The other night I was tangentially involved in a discussion between Brian Geltzeiler and Stephen Litel about the Timberwolves’ Anthony Randolph, who’s been playing well lately in the wake of injuries to the Wolves actually good players. It all stemmed back to this post, where Geltzeiler named Randolph his “12th Man of the Year” and said that when Randolph got playing time this year he “rode to the occasion and showed that tantalizing ability and athleticism that had made the Warriors and the Knicks before the Timberwolves believe he could be special.” His fundamental argument is that if Beasley and Williams were getting minutes and often squandering them, why not give Randolph the chance to show his talent? He sums it by saying, “AR has a ton of talent and is young enough and shows enough flashes, that it’s tough to quit on him.”

He’s certainly young enough, which is kind of the weird part of this. It feels like he’s been in the league forever, but it’s actually only been three years, and Randolph is only 22. Part of that illusion is created by the fact that he’s played for three different teams in those three short years—the Golden State Warriors, the New York Knicks, and the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Warriors thought enough of him to take him with the 14th pick of the draft and it’s not hard to understand what they thought they were seeing. It’s the same thing Geltzeiler’s seeing and his Draft Express profile from 2009 sums it up pretty neatly:

In terms of raw talent, no player displayed more glimpses of potential than Golden State Warrior Anthony Randolph …Randolph’s physical gifts are impossible to ignore, and are clearly a huge part in what makes him such a special talent. 6-10, with a pterodactyl wingspan (7’3″) and freakish athleticism, there are very few players in the NBA he can be compared to … What makes Randolph unique is his ability to create his own shot from the perimeter at his size, or operate as a super fluid one-man fast break. He possesses a devastating first step and excellent ball-handling skills, to go along with great coordination and extremely advanced footwork. It’s not rare to see him tap-dancing his way to the basket with the greatest of ease, often throwing in lightning quick spin-moves along the way, only to stop on a dime and then pivot in the opposite direction for an effortless finish … Randolph also didn’t shy away from taking his man down to the paint and showing his post repertoire. This is an interesting part of his game that can still be developed into a terrific weapon, as his excellent combination of quickness and footwork really makes him a big mismatch against small forwards and power forwards alike, despite his lack of strength.

Sounds amazing, doesn’t it? Geltzeiler feels that Adelman didn’t make the most of Randolph, which I would agree with, if the above assessment were correct. But Randolph’s already played for two coaches who seemed to be perfect fits for making the most of his talents and neither of them could get anything meaningful out of him. Don Nelson has long been known for running with abandon, for not emphasizing defense, for loving athletic guys in that 6’8” to 6’10” range. But Randolph didn’t blossom there. So off he went to New York and Mike D’Antoni, the coach who plucked Boris Diaw from obscurity, who loves to run the break and get guys who don’t seem to fit anywhere to become essential cogs and flywheels in a smoothly working offense. In fact, D’Antoni’s great failure in New York—the one that led to his departure—was failing to work with the superstars, not the guys like Randolph.

Adelman is a coach players love, a guy who will keep guys in there when it’s working and is known to give players a lot of chances before relegating them to the bench. In January, Randolph played in 15 games, and although he only averaged 12 minutes, his per 36 numbers were pretty good for a reserve player (~16 PPG, 7.5 RPG). Furthermore, he saw the court in most of the games the team played that month (18 total). And then, it suddenly dried up for Randolph.

After the Wolves’ game against Houston on January 30, he didn’t see the floor again for more than a week, next appearing against Memphis on February 8. And then after that he didn’t get any playing time for three weeks until the Wolves played the Lakers on February 29. What happened?

In the last two weeks of January, even as Randolph was playing well, there were these stretches where he would seem to completely lose focus. Take this sequence against the Kings on January 16 (Randolph is #15).

Starting on defense, Randolph loses Jason Thompson as he cuts to the basket then tries to make up for it with a poor steal attempt. Tolliver manages to block the shot and on the other end, Randolph is left all alone to throw down the dunk. Which is great, but on the next defensive possession, he can’t keep Thompson in check and fouls him while giving up the basket. Then, on the free throw attempt, he fails to box out his man, who gets the rebound and then gets fouled (possibly by Randolph again, although it might be Williams) going up for the shot.

Two nights later against the Pistons, Randolph’s hazy defense was on display again.

Although the Wolves don’t appear to be playing zone, it’s not at all clear who Randolph thinks he’s defending at the beginning of this play. It looks like he indicates to Williams that he should take Maxiell while he takes Jerebko. He’s down in the paint on the left side not moving very much. In the picture below, everyone’s totally out of position.

It appears that Randolph is on Jerebko and Williams is on Maxiell, but Ellington’s man is Stuckey, who’s screened from him by Randolph. As the play evolves, Randolph and Williams switch and Randolph allows Maxiell to cut to the basket when he takes an ill-advised step towards the driving Stuckey. If you watch closely, you can see that’s actually the only time Randolph moves during the play. His feet are basically glued to the floor. That’s not the kind of thing that will endear you to a coach.

