5:23pm: McDaniels has a fractured hand, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski tweets.
Minnesota’s President of Basketball Operations Tim Connelly, addressing the Gobert situation, didn’t specify whether he would take further action against Gobert, Wojnarowski tweets: “We made the decision to send Rudy Gobert home after the incident in the second quarter. His behavior on the bench was unacceptable and we will continue handling the situation internally.”
4:23pm: Rudy Gobert was sent home by the Timberwolves after he punched teammate Kyle Anderson during a timeout on Sunday afternoon, Shams Charania of The Athletic tweets.
In a video posted by Backcourt Alerts (Twitter link), Gobert and Anderson could be seen standing up and arguing with each other. Gobert lurched forward and took a swing at Anderson, hitting him in the chest. Anderson then had to be restrained from retaliating.
Minnesota is in the midst of a pivotal game against New Orleans. The Timberwolves could be seeded anywhere from seventh to ninth in the Western Conference play-in tournament, depending on the outcome of that game and the Lakers’ game against Utah.
Interestingly and somewhat ironically, Gobert commented about Anderson’s leadership skills to Chris Hine of the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Twitter link) on Saturday.
“Kyle wants to win and sometimes he’s a little aggressive in the way he talks, but I don’t take it personally,” Gobert said a day ago. “I receive it in a positive way because it comes from a place of wanting me to be the best Rudy I can be and wanting us to win. I love his competitiveness, love the way he plays the game.”
In a separate development, forward Jaden McDaniels left the game with a right hand injury, the team’s PR department tweets. McDaniels apparently suffered the injury when he punched a wall while exiting the court, Pelicans Film Room tweets.
It’s obviously an ominous way for Minnesota to enter the play-in tournament for the second straight season. It remains to be seen whether Gobert will draw a team suspension for his actions, which would put it at a disadvantage up front. Minnesota’s key frontcourt reserve, Naz Reid, underwent wrist surgery on Wednesday.
Well poop
Pop*
Unprofessional.. but not much else there.
Naa, the world has gone too soft these days. Should have slugged him in the face tbh.
Kermit Washington style I hope not
I wish I could delete this. Sorry Rudy T
Man, Gobert looking like he kinda crazy.
No self control at all.
And the team won the game without him.
Is he gonna be accepted in the locker room after this?
I guess so, Draymond and Poole seem to be fine.
That trade lookin better everyday for Utah……what a fleecing.
I doubt any sane NBA GM would trade Walker Kessler for Goebert straight up at this point (if salary matching was not an issue). To think the Jazz also got 4 unprotected picks plus Vanderbilt and Beasely is crazy.
It’s funny cause when the Jazz lost the playoffs to the Mavs last year and everyone was saying the team will likely be broken up, I was thinking who the heck would want to take Gobert’s $40M contract after the Mavs exposed his worthless he is in a switch in the playoffs. I thought they would have to add a sweetener for someone to take him. Then that trade, lol!
Trade Rudy to the Nets ……..
Ben and Claxton should get it done …….
So the Nets get 10000x worse? Nope. Blacklist Gobert out of the NBA – now.
Ngl kinda dig it.
Dinwiddie Thomas Bridges Johnson Gobert. Great on ball D from bridges and Gobert inside covering everything else. Dinwiddie and Johnson aren’t bad either. Offensively your very reliant on Bridges and Thomas but Dinwiddie and Johnson also have the occasional good game.
Very moveable deals in Curry Mills ONeale and DFS if you want to re work things….
For the Wolves Simmons has been terrible but there’s potential for him to find form
I thought Rudy’s problem was with the refs? Now it’s with his teammates opinions? This train wreck gets worse by the day in Minny
Kick that moron Gobert out of the NBA, he’s been nothing but a curse on the league and every team he’s been on. Maybe the single worst teammate of all-time, screw that clown. No team will ever win a title with him on it, period.
Plus he gave everyone covid, effectively starting the global pandemic
It ended up being a good game too. These two story lines are all people will talk about. How dumb for both players. They work so hard just to throw it away at the end.
Gobert can’t handle criticism, and needs to grow up. Again, he is the guy that made light of COVID, and had a falling out with Spida.
That said, and to be fair, if Minny had given up Beasley, Vandy and a 1st, no one would be pooping that hard on this guy. It’s a combination of the package to get him, his underperforming in Minny and then his general attitude that leads to the backlash against him.
Jazz took the Timberwolves to the cleaners
2023 NBA Soap Opera rolls on.
Now McDaniels??? Hope that wall learned a lesson! Please tank the play in, because if I have to watch this team in a 7 game series I might just sow my eyelids shut
You must be a die hard fan obviously
This is dumb. Anderson was obviously taking a shot, and Gobert took one back that was nothing. A punch to the chest?
Is that what Draymond Green did to Jordan Poole?
Equal crime, equal punishment.
Anderson had it coming, Poole didn’t look like he did that much to deserve the punch
This is a really good example of why guaranteed contracts in the NBA are a bad idea. If players could face being released for BS moves like this, it might make them think twice about the consequences.
However, it isn’t like that, and players can do whatever the hell they want without worrying about whether that argument was worth a millions-of-dollars punch. They can play marginally and do stupid stuff and still get paid, and make fools of all the fans who pay to see this.
The best part is if you don’t like it you don’t have to watch. *shrugs*
The NBA needs to start getting these spoilt jocks in line… There’s no accountability…
The coaches have no power anymore due to their need to get along with the players or lose their jobs..
You are right and alot more needs to happen
I keep thinking they must have hit bottom, but no.
WTH did Lore do in hiring Connelly? WTH did Connelly do with a young, promising group of players with a descent team culture and bring in Gobert and trade away so much including pics? Where is the head coach Finch in all of this? Management & coaching leadership matter and WTH is it or what is this… a colossal embarrassment!!
The current and future owner of MIN should hold a PC saying that they sent Connelly home.
Surprisingly, a few weeks ago, Finch was actually getting close to bailing out the FO for their travesty of a trade. He couldn’t account for KAT coming back and proving once againt that (outside of the 3 pt shooting contest) he’s a complete non-competitor. Nobody could account for McDaniel’s stupidity.