everything. That’s what got the Jazz into trouble in the playoffs. And it does not address one major weakness, which is getting back in transition. Gobert spends so much time right near the rim that he will not be the quickest back down to the other end of the floor, and that will require the rest of the Wolves to get his back just like he will have theirs in other areas.

“Those are things that a good team does for each other,” Finch said. “We’ll see if we want to do that, but I believe we do.”

[Devilzsidewalk]

Rudy has really KG like body, long, yet super strong.

wtf, he has like a 22 pack

[Rauxcee]

Read on Twitter

I hope so. I'd love for Rudy put the false narrative about him to rest.

[D1SGRUNTL3D]

My Jazz heart hurts seeing Rudy in a Wolves jersey.

There’s always room on the bandwagon, buddy

[winforlose]

My Jazz heart hurts seeing Rudy in a Wolves jersey.

There’s always room on the bandwagon, buddy

Sooner the better. That bandwagon is gonna get crowded.

[Rauxcee]

My Jazz heart hurts seeing Rudy in a Wolves jersey.

There’s always room on the bandwagon, buddy

I'll be watching and rooting for Rudy for sure.

[Colbinii]

Boys, I think we are winning the Championship

[Colbinii]

Rudy has really KG like body, long, yet super strong.

wtf, he has like a 22 pack

What a little bitch using the isolation machines.

[stitches]

Read on Twitter

I love this!

Finch said the Wolves will give Gobert everything he can handle. The more he shows them he is capable of doing, the more empowered he will be.

“I think we can maybe free him up a little bit, trust him a little bit more,” Finch said. “We start with a clean slate, and that’s how we start with all of our players. We give them a very wide spectrum of things to try to see what they can do within the flow of our offense.”

But he also made it a point to say that Gobert’s arrival should not bring the assumption that all is immediately fixed with the defense. The Wolves can’t just depend on Gobert to cover up everything. That’s what got the Jazz into trouble in the playoffs. And it does not address one major weakness, which is getting back in transition. Gobert spends so much time right near the rim that he will not be the quickest back down to the other end of the floor, and that will require the rest of the Wolves to get his back just like he will have theirs in other areas.

“Those are things that a good team does for each other,” Finch said. “We’ll see if we want to do that, but I believe we do.”

This is brilliant! It's also kind of frustrating that other team's coach pinpointed the problems with our defensive schemes better than the Jazz and their coach were able to. He is 100% correct - overreliance on Gobert on all levels was one of the biggest mistakes of the Jazz - the FO continued adding only offensive weapons who couldn't help defensively, Quin continued forcing that same scheme where everything was reliant on Gobert to clean mistakes up and didn't enforce accountability from the perimeter defenders... so what did the the perimeter defenders do? They did what anyone would do when allowed to not exert effort - they did the bare minimum, they developed bad habits and their lack of accountability was reenforced by Gobert being able to clean things up well enough in the regular season... but then the playoffs came and every year we saw the exact same thing - opponents focusing on exploiting the perimeter defenders and relying on them not being sharp enough and not trying enough... which worked like a clockwork.

Good on you guys for having a coach who understands that having 1 generational defender is great, but it's not enough when the best teams focus on your weaknesses and relentlessly exploit them. Gobert doesn't need the perimeter defenders to be world beaters... he needs them to put up some resistance on drives so it will allow him that extra second to help and he needs them to execute some basic rotations so it would allow him to recover after helping at the rim.

[winforlose]

Read on Twitter

I love this!

Finch said the Wolves will give Gobert everything he can handle. The more he shows them he is capable of doing, the more empowered he will be.

“I think we can maybe free him up a little bit, trust him a little bit more,” Finch said. “We start with a clean slate, and that’s how we start with all of our players. We give them a very wide spectrum of things to try to see what they can do within the flow of our offense.”

But he also made it a point to say that Gobert’s arrival should not bring the assumption that all is immediately fixed with the defense. The Wolves can’t just depend on Gobert to cover up everything. That’s what got the Jazz into trouble in the playoffs. And it does not address one major weakness, which is getting back in transition. Gobert spends so much time right near the rim that he will not be the quickest back down to the other end of the floor, and that will require the rest of the Wolves to get his back just like he will have theirs in other areas.

“Those are things that a good team does for each other,” Finch said. “We’ll see if we want to do that, but I believe we do.”

