The offseason just keeps getting worse for the Timberwolves

 

That basically sums up what it has been like to be a fan of the Timberwolves at all times, but especially this offseason. The Wolves went from having one of their best seasons in a decade and a half to turmoil and anarchy. I know they are only reports, and reports could be false, but they are overwhelming. When you hear that Andrew Wiggins, Karl-Anthony Towns, Jamal Crawford, Tyus Jones and now Jimmy Butler aren’t happy with one thing or another you start to assume the worst. Supposedly Wiggins is pissed that he’s the third option (more like 5th), Towns doesn’t like the organization, Butler is fed-up with Towns (and probably Wiggins for that matter), Tyus didn’t like the his lack of playing time off the bench, and Crawford just wanted to get the hell out of there as fast as he could. That sounds like an organizational problem. I’m sure most people will blame Thibs, and maybe rightfully so, but getting rid of him won’t solve this kind of problem. There seems to be a complete distrust of the entire organization from top to bottom. I don’t know what the right solution is. Maybe you trade Butler if you really believe he wants to team up with Kyrie Irving in the Eastern Conference next season. You could dangle Towns in a trade and net just about anyone in the league outside of LeBron, Curry, Durant and maybe James Harden. Wiggins won’t net much in a straight up trade, but it could be best to get rid of him and his max contract. Maybe you blow it all up and go into another 14 year rebuild. You could get rid if Thibs and all of this could blow over, or most likely Glen Taylor just needs to sit down and look everyone in the eye and magically fix everything, I really don’t know. What I do know is that the Wolves should be looking to add a few bench pieces to bolster their standing in the stacked Western Conference, instead they’re bickering and fighting and looking for the exit. Next season should be so much fun.

Minnesota Timberwolves season review

The Minnesota Timberwolves were finally bounced from the playoffs on Wednesday by the Rockets in Game 5 of the first round series 122-104. It was the first playoff appearance for the franchise since 2004. This season definitely had its ups and downs, but the season as a whole should be seen as a success.

Minnesota won 47 games this season, 16 more than the previous year. A lot f that can be contributed to the new additions of Jimmy Butler, Taj Gibson, Jeff Teague and Jamal Crawford. Butler was the key piece as he led the team in scoring and was top-10 MVP candidate until his knee injury in February. Karl-Anthony Towns notched his first all-star selection and is still coming into his own as a 22-year-old budding superstar. Role players like Tyus Jones and Nemanja Bjelica showed improvement in their third years with the team. There is plenty to like about the Timberwolves going forward but that doesn’t mean there weren’t bad signs this year.

The team struggled without Jimmy Butler in the lineup. Butler missed 23 games this year, in which Minnesota went 10-13. That could be chalked up to tough competition in those games, but it shows the Wolves relied too heavily on Butler this season. The young duo of Towns and Wiggins couldn’t step up to lead the team without Butler, and that resulted in sliding to the 8th seed and barely making the playoffs.

Speaking of Wiggins, he regressed majorly from the 2016-17 season to have his worst season as a pro. His shooting was down across the board, especially looking at his unexplainable 12% drop in free throw percentage. He seemed especially disengaged this year, and disappeared for quarters and halves at a time this season. While he may have made marginal improvements on defense, his overall game took a huge dive.

Overall though I think the season was a success, and showed why the Butler trade was necessary. I’ll grade it out as a B since the trajectory the Wolves were on before the Butler injury was the three or the four seed. If they grabbed a higher seed, maybe they would still be playing.

Looking ahead to next year it will be really interesting to see who they can add through free agency and the draft. Limited cap space may make adding a significant piece difficult. Hopefully they can add a three and D player or two to improve the bench and take the team to the next level next season.

The Timberwolves finally don’t suck anymore

For the first time since I was 13 years old the Minnesota Timberwolves are headed to the playoffs. That long gap spanning half my life sucked since I grew up in the Kevin Garnett era and watched the Timberwolves make the playoffs eight straight years from 1996-97 to 2003-04. I thought that as long as Garnett was on the team they would be contenders forever. But those dreams came crashing down as they missed the playoffs the season after making it to the Western Conference Finals. After that they traded the greatest player in franchise history for Al Jefferson and a bunch of nobodies. That’s when I figured out it was time for a rebuild, but I had no idea that rebuild would take well over a decade to complete.

