For the first time in three years, Minnesota heads into a season without the safety net of a proven second unit. The Timberwolves’ bench is no longer built around established rotation pieces, and that changes everything. The top five look set, but after that, the minutes are there for the taking.
That’s a sharp departure from last season, when Minnesota kept seven of its top eight players and later used the trade for Ayo Dosunmu to get back to an eight-man rotation filled with players who could start for plenty of teams. This time, only four of last year’s top eight remain. Mike Conley is in Boston, Kyle Anderson is in Toronto, Naz Reid was traded to Charlotte, and Julius Randle is in Brooklyn.
If LaMelo Ball, Anthony Edwards, Dosunmu, Jaden McDaniels, and Rudy Gobert open as the starters, the bench picture gets thin in a hurry. Donte DiVincenzo being sidelined for most of the season only adds to that uncertainty, since no one on the reserve group would have been a rotation player last regular season.
Terrence Shannon Jr. looks like the likeliest candidate to step into the sixth-man role after his strong playoff run last year. The talent is obvious, but the resume is still small: 877 career minutes over 75 games, which works out to 11.7 minutes a night. He’s flashed real value as a primary ball handler, but defensive lapses have also knocked him out of the rotation entirely at times.
Health has been part of the issue too. Shannon Jr. dealt with ankle, shoulder and groin injuries during his rookie season, then had a foot injury last year that kept him out for most of November.
It flared up again in February and cost him another month and a half. The ability is there, but so far injuries and defense have kept him from getting a real extended run.
Bones Hyland is next in line and should be the first guard off the bench after a productive 2025-26 season. He averaged 16.6 minutes across 71 games, his highest workload since 2022-23, and shot 38.8% from three, the second-best mark of his career. He also posted a career-high 1.3 defensive win shares and a 2.69 assist-to-turnover ratio.
Still, Hyland’s reputation follows him. He has bounced around the league because of streaky shooting, playmaking mistakes and defensive inconsistency, and that history hasn’t vanished.
If he can stay steady on defense, avoid the cold spells and keep the turnovers in check, he has a strong case to run the second unit. If not, the uncertainty that has followed him will show up again.
Josh Green brings the most NBA mileage of the group. He has more than 7,200 career minutes over seven seasons and has been part of Dallas teams that reached the playoffs.
Minnesota, though, presents a different puzzle. At 6-foot-6, he fits in a crowded wing group with Shannon Jr., Edwards, McDaniels and Dosunmu, and he may be a little small to slide into a power forward role.
Green does have useful traits. He’s a solid shooter, connecting on 38.7% of his career three-point attempts, and he has only one season in which he shot under 45.0% from the field.
He can defend bigger forwards and smaller guards, but rebounding and attacking the defense off the catch remain his weaker spots. At 25, he may be the most established bench option, even if his ceiling is lower than some of the others.
His route to minutes could simply be staying steady while others go through slumps or miss time.
After that, the rest of the bench becomes a pile of unknowns.
Joan Beringer should get early minutes behind Gobert, but there’s not much of a sample to lean on. He played just 314 minutes as a rookie. The athleticism and defensive versatility are there, but the sample size is still too small to pin down exactly what he’ll become.
Jaylen Clark has flashed in his first three seasons and fits the defensive-wing mold, but his offensive game has lagged behind. Unlike Green, he hasn’t shot the three well, and that makes his path tougher. The defense will keep him in the conversation, but he likely starts the season near the bottom of the depth chart.
Trey Lyles is one of only two players on the roster over 30 and came back from Europe on a veteran’s minimum deal. In theory, he gives Minnesota a stretch forward who can rebound and hit threes. He has averaged 18.4 minutes per game over a 10-year career, but younger players are likely to get the first shot at carving out rotation time.
The two rookies, Isaiah Evans and Trey Kaufman-Renn, also appear to be on the outside at the start. Evans is a 20-year-old who has shown promise as a high-volume three-point shooter.
Kaufman-Renn is a 23-year-old rebounding forward who spent five seasons at Purdue and profiles as a do-everything post player. Both could get their chances later, but neither is expected to be first in line.
That’s the story of Minnesota’s bench entering the season: less certainty, more openings. For once, the Wolves are not bringing multiple starter-level reserves into October. Instead, they’re handing out chances and waiting to see who turns one into a real role.
And that kind of search has worked before. Alexander-Walker wasn’t viewed as a starter when he arrived from Utah, and Reid wasn’t a starter-level prospect when he went undrafted.
Now the Wolves are looking for the next one. Multiple players on this bench will get that opportunity, and one of them could end up shaping Minnesota’s playoff hopes.
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Bones Hyland Suddenly Carries A Huge Timberwolves Question
Bones Hyland has quickly become one of the more important second-unit pieces for Minnesota, and not just because of the energy he brings with the ball in his hands. The Timberwolves have been looking for a reliable backup point guard who can keep the offense moving when the starters sit, and Hylands improved playmaking and shooting have given the bench a much-needed lift.
The next step is figuring out whether that strong stretch can become a steady habit, especially with the Wolves needing more consistent production from their reserves. Hyland is now positioned to do more of the heavy lifting as a scorer and creator off the bench, and how well he handles that responsibility could go a long way toward shaping Minnesotas offensive depth. [Read more 🡒]