On the latest episode of Flip This House, Minnesota Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor has reportedly agreed to a contract with Flip Saunders to be the new president of basketball operations. This means the old president of basketball operations, David Kahn, is not going to have his team option for next season picked up. Continue Reading…
This nice young man just got his 1,000th win.
In many ways, Rick Adelman’s 1,000th win resembled his 703rd loss. As in Friday night’s game against Toronto, his team enjoyed spells of real ease, in which an overmatched opponent appeared ready to fold the tent and cede the game. In this one, the Wolves cruised to an 11-point lead in the first quarter. They dropped a 12-0 run in the second quarter and a 10-0 run late in the third. But as in their loss to Toronto, they repeatedly gave those leads back with stretches of unfocused play. That is what young teams do I guess, especially one whose primary ballhandlers include an emotional, turnover-prone 22-year-old, a 5’8″ shot-chucking black hole and the fourth Karamazov brother (the skinny, depressed-looking one with the wildly inconsistent shooting mechanics).
It’s amazing how fun Ricky Rubio can be at times.
We know about the passing and the steals. We know he can crash the boards and break down opposing perimeter defenders. And we see glimpses of an improved jump shooter. In fact, over Rubio’s last 10 games, he’s over 40% from the field (41.2%) and he’s made 50% of his 3-point shots. Now, I wouldn’t say he’s fixed his ability to put the ball in the basket; it’s still very much a work in progress. But there are signs of improvement.
Two things I look for when Rubio taking a jumper are 1) was he readying himself before the pass got to him and 2) where is the arc on his shot? Continue Reading…
It’s a boy.
Something you hear a lot of commentators say is that the NBA is a “make or miss” league. I don’t get this. Or rather, I understand that the game is decided by who scores more points, and thus that the team that wins has—by design—made more shots than the other team. But is that all there is to this cliché? If anyone has some deeper insight to it, I’d appreciate it.
But another thing that makes a lot more sense to me that people often say is that the NBA is all about matchups. Consider this: This season, the Timberwolves have a winning percentage of .366, while the Thunder have a winning percentage of .726. And yet the season series between the two teams is even at 2-2. And last season—even though the Wolves were 0-3 against the Thunder—the games were hard fought. Minnesota lost their season opener to OKC 104-100 in 2011-12, and that was before anyone really knew what Rubio could do on a basketball court. And then, of course, there was that magnificent double overtime game in Oklahoma City that saw Barea and Durant notch triple doubles and Love score 51 while pulling down 14 rebounds. Continue Reading…
Although in our hearts we always suspected it to be true, we couldn’t help feeling a little distressed over Rick Adelman’s admission yesterday that he is considering walking away from the Wolves this coming summer. (Though you certainly can’t blame the guy for wanting to actually live with his ailing wife, especially after a pair of seasons as cosmically aggravating as these past two.) We can talk all we want about Derrick Williams’ development or Nikola Pekovic’s contract, but the truth is that the middle-term future of this franchise rests entirely upon the relationship between Rick Adelman, Ricky Rubio and Kevin Love. Take out one vertex of that triangle and, one suspects, the entire spindly structure might collapse.
Let’s go with the sad news first, that way I can tear us down before I build us back up! Strategy!
Kevin Love told Jerry Zgoda that he knows missing the rest of the season is a real possibility. He’s able to admit that to himself, knowing that while he definitely wants to get back onto the court for the team, he still has to listen to the doctor and wait for clearance with the clock on the season ticking away. Continue Reading…
I don’t know if you heard about it on MPR on the way to work like I did, but the Timberwolves were shocked last night to defeat “one of the best teams” in the NBA, the San Antonio Spurs. Numerically speaking, it’s not even a matter of “one of” with the Spurs; even with last night’s loss they stand atop the Western Conference with the most wins in the NBA at 49-16.
But it’s a little more complicated than that. The Spurs actually have the second best win percentage behind the Eastern Conference’s top team, the Miami Heat (.754 vs. .774). So even by the numbers the definition of “best” is a little fuzzy and it only gets weirder from there. With Tony Parker sidelined with a sprained ankle and both Tim Duncan and Kawhi Leonard sitting with somewhat suspicious “sore left knees” last night, the Spurs weren’t putting their best team out there. And yet that exact thing might be what makes them “one of the best” teams in the NBA. Continue Reading…
Teams need wins.
Pretty obvious statement, right?
Obviously teams need wins. Wins produce success. Wins produce playoff chances. Wins produce playoff seeding and possible advantageous match-ups. Wins produce championships. Wins produce confidence and chemistry. Wins produce opportunities. For a team like the Timberwolves, who have struggled so much this season while battling injury after injury, wins produce a sense of relief. Continue Reading…
When you’re a losing team and you have injuries all over key parts of your roster, you need a full team effort to pull out victories. It isn’t getting good performances just from your remaining top players. Of course, you need good games from them but it takes a village to raise a victory, or something like that.
It also helps playing a really bad team. It gives you more and less pressure at the same time, which is an odd thing for a team to manage. The Cleveland Cavaliers are not a good basketball team — at all. They have Kyrie Irving, who might already be a top 5 point guard, and if he’s not then he’s knocking on the door like one of those creepy stalkers in the movie The Strangers. Continue Reading…
A pair of white and blue Nike Hyperdunks lie in front of Greg Stiemsma’s ice-wrapped legs in the Timberwolves’ locker room. The tongue is branded with a nickname: B. ROY in all caps. But this isn’t some handmade tribute; these shoes were made by Nike for Roy.
“He’s got a ton of them,” explains Stiemsma, nodding his head towards the locker where Roy hasn’t been since November 9 when he played his fifth game as a member of the Timberwolves and likely his last game as a pro. Roy isn’t using them, so he passed them along.
Another pair of the shoes stands in front of Nikola Pekovic’s locker, one of them knocked to the side and the B. ROY on each tongue blacked out with Sharpie. As he dresses, he answers questions. Are these Brandon’s shoes? “Yup.” You put the marker over them? “Yup.” His clipped responses carry some kind of weight, but it’s hard to tell just what. Continue Reading…
