{"id":591185,"date":"2026-02-08T20:34:38","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:34:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/591185\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T20:34:38","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:34:38","slug":"fed-up-rudy-gobert-wants-coach-to-bench-timberwolves-players-over-lack-of-effort","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/591185\/","title":{"rendered":"Fed-up Rudy Gobert wants coach to bench Timberwolves players over lack of effort"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Rudy Gobert has implored the Timberwolves\u2019 coaching staff to do something about his teammates\u2019 lack of effort.<\/p>\n<p>The three-time All-Star center was not happy after Minnesota flushed an 18-point lead in the third quarter and lost at home Friday night to the Pelicans, the team with the second-worst record in the Eastern Conference.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt some point, if the players don\u2019t have accountability, someone has to have accountability for the players,\u201d Gobert said after the game. \u201cI\u2019m on straight effort. I\u2019m just talking straight effort. I\u2019m not even getting to the basketball side of things, like \u2026 mistakes are a part of the game, but the effort to me for a team that wants to play for a championship, it\u2019s unacceptable.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not an easy position for a coach to take guys out of the game. It\u2019s not something that you want to do, but I think if the players don\u2019t show any effort, at some point, no matter how talented we are as a team, if you don\u2019t have that, you just can\u2019t be a winning team.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38426190\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-1868058462.jpg\" alt=\"Rudy Gobert (27) and head coach Chris Finch of the Minnesota Timberwolves react during the first half at the Smoothie King Center on December 11, 2023 in New Orleans, Louisiana. \" class=\"wp-image-38426190\"\/>Rudy Gobert (27) and head coach Chris Finch of the Minnesota Timberwolves react during the first half at the Smoothie King Center on December 11, 2023, in New Orleans, Louisiana.  Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>The Timberwolves (32-21) enter Sunday\u2019s home game against the Clippers in sixth place in the West, one game ahead of the Suns for the 7-10 play-in cutoff.<\/p>\n<p>Ahead of Thursday\u2019s trade deadline, the T-Wolves added guard Ayo Dosunmu from the Bulls \u2014 in exchange for guard Rob Dillingham, forward Leonard Miller, and four future second-round picks \u2014 to a roster also featuring Anthony Edwards and former Knicks forward Julius Randle.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think we have a real puncher\u2019s chance to win a championship,\u201d president of basketball operations Tim Connelly said.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38426223\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2259673213.jpg\" alt=\"Julian Phillips (4) and Ayo Dosunmu (13) of the Minnesota Timberwolves are introduced during media availability on February 6, 2026 at Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota. \" class=\"wp-image-38426223\"  \/>Julian Phillips (4) and Ayo Dosunmu (13) are introduced as newly acquired Minnesota Timberwolves during media availability on February 6, 2026, at the Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Gobert didn\u2019t single out any teammates, but Minnesota coach Chris Finch said he was aware of the 33-year-old center\u2019s concerns and that the team\u2019s effort was addressed on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI handle all my conversations with ourselves in-house,\u201d Finch told reporters. \u201cDisappointing [Gobert] felt the need to go outside. Nonetheless, that\u2019s been addressed already today. There\u2019s never been a team that\u2019s won anything meaningful that substituted their way there.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rudy Gobert has implored the Timberwolves\u2019 coaching staff to do something about his teammates\u2019 lack of effort. The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591186,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3782],"tags":[7,307,152,3954,6,373,66,308],"class_list":{"0":"post-591185","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-timberwolves","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-minnesota","10":"tag-minnesota-timberwolves","11":"tag-minnesotatimberwolves","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-rudy-gobert","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-timberwolves"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116036927398663480","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}