Heading to the bench, Justin Patton was frustrated.

He had just fouled out of the game, was 0 for 6 from the field and had picked up a technical foul as the Iowa Wolves headed to their eighth straight loss.

While he’s displayed plenty of signs of youth, inexperience and fatigue since joining the Timberwolves’ G League affiliate in December, he’s shown an plenty of flashes of brilliance, and his teammates have taken notice.

“He shows flashes, like ‘Oh, s—‘,” Timberwolves teammate and two way-contract signee Anthony Brown told Zone Coverage. “If he works, he could potentially be [worth] like $80 million. The value of his game, he could be damn near a max player.”

Those ‘flashes’ have come periodically throughout the last three months Patton has seen the court, but came as soon as his first game in G League.

But to this point, Patton is a virtual unknown to those who haven’t seen him play — either at his lone year at Creighton last year or as a rookie in Des Moines this year — but that’s also part of the allure. Amidst a mostly-successful season for the Minnesota Timberwolves as a whole, the big ‘what if’ continues to revolve around the team’s lone rookie this season.

And as he earns the support of his teammates in Iowa, the buzz continues to build

And while all the support in the world from your teammates is undoubtedly helpful — especially while he continues to rehab a broken foot from July — it’s hard to make a leap without self-confidence.

Patton, thankfully, has that.

“Every level of basketball, I’ve found a way to stand out,” Patton told Zone Coverage before Iowa’s game on Sunday. “I know once my name is called in the big leagues I’ll be an All-Star. Sooner or later, whenever my name is called, I’ll do what I have to do.”

But he also knows the process of being a rookie, and tries to learn from those who have already made it. He’s texted with Jamal Crawford all season, and gone back and forth with Karl-Anthony Towns about what they could do on the court together one day.

He knows he still has to learn while he’s in Des Moines, sometimes working to learn from his “big brother” Towns a few hours away. But he also knows he’s a rookie, and goals like that are a bit down the road.

“If I’m going to be on the same level someday, I don’t know,” Patton said. “But it’s all about building myself and making myself try to be that player.”

For now, he’s averaging 12 points on 48.8 percent shooting and is starting to shoot from 3-point land at a higher volume — he’s shooting 38.2 percent from deep, but on just 1.5 attempts per game.

He’s smooth with the basketball in his hands, has a nice-looking jumper, good passing ability and good speed for a seven-footer.

He’s also an inconsistent defender and has yet to find his footing as a fully reliable go-to guy at the G League level. The injury rehab has been a factor and hindrance to his initial success.

In a way, his first-round pick status is another roadblock, as well.

“They’ve got a bullseye on him, because everyone knows who he is,” Iowa Wolves head coach Scott Roth said. “Every team’s coming after him. Every team’s testing him.”

But when he was acquired by Minnesota, he was far from “the guy.”

“The Other New Guy”

When the Timberwolves traded Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and the No. 7 overall pick in the 2017 NBA Draft to the Chicago Bulls on draft night, many thought Jimmy Butler would be enough of a return.

Butler had all the accolades Wolves fans were looking in a potential culture-changer. He had been to four All-Star teams to go along with a slew of other accolades that made his arrival in Minnesota a win by itself.

But that’s not all that came back.

Packaged with Butler came the No. 16 pick in the draft, a big get both because it meant the Wolves got a draft pick in addition to one of the league’s best players.

Ultimately, Patton would be the player Tom Thibodeau chose to fill out one of the biggest trades in Timberwolves history.

As early as the day he was introduced, it was clear that Thibodeau viewed Patton as anything but a throw-in.

“We’re seeing the versatility of bigs now that we haven’t seen in the past, when you look at Karl [-Anthony Towns],” Thibodeau said in June during Patton’s introductory press conference. “And we’re excited about Justin, not only by his offense, but we think he’s just scratching the surface defensively. He’s got great feet. He can run. He’s a multiple-effort guy. I think the shot blocking will get better and better.”

In his one season at Creighton, Patton showed a bit of every attribute Thibodeau enthusiastically described in June. But to this point, Wolves fans have yet to see what the front office saw in him. Not at the NBA level, anyway.

Before even getting a chance to play in the Las Vegas Summer League, he broke his foot.

“He’s probably half a year to a year behind in terms of just basketball playing,” Roth said. “Not having Summer League, it’s a huge thing to be with the team, and be in the facility and compete against the other NBA teams.”

It wouldn’t be until Dec. 8 that he would make his debut as a pro, but it wasn’t with the team that drafted him.

Not exactly, anyway.

Between the big-man combination of Towns, Taj Gibson, Gorgui Dieng and Nemanja Bjelica, the idea of Patton seeing any time in his rookie year seemed low from the start.

Lucky for Patton and the Timberwolves alike, the Timberwolves finally joined the majority of the NBA in acquiring their own NBA G League franchise. In this case, the Iowa Wolves.

Him starting his career in Iowa may have been inevitable for roster-related reasons, but he ended up needed it to get his feet back under him.

His path into Thibodeau’s rotation will be another story.

Finding His Way with the Big Club

But while he’s spent the majority of his time with Roth, Brown and the rest of the minor league club, Patton has spent a bit of time with Thibodeau learning the sets he’ll one day have to execute on an NBA floor.

And while all rookie timelines come with the necessary caveat of patience, he still plays on a basketball team with perfectionists like Butler. But he’s learned to embrace the criticism.

“If I’ve got Taj [Gibson] or Jimmy [Butler] talking to me or yelling at me, I can relate to it more,” Patton said.

And while that may be the case, he was also impressed — and maybe a bit surprised — by the intense mental approach of his head coach.

“Thibs, he’s so precise. He’s going to worry about all the little things,” he said. “He’s going to worry about all the little things, so you have to stay on top of it.”

The broken foot stopped Patton from getting to where he might want to be right now, but he hasn’t let that stop his drive.

And with the rehab, and the plain struggles of being a 20-year-old pro basketball player, both sides of Patton have manifested over the last three months.

There have been dunks, no-look passes, 3-point bombs and blocked shots that lead some to think Patton could indeed be the max player his teammate thinks he can be, and the All-Star he himself thinks he can be.

But even despite the injury, odds are high another game will frustrate him the way he got on Sunday afternoon in Des Moines. Frustration is part of a young, growing basketball player.

And while his true NBA potential remains as much of an unknown as it was when the Timberwolves traded for him on draft night, Patton’s rediscovery of what got him there in the first place might be the most exciting part of the mystery.

“I’ve found myself again. It’s been great to have fallen in love with the game again.”