Anthony Edwards admits the Timberwolves continue to be ‘soft as hell’ internally

Anthony Edwards admits the Timberwolves continue to be ‘soft as hell’ internally

Ahead of their narrow one-point, ugly win against the Los Angeles Clippers Friday night, the Minnesota Timberwolves were losers of their previous four games and seven of their previous nine. Despite rearranging deck chairs after trading Karl-Anthony Towns to the New York Knicks for Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo, the results have been anything but positive through the first quarter of the season.

Minnesota is currently 9-10 on the season, a far cry from its 15-4 start through 19 games a year ago. You could make an argument it’s slightly underperformed, sporting a plus-1.9 adjusted NET (12th) with the 16th-best offense and 7th-best defense. But that hasn’t quieted any frustration through 19 games, especially from superstar guard Anthony Edwards.

“We soft as hell as a team, internally,” Edwards said. “Not to the other team, but internally, we soft. We can’t talk to each other. Just a bunch of little kids. Just like we playing with a bunch of little kids. Everybody, the whole team. We just can’t talk to each other. And we’ve got to figure it out, because we can’t go down this road.”

In the fourth-straight loss, they were booed off the court by fans. Edwards didn’t take kindly to that, even though he acknowledged the team’s poor play through this early stretch.

“However many of us it is, all 15, we go into our own shell and we’re just growing away from each other,” Edwards said. “It’s obvious. We can see it. I can see it, the team can see it, the coaches can see it. The fans f—–g booing us. That (stuff) is crazy, man. We’re getting booed in our home arena. That’s so f—–g disrespectful, it’s crazy.”

It’s not going to get any easier for Minnesota, either. They face the Los Angeles Lakers on Monday followed by the Clippers, Warriors thrice, Knicks, Hawks, Mavericks, Rockets, Spurs, Thunder and Celtics over their next 12 games. Seven of those games will be on the road.

It’s not too late for Minnesota to go on a run, even though it will be an uphill climb. We’ve seen teams get off to poor starts before things finally click together. The Timberwolves are on the outside-looking-in on the play-in picture in a loaded Western Conference, but that should even itself out over the course of an 82-game season.

The biggest question will be whether or not Edwards, Randle (who’s been very inconsistent), Rudy Gobert and Co. can all mesh. This is what the entire front office is banking on for the next 2-3 years at least. All of their eggs are in this basket, so it’s going to have to get better if they want to compete for a title.

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