Charles Barkley claimed on the Halloween segment of TNT that Karl-Anthony Towns and Rudy Gobert cannot play together for the Minnesota Timberwolves. With both players over 7 feet tall, Barkley argued that the two are not good enough on the offensive end to justify playing together for the Timberwolves.
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Comparing the players with Shaquille O’Neal, as per the video shared by Clutchpoints, Barkley said that while Shaq might struggle to guard the smaller, more technically gifted players, he was dominant enough on the other end to make up for it.
However, that is not the case for both Gobert and KAT. Chuck talked about the Timberwolves’ recent loss against the Atlanta Hawks. Despite 31 points and 7 assists from Anthony Edwards, Gobert and KAT seemed out of touch with each other, something that has been consistent in the 3 regular season games thus far.
“For those two guys at Minnesota camp to play together. I mean that was one of the stupidest trades ever. You gonna get two guys over 7 feet tall in a little man league, and neither one of them are good enough on the offensive end,” Barkley said, before comparing the two with Shaq.
“They are not like Shaq. Rudy, and Karl- Anthony Towns, they don’t dominate in the post enough to justify playing two 7 ft guys together. Like last night, against the Hawks. The Hawks just stopped them,” he claimed, talking about the 127-113 loss to the Hawks.
“[Karl-Anthony Towns and Rudy Gobert] in Minnesota can’t play together… You go get two guys over 7 feet tall in a little man’s league and either one of them are good enough on the offensive end, they’re not like Shaq.”
– Charles Barkley 👀pic.twitter.com/iNS62dhsEC
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) November 1, 2023
While the alarm bells will not ring anytime soon, the Timberwolves’ tame start to the season comes alongside a clear lack of chemistry between their two big men. While things might yet work, Chuck surely seems to believe that they have set themselves up to suffer on both ends of the court.
Rudy Gobert and Karl-Anthony Towns have very limited success while playing together
Barkley’s rant does not seem to be without cause. Gobert, since his move from the Utah Jazz in 2022, has played alongside KAT a total of 30 times, and they have ended up on the losing side on half of those occasions, according to StatMuse.
That, by no means, is a favorable statistic and has already resulted in quite a bit of speculation over the pair’s future. KAT, in particular, has been consistently linked with the New York Knicks in recent weeks.
This was partly due to the way in which he greeted Leon Rose before the Timberwolves’ pre-season match against the Knicks. Owing to a poor record, dwindling hope of things working out, and the speculation surrounding a move already, the current season might prove to be the final one in which they play together, for the Timberwolves at least.