It’s not even all on the defensive end. From that same Pistons game, there’s this, where Randolph looks completely bamboozled on offense:

Waiting in the high post, he jumps out, clearly thinking that Barea is passing to him when Barea is in fact passing to Ellington. He sets a pretty decent pick to get Ellington free and then tips it out of bounds when Maxiell can’t control the rebound. It’s not damning play, which is probably how he kept getting minutes for at least a while longer. And keep in mind this is all from the guy who already simply ignored Ricky Rubio calling for the ball on the break.

All of this, though, is just prelude to his performance on January 30 against the Rockets. His line isn’t a total indictment, even if it’s not great (14 mins., 5 pts, 3 rebs, a -7 in +/-). But watching his minutes and focusing on him, there are lots of little things (some of which don’t get called against him) that point towards his head not being in the game: grabbing guys on screens, pushing guys on rebounds.

There’s also Randolph’s consistently weak screening. Svelte is something of an exaggeration for Randolph and maybe it’s down to his body, but time and again Randolph fails to set a pick that actually stops the defender from following the ball. The first screen he sets for Ridnour in this play is more like a screen door:

The second one is better, but then you can see that instead of rolling all the way to the hoop, Randolph stops short for some reason. Look at how wide open the lane is:

But because he stops—perhaps wanting to take a midrange jumper—Ridnour’s pass sails right past him and into Kyle Lowry’s waiting hands.

Here, he falls for the initial fake and then fades into the lane, where he fails to box his man out and gives up the offensive rebound and tip in.

And then there’s defense like this:

As the play starts, Randolph is on the right block defending Jordan Hill. As Hill crosses the lane, Randolph sort of stays with him, and then when Dragic drives the lane he bites completely, leaving his feet to challenge the 6’4” guard (remember, Randolph is 6’10”) and leaving Hill open for the easy dish and lay-in.

But perplexingly, he’s not all terrible and that’s where it gets frustrating because in the very same game there’s this, which is pretty much exactly what that Draft Express profile was singing hallelujah over:

Seeing Randolph catch the ball on the wing, swing it down, blow past his man and get to the hoop for a ridiculous dunk in just four steps is what makes people keep believing in him. And it’s why teams keep getting hurt by him because a lot of the time, he’s not even awful. He just sort of disappears. When he’s not engaged in the offense, he spends a lot of time setting up in the high post and then calling for the ball. In fact, he spends a lot of time calling for the ball period. Then on defense, his physical limitations come to the fore more than his strengths. At 205 pounds, he doesn’t have enough mass to defend centers or power forwards, but he’s also not fast enough to just blow by them most of the time. When he can get past them, as above, it usually requires a little nifty footwork, which Randolph often seems loathe to engage in.

When he got another chance against Memphis a week after the Houston game, things hadn’t improved. Here are four back-to-back offensive possessions from midway through the fourth quarter.

In the first one, he can’t seem to figure out how to set a screen for J.J. Barea. When it sort of works, finally, he rolls straight to the lane while Barea weaves around him (which, admittedly, is at least partly on Barea). He actually puts the feed from Barea in, but it’s a minor miracle they didn’t trip over each other on the way there. The point, though, is that he got to the basket and got points.

In the second one, when Marc Gasol leaves Randolph to defend Barea’s drive, Randolph catches it in space and drives (presumably mindful of the success he had on the last possession), but he jumps from well outside the restricted area more or less directly into Gasol and fails to put the layup in.

He actually makes the smart play in the third one, even if he hangs back because the contact on the last possession bothered him. Catching it near the right elbow, he pump fakes and gets Rudy Gay to back off him before he drains the midrange shot. The problem is that having sunk that shot, he pulls up on the next possession and takes a bad midrange jumper.

So Randolph uses four consecutive possessions and the result is four points on one half-decent roll, one bad drive, one good jumper, and one bad jumper. It’s just not a sequence of offensive possessions you can give him time and time again. This is what people mean when they talk about bad decision making, about settling. Randolph doesn’t seem to know what to make of his skillset any better than we do—any good decision seems to be a random one, and not grounded in any overarching sense of what his game is. Here, for example, he follows up a smart defensive play (drawing the charge on Marc Gasol) with an exceedingly boneheaded offensive one:

The jump ball leads to possession for the Wolves and Randolph has it right near the arc so he goes for the longest conceivable two point shot. Obviously. Because he’s Anthony Randolph. And that ability to blow past big men from the perimeter that he showed off against the Rockets? It fails him utterly here where he can’t get past Marc Gasol, blows the layup, and then fouls Gasol out of frustration:

Is it any wonder that he sat for three weeks after that game? The coaches Randolph has had so far have looked on the surface like ones who could make the most of his talents, but maybe what he needs is the opposite: someone like Larry Brown to break him of his bad habits.

But I also wonder if they’re even really habits. “Habit” implies consistency and Randolph seems more like a random number generator on the court. He’s like the basketball equivalent of Schroedinger’s cat. There are a million shades of gray in evaluating a player, but on a quantum  level, it seems like it’s possible to make a Manichean evaluation of their talent, separating players into the ones who can play NBA basketball and those who can’t. But Randolph remains a paradox, a player who at any moment is a locked box inside of which basketball is simultaneously alive and dead.