This is brilliant! It's also kind of frustrating that other team's coach pinpointed the problems with our defensive schemes better than the Jazz and their coach were able to. He is 100% correct - overreliance on Gobert on all levels was one of the biggest mistakes of the Jazz - the FO continued adding only offensive weapons who couldn't help defensively, Quin continued forcing that same scheme where everything was reliant on Gobert to clean mistakes up and didn't enforce accountability from the perimeter defenders... so what did the the perimeter defenders do? They did what anyone would do when allowed to not exert effort - they did the bare minimum, they developed bad habits and their lack of accountability was reenforced by Gobert being able to clean things up well enough in the regular season... but then the playoffs came and every year we saw the exact same thing - opponents focusing on exploiting the perimeter defenders and relying on them not being sharp enough and not trying enough... which worked like a clockwork.

Good on you guys for having a coach who understands that having 1 generational defender is great, but it's not enough when the best teams focus on your weaknesses and relentlessly exploit them. Gobert doesn't need the perimeter defenders to be world beaters... he needs them to put up some resistance on drives so it will allow him that extra second to help and he needs them to execute some basic rotations so it would allow him to recover after helping at the rim.

Our biggest weakness last year was not having enough defensive diversity. We ran high wall because that was the scheme that did the best at covering up our weaknesses. But we lacked the personnel to optimize it. Finch was smart enough to find something that works and stick with it, but also was trapped by the fact that experiments to go beyond it tended to fail. Rudy gives Finch the flexibility to coach the way he wants to coach. With Rudy, Finch can play more zone, more drop, optimize the high wall, ect… Gobert really is a generational defensive talent. In a league where so much attention is paid to the guys who drop 30 or 40 not enough attention is paid to the guys who save 30 or 40 with their defense and their defensive presence. I mean seriously, how many guys enjoy attacking Rudy. How many teams settle for jump shots rather than get near the paint with Rudy down low. I honestly believe Rudy is a walking top 10 defense and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see us as a top 5 this year. Finch is a brilliant coach and has a ton of experience coaching multiple star bigs. He is kind of the big man whisperer if the stories are true. This team is gonna be scary good in no small part because Rudy is scary good.

[Nick K]

Boys, I think we are winning the Championship

I haven't wanted to say it but I think we definitely can win a Championship. I wouldn't switch our roster with anybody.

It's amazing that my first reaction to the trade was that we gave up too much but quickly realized we vastly improved. It was addition by subtraction in many ways. I am so stoked!

[D1SGRUNTL3D]

Boys, I think we are winning the Championship

I haven't wanted to say it but I think we definitely can win a Championship. I wouldn't switch our roster with anybody.

It's amazing that my first reaction to the trade was that we gave up too much but quickly realized we vastly improved. It was addition by subtraction in many ways. I am so stoked!

Glad you see the light

*bro hug*

[Rauxcee]

Our biggest weakness last year was not having enough defensive diversity. We ran high wall because that was the scheme that did the best at covering up our weaknesses. But we lacked the personnel to optimize it. Finch was smart enough to find something that works and stick with it, but also was trapped by the fact that experiments to go beyond it tended to fail. Rudy gives Finch the flexibility to coach the way he wants to coach. With Rudy, Finch can play more zone, more drop, optimize the high wall, ect… Gobert really is a generational defensive talent. In a league where so much attention is paid to the guys who drop 30 or 40 not enough attention is paid to the guys who save 30 or 40 with their defense and their defensive presence. I mean seriously, how many guys enjoy attacking Rudy. How many teams settle for jump shots rather than get near the paint with Rudy down low. I honestly believe Rudy is a walking top 10 defense and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see us as a top 5 this year. Finch is a brilliant coach and has a ton of experience coaching multiple star bigs. He is kind of the big man whisperer if the stories are true. This team is gonna be scary good in no small part because Rudy is scary good.

There was one season- really the only season Rudy was injured- and he only played 56 games (same season he won his first DPOY I believe) and while he was out, the Jazz were ranked 28th in the league in defense and had a losing record. When he came back, Jazz started winning and they were ranked 4th (I think) defensively. You guys should probably be a top 3 defensive team. If not, something is going horribly wrong.

Rudy also gets about 2-4 game winning, or saving, blocks a season. Which is no different than a game winning shot IMO, except it's defense and nobody likes to talk about defense.