{"id":592865,"date":"2026-02-09T17:01:25","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T17:01:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/592865\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T17:01:25","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T17:01:25","slug":"chris-finch-calls-out-rudy-gobert-over-benching-suggestion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/592865\/","title":{"rendered":"Chris Finch calls out Rudy Gobert over benching suggestion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As the <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/minnesota-timberwolves\/timberwolves-news-ayo-dosunmu-standing-ovation-debut-which-goes-terribly\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Timberwolves are going through a terribly<\/a> frustrating rough patch, with the last two losses raising questions about the team&#8217;s effort, it has led to some interesting comments from <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/players\/b1c109da\/rudy-gobert\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Rudy Gobert<\/a>. With the <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/minnesota-timberwolves\/timberwolves-biggest-2026-nba-trade-deadline-mistake\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Timberwolves looking to excel after the trade deadline<\/a>, Gobert would publicly question the accountability given to the team, which some could see as a shot at head coach <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/tag\/chris-finch\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Chris Finch<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Gobert would say after Minnesota&#8217;s disappointing 119-115 loss to the New Orleans Pelicans that the effort was at a low point, \u201csomeone has to have accountability for the players,\u201d and also acknowledged how hard it is to take players out of a game. Finch would respond,<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=CuiPRYEtO84&amp;t=3099s\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"> saying that it has been addressed.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI handle all my conversations with ourselves in-house. Disappointed, he felt the need to go outside. But nonetheless, that\u2019s been addressed already today. There\u2019s never been a team that\u2019s won anything meaningful that\u2019s substituted their way there,\u201d Finch said.<\/p>\n<p>For the NBA insiders on \u201cThe Hoop Collective,\u201d Brian Windhorst would say that Finch&#8217;s comments are saying that he isn&#8217;t taking out star <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/players\/b76109c3\/anthony-edwards\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Anthony Edwards<\/a>, which many believe he&#8217;s one of the players Gobert was talking about, though he didn&#8217;t name anybody.<\/p>\n<p>Timberwolves&#8217; Rudy Gobert emphasizes accountability and effort\u00a0<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3658787\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Jaden-McDaniels-makes-sure-Rudy-Gobert-knows-he-can-pass-after-beating-Heat.jpg\" alt=\"Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert (27) prepares to play the Miami Heat before the game at Target Center.\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\"  \/>Bruce Kluckhohn-Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p>While the <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nba\/minnesota-timberwolves\/timberwolves-rumors-minnesota-kicked-tires-lamelo-ball-trade-trae-young-angle\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">rumors around the Timberwolves will continue<\/a>, Gobert&#8217;s original comments attracted a lot of attention, calling out players on the team who are not giving enough effort. He spoke at length about accountability, though didn&#8217;t name any players <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/story\/_\/id\/47860385\/rudy-gobert-slams-wolves-teammates-unacceptable-effort\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">who were showcasing a lack of effort.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt some point, if the players don&#8217;t have accountability, someone has to have accountability for the players,\u201d Gobert said, via ESPN. \u201cI&#8217;m on straight effort, I&#8217;m just talking straight effort. I&#8217;m 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&#8217;s unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s not an easy position for a coach to take guys out of the game,\u201d Gobert continued. \u201cIt&#8217;s not something that you want to do, but I think if the players don&#8217;t show any effort, at some point, no matter how talented we are as a team, if you don&#8217;t have that, you just can&#8217;t be a winning team.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Minnesota is currently 32-22, which puts them sixth in the Western Conference as they next take on the Atlanta Hawks on Monday night.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the Timberwolves are going through a terribly frustrating rough patch, with the last two losses raising questions&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3782],"tags":[375,7,2026,307,152,3954,6,373,308],"class_list":{"0":"post-592865","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-timberwolves","8":"tag-anthony-edwards","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-chris-finch","11":"tag-minnesota","12":"tag-minnesota-timberwolves","13":"tag-minnesotatimberwolves","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-rudy-gobert","16":"tag-timberwolves"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116041751150587552","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592865","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=592865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}