Why Does Chris Finch Refuse to Call Out Julius Randle's Horrific Play?

Julius Randle is having a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad second-round playoff series for the Minnesota Timberwolves, who are a game away from elimination at the hands of the San Antonio Spurs after another blowout loss on Tuesday night.

For whatever reason, his head coach doesn't seem to want to publicly acknowledge that reality.

Randle put up another stinker in Game 5 on Tuesday, scoring 17 points on 6-of-17 shooting with 10 rebounds and one single assist. Those numbers may not look that bad, but it has to be noted that Randle had 9 points on 4-of-5 shooting and 5 rebounds in a fourth quarter where the game was already out of reach. In the first three quarters, when it really mattered, he had 8 points on 2-of-12 shooting, including missing all four of his three-point attempts. He was a -22 for the game.

Asked about both Randle's offense and defense in his postgame press conference, Finch didn't say anything that could be considered criticism or "we need him to be better."

"He played with force, played through contact, the first level of contact, stayed on balance a little better," Finch said of Randle's fourth-quarter performance when asked about the key to getting more offensive consistency out of him.

As for Randle's defense, Finch said he didn't see any problems. "Honestly, no, I don't think there's a ton of breakdowns around Julius's defense right now," he said. "It's a combination of a lot of different things."

This is the second straight game where that has happened. In the Wolves' Game 4 win on Sunday, Randle put up 12 points on 12 shots and turned the ball over six times. When asked about Randle's turnovers afterwards, Finch appeared to deflect the blame.

"We were probably just trying to play too fast," he said. "The one in transition, he probably didn't see the guy tracking back. Maybe playing in a crowd a little bit too much. He was doing a good job of drawing the crowd, he found Mike a couple times, that was great. They swarm you so fast that you've gotta be off of it quick."

Julius Randle | Bruce Kluckhohn-Imagn Images

Five games into this series, Randle has averaged 14.8 points on 37 percent shooting (26 of 71). He's made four threes on 19 tries. Since his solid 21-point outing in Game 1, he's scored 12, 12, 12, and 17 points. Perhaps even more egregious than his shooting is the fact that Randle, who led the Wolves in assists in the regular season, has eight total assists and 18 turnovers.

The Spurs have loaded up with traps on Anthony Edwards, forcing the ball out of his hands. That's put pressure on Randle and Jaden McDaniels to deliver — and they simply haven't. But at least with McDaniels, when he isn't in foul trouble, you can see the impact he has on the defensive end of the floor even if his shots aren't falling.

The Wolves have an 89 offensive rating and a 117 defensive rating in Randle's 174 minutes against the Spurs. He's having a historically bad playoff series with the ball in his hands.

The Wolves are getting just 0.85 points per direct touch from Randle these playoffs. That's the second-worst mark in the Tracking Era for a player with 300+ direct touches in a single playoff run pic.twitter.com/4aDr3rIrGw
— ALL NBA Podcast (@ALLCITY_NBA) May 13, 2026

That's why Finch's continued lack of public criticism for the team's third-highest-paid player has been strange. It would be one thing if Finch was a head coach who rarely ever called out any of his players in press conferences, preferring to keep those kinds of things internal. But that's not the case.

Earlier in these playoffs, Finch called out Terrence Shannon Jr.'s defense. And while Shannon's case is a bit different as a young player, veterans aren't exempt from criticism. Finch has called out Rudy Gobert and Jaden McDaniels, including early in this regular season. He called out Gobert multiple times in February. He's called out Edwards, including after Game 1 of the second round last year. He usually doesn't shy away from saying what's on his mind.

For whatever reason, Randle tends to avoid being the subject of any Finch criticism. The only time it's happened in recent memory is when Finch called him out for having three defensive rebounds in a March loss.

Maybe Finch, whose history with Randle goes back to a year they overlapped in New Orleans, doesn't think he's a player who responds well to public challenges. But right now, whatever Finch might be doing isn't working. Randle is a major reason why the Wolves' season has been pushed to the brink, and it comes off as bizarre that Finch keeps side-stepping opportunities to address the reality of how poorly the three-time All-Star has played.

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