The one thing that comes to mind during 14 years between playoff appearances, other than god awful basketball, was really crappy drafts. I always got excited for the drafts, especially when the Wolves had high picks, because it meant a new era could possibly start. They had some seemingly nice drafts from 2006-2008 drafting Brandon Roy, but trading him for Randy Foye in 2006, drafting Corey Brewer in 2007, and taking O.J. Mayo, but flipping him for Kevin Love in 2008. Put those guys together with young star Al Jefferson, and you would have thought the Wolves were on a decent track. Both Foye and Brewer had a few mediocre years before departing, but Kevin Love turned into a star and future building block. Then the most infamous draft in recent history happened. Minnesota had three first round picks in the 2009 draft. Seemingly ready to add some major talent to its team, David Kahn made what will go down as one of the biggest draft day blunders of all time. He chose Spanish phenom Ricky Rubio with the 5th pick, then turned around and took another point guard, Jonny Flynn with the 6th pick (and a third point guard, Ty Lawson with the 18th pick). It seemed like a huge draft at the time. Rubio and Kevin love could be the dynamic duo that the Wolves needed to get back to prominence, while Flynn and others could form a solid supporting cast. But there was one name in the draft that will forever be linked to the Wolves futility in the 2000s, that being Steph Curry. The NCAA tournament darling out of Davidson wasn’t supposed to be a great all around player. He might provide some shooting help, but couldn’t be a point guard and run a team is what scouts said before the draft. As we all know Curry went on to win two straight MVP awards and lead the Golden State Warriors to two NBA Championships in the past three years, while becoming one of the biggest superstars of this generation. The Wolves had two chances to nab the five time all-star, but instead got a huge bust in Flynn, and had to wait two years for Rubio to come from Spain and become a slightly above average NBA player. That draft alone set the franchise back several years. Minnesota had a string of first round busts in the years afterwards. They picked Wes Johnson fourth overall in 2010, Derrick Williams second in 2011, and traded Trey Burke for Shabazz Muhammad in 2013. Minnesota struck out in the draft more times than any other franchise, and I began to think we would never had another superstar again. Finally some hope emerged when The Wolves traded disgruntled star Kevin love to Cleveland for their two straight number one overall picks (Anthony Bennett from the 2013 draft, and Andrew Wiggins from the 2014 draft). This excited me as Wiggins was dubbed Maple Jordan and was one of the most highly anticipated phenoms in recent years (we all knew Bennett was terrible already).

Another major reason for the decade and a half long struggle was the absolute inability to find a decent coach. After the conference finals run in 2004, Flip Saunders returned with largely the same team. After  going just 25-26 through the first 51 games, he was fired and replaced by executive turned coach Kevin McHale, who for his efforts went 19-12 down the stretch, albeit failing to make the playoffs. Dwane Casey stepped in the next season going 33-49. The Current Toronto Raptors head coach actually had the Wolves off to a decent start in the 2006-07 season, but was fired to give Randy Whittman a crack at the position. The Wolves finished an abysmal 12-30 under Whittman to close out the season 32-50. He was back again next year and somehow got worse as the Wolves went 22-60 in his only full season. He only got 19 games of the 2008-09 season before enough was enough. He went 4-15 and was replaced by McHale again, who guided the team to another terrible 24-58 record. Then there was hope for the 2009-10 season, and hopes name was Kurt Rambis. Rambis was a hot commodity in the coaching world having been an assistant for the Lakers for four championships, including the previous season. That hope fizzled quickly as he amassed an amazingly bad 32-132 record over two season and was fired. After that even more hope for the franchise came in it’s next coach, Rick Adelman. Adelman was one of the greatest coaches in NBA history when he took over the struggling Timberwolves. He made his name guiding the early 90’s Trail Blazer squads to perennial playoff appearances, and did the same with the Chris Webber led Sacramento Kings teams of the early 2000’s. Most Timberwolves fans, including myself figured he would be the one to get us back to the playoffs. While he may have had the best run for a Timberwolves coach since Flip Saunders, it wasn’t enough to get into the playoffs. Minnesota won 26, 31, and 40 games in Adelman’s tenure thanks to the rise of Kevin love, and he was fired after three seasons. The white night of the franchise, Flip Saunders returned for another go with the Wolves, taking up a position as head coach after already becoming the President of Basketball Operations the previous year. Minnesota bottomed out at 16-66 that year but thankfully got the first overall pick.

For the first time in franchise history the Timberwolves were awarded the number one overall pick in the 2015 draft. After some debate over who to pick it became obvious that Kentucky big man Karl-Anthony Towns was the selection. They took Towns and planned to start him slow, but after putting up rookie numbers not seen since Tim Duncan, Wolves fans finally had some hope for the future. Tragically Flip Saunders passed away in October 2015, just before the season began. Sam Mitchell took over, guiding the young Wolves through some growing pains to a 29-53 record. Another turning point came that offseason when former Chicago Bulls head man Tom Thibodeau was hired as the head coach. Thibs led the Bulls to the playoffs in all five years he was there. Finally the Wolves had a blueprint for success. After they only managed 31 wins in the 2016-17 season though, enough was enough and it was time for the Timberwolves to make their biggest splash since trading away Kevin Garnett ten years prior.

