Kevin Love Trade Rumors: 5 Ways T’Wolves Get Better

BETTER BALL MOVEMENT

Far too often, teams who rely on their stars look for them when the best basketball play might be to go elsewhere with a pass. That seemed to be the case for the Wolves at times, when the offense would stall because they’d throw the ball to their horse and ask him to do his thing. To Love’s credit — he acted as more of a playmaker in 2013-14, racking up more assists in 77 games (341) than he had in his previous 146 games (337).

Rubio will be leaned upon heavily to create off the dribble and in pick-and-rolls. If you’ve watched him in the past, you’ll know that won’t be a huge problem for him:

Still, without Love on the court, the Wolves will have to rely more on ball movement and set plays to create offense. Usually, that’s a good thing. It doesn’t enable players to stand out as much, but the goal here is winning games — not building up individual stats. Think about the San Antonio Spurs here. Do they dump it in to Tim Duncan and have him do his thing on a regular basis? No — they work the ball around and run the offense. If it ends up in Timmy’s hands and he has the advantage, he shoots. Otherwise, they keep moving around to find a better shot.