NBA Draft 2020: Top 3 options for Minnesota Timberwolves with No. 1 pick

3. LaMelo Ball

Guard | Illawarra (NBL) | 6’7 | 180 lbs | 19 years old

In a lackluster draft class that lacks a consensus can’t-miss prospect — there are no Lukas or Zions this year — LaMelo Ball (17.0 points, 7.4 rebounds, 6.8 assists) has nevertheless established a widespread reputation of being the single player who possesses the highest upside, more so than his projected top-three counterparts in Anthony Edwards and James Wiseman.

The reputation is a lofty one, but it’s well deserved. No other prospect offers Ball’s intersection of positional size (6’7), creative and fluid ball-handling, and savant-like passing ability, a package of tantalizing skill and pure playmaking instinct that makes him one of the best bets to become a legitimate primary initiator in the mold of other great pick-and-roll maestros.

He has his warts, primarily in his contact-averse scoring tendencies, disinterested approach to defense (though his lone NBL season was the first he was asked to defend), and a jumper that is still a work in progress (and progress has been made!), but there’s enough low hanging fruit and signs of growth to believe in some of his concerns being mitigated with NBA reps, coaching, and weight training.

Ball is a very, very good prospect, one with tremendous potential. But does he make sense for the Timberwolves with the first overall pick? Yes and no, depending on what the objective is. If Gersson Rosas is willing to bet on raw talent winning out in Minnesota, regardless of whether the pieces fit seamlessly together or not, then Ball is the pick. The same goes for if Rosas wants to simply grab the best possible trade asset to shop around at a later date.

But if Rosas is operating under the idea that this draft pick must fit alongside a core of Karl-Anthony Towns and D’Angelo Russell so that a playoff run is attainable in the next couple of seasons, then Ball probably shouldn’t be the pick here.

There’s a significant degree of overlap between what Ball and Russell offer, both in terms of offense — with the two guards being P&R-heavy creators who wouldn’t be maximized by spending significant time off-ball — and defense — with each player lacking in physicality and optimal effort on that end.

It’s also unlikely that coach Ryan Saunders would allow a rookie guard to carry a sizable playmaking load when he has two All-Stars on the roster, and while a complementary role (i.e., connective passing, spot-up scoring) wouldn’t be horrible for Ball, shoehorning him into such a role wouldn’t maximize either party in this player-team pairing.

This isn’t to say that selecting LaMelo Ball with the No. 1 pick is doomed to fail. It can work out, especially if he’s further along with tweaking his shot mechanics and if his defensive playmaking flashes are true signals of future aptitude on that end, but constructing an offense that accentuates Towns and Russell without completely overlooking Ball is imperative.

It will require strategic ingenuity and schematic creativity, prerequisites that ultimately beg the question: Is Saunders the coach who can make this work? If not, then Minnesota should probably look elsewhere.