The 2017 NBA draft was huge for the franchise not because of who they picked, but a blockbuster trade that changed the entire landscape of the league. The Wolves traded Kris Dunn, Zach Lavine, and the 7th overall pick (that would become Lauri Markkanen) for Butler, and the 16th overall pick (Justin Patton). Butler was a three time all-star, and one of the league’s top two way players. The excitement around the team was the highest since playing the Lakers in the 2004 Wester Conference Finals. With Butler, Wiggins, Towns and later additions of Jeff Teague, Taj Gibson, and Jamal Crawford, the playoffs were finally in sight.

Many thought the Wolves could compete in the West right away. They were chosen to be the fourth or fifth best team in the conference by many experts. They started to look the part right away, reaching as high as the three seed in the West. But Butler injured his knee, and the Wolves sputtered without him going 8-9 in his absence. Luckily he came back just in time to lead Minnesota into the playoffs with an overtime win against Denver in the regular season finale, in which Butler scored 30 points with five assists and five rebounds. The 8th seed isn’t glamorous, and isn’t quite where hopeful Wolves fans saw this team ending the regular season, but a playoff berth is a playoff berth in the eyes of fans waiting a generation for their team to get back in the postseason.

Now hopefully they don’t get embarrassed by the Rockets in round one. My prediction: Wolves steal a home game, but the Rockets blow them out for three of their four wins and take the series in five games.

Andrew Wiggins is forming a troubling pattern in his performance

The Minnesota Timberwolves are enjoying their best season in a generation. The turnaround from dismal franchise in constant rebuild to top four seed in the West has been led by their two All-Stars, franchise golden boy Karl-Anthony Towns, and the first year wolf and MVP candidate Jimmy Butler. The two-headed monster have the Wolves in prime position to make their first playoff appearance since 2004. But it seems like someone is missing from that equation. Andrew Wiggins, the top pick in the 2014 draft (drafted by Cleveland) should be part of a “Big Three” with Towns and Butler, but that hasn’t been the case this season. The fourth year small forward out of Kansas is having his worst season as a pro, marred by inefficiency, poor shot selection, and failure to get to the free throw line.

Wiggins is scoring six points fewer per game than last year (23.6 last season to 17.7 this year), and his Player Efficiency Rating is a career worst 13.1 according to ESPN. Some of that can be attributed to inserting Jimmy Butler and his 22.4 points per game. But most of it has been caused by his lack of interest in meshing with new alpha dog teammates in Tom Thibodeau’s offense, and his willingness to take a backseat at times to even less accomplished scorers like Jeff Teague, Taj Gibson and Jamal Crawford.

On Tuesday, Wiggins may have bottomed out against the Rockets, missing his first 12 shots before salvaging a 2-14 shooting line that included him going 0-5 from beyond the arc. This is becoming Wiggins’ most troubling pattern, hitting rock bottom just about every five games. Look through his game-by-game stats. You’ll find plenty of games where he goes 8-17 with 18 points, 4 rebounds, a few assists, maybe a steal or two. Those are his averages so that’s the bulk of stat lines you’re going to find. But every week or two there’s at least one game, sometimes two or three in a row, where it seems everything went off the rails for Wiggins and he wasn’t part of the offense at all. Wiggins was off to a hot start this season, averaging 24.7 points through his first three games. In the fourth game though: 3-9 shooting, 0-3 from three, 1-6 from the free throw line for a total of seven points. November was full of plenty of off games, 4-10 for 11 points, 5-14 for 11 points, 5-15 for 13 points. Nothing so bad, but inconsistent with what should be his norm. December was his worst month of the season so far. Wiggins shot just 39% from the field for 15.5 points per game. He had 4 games in December where he shot below 30% from the field, and five games where he failed to score more than 12 points. He rebounded nicely in January, excluding his 4-18, 10 point performance in a loss to Golden State. February has brought back his inconsistency. He’s scored seven points twice in six games, and has failed to eclipse 20 points in a game this month.

Everybody has bad games, but Wiggins’ poor performances are sometimes so bad they are derailing his season, and detrimental to Minnesota’s cause. In 60 games this season Wiggins has failed to reach double digits in six games, something he did just three times all of last season. He found consistency last year, but has reverted back to his rookie ways of shooting too many long jumpers instead of getting to the rim.

If history has shown us anything about Andrew Wiggins in the NBA, it’s that he gets better as the season goes on. We have to see some improvement in the remaining 22 games to believe he can actually help this team once the playoffs arrive, otherwise, he could see his minutes diminish drastically when games begin to really matter.