The Jim Stack Letter?

[shrink]

I've read this on a couple sites, and can't verify its authenticity, but its a good read, regardless. Supposedly Jim Stack sent this to a message board poster on ESPN's Timberwolves forum regarding the OJ Mayo/Kevin Love trade.

"First of all thanks for your concerns regarding what we did on draft night. I can assure you I understand how important it is to have fans who are passionate.

I would like to address your concerns in the order you presented them if that is good with you.

Regarding getting Jaric included in the deal with Memphis, this was an extremely important step for us to put us in a position to be cap fluid in two years. Our near term goals are to make the team as competitive as possible right now so we will be attractive to free agents over the next two years. Because I am in contact with all the other teams in the league all the time and many of them are eyeing the free agent market as well, I felt if we could move Jaric now it would be something we needed to do based on cleaning our books up for 2010. Getting Jaric's third year off our books without having to take back a similar contract really sets up our future. To get Miller and Love included and a backup center in Collins really addresses the needs we had going into the draft. Cardinal brings experience as well as perimeter shooting and is a great locker room presence.

Regarding Buckner and Walker being bigger assets because of 11 million in expiring contracts I respectfully disagree with you. In talking to teams around the league it was clear to me that we would have to include one or possibly two of our young players in any deal with Walker involved to maybe have a chance at taking on a player who probably has underachieved with his previous team. I have studied the market very carefully as this is part of what I do and it is a real gamble to wait back and hope a Gasol type deal presents itself like what happened for the Lakers. I believe because of the backlash that deal received for Memphis, teams will not be willing to trade an asset of Gasol's caliber unless they are really holding you up in terms of what they get back.

Coupled with the fact that Antoine was becoming a distraction in our locker room with Al Jefferson using Al to push for playing time for himself. Buckner was a pro in every sense of the word. In order to get Collins who I think has shown he can play as he has been on some playoff caliber teams as a starting center, it was a deal I felt like we had to make. It gives us flexibility with our roster to play big when the need arises. Collins is also a great guy and will fit in well with the culture we are building.

I understand clearing cap money does not guarantee we will sign a star but as we move forward with our team Al Jefferson will be a star. Mike Miller is an elite level shooter who is in the prime of his career and can start or come off the bench as demonstrated by his sixth man of the year a few years back. Kevin Love is the most skilled big man in this draft by far and at 19 years old has a really bright future. He will make everyone around him better and he is a winner. Randy Foye it's a shame he got injured last year but he is one-hundred percent healthy and showed me down the stretch of the season he has a chance to be really good. Corey Brewer can defend elite wings right now in our league and as his shooting develops he will be a really good role player for us. So as we move forward I think our team has a chance to dramatically improve and be very attractive to free agents the next couple of years. Walker and Buckner were instumental in helping us get Miller and Love and Collins. Adding Jaric to be cap fluid was a very important add on.

Regarding Al and Kevin Love playing together at 4 and 5, I think you have to realize that whether Al is listed as a 4 or a 5 he will draw the other team's best low post defender. What Kevin brings is a guy because of his skill set who can step out and shoot and pass and rebound. He can also post and dribble drive and will be defended by the weaker of the other team's low post players. They fit together very well on offense and I am really excited to see that evolve next season. On the defensive side Al made a bigger commitment down the stretch of last year to be a basket protector as demonstrated by his shot blocking. Kevin is an early help player who understands team defensive schemes and will take charges and is very physical. All of these traits will translate at the defensive end.

The league has downsized overall upfront with the exception of a few teams where I think having Collins will give us the ability to play bigger when we need to.I can assure you we will not be getting destroyed down on the blocks with Big Al and Kevin. In fact I think it will be the other way around.

Regarding trading the pick at # 34 in the draft, we did not have the Memphis deal until after that pick was made. A few other thoughts for your consideration. Chalmers played mostly the off guard at Kansas. They had Russell Robinson and Sherron Collins as their main ballhandlers. While Chalmers did play some point he was primarily a defender and scorer for the Jayhawks last year and at 6'1" is a very undersized two guard who showed some ability to play the point in certain situations. The other important point to consider is that being a rookie in the NBA next year at a position that he only played part time and is the most difficult position in the league to learn, there will definitely be a long learning curve for him to adjust to playing this position on a more full time basis. I think you saw that last year with Telfair who has been a point guard his whole life where there were some real growing pains for him before he found his groove and started playing better down the stretch of the season. In my view there are other avenues for us to pursue to find a more accomplished experienced point guard than Chalmers. I do not think we are in a position to wait on a player who has not played the position full time and who will be a rookie next year. Telfair was in the league three years before we got him and he still had a very difficult adjustment period last year and still needs to upgrade his shooting before we can consider him to be a bonifide part of our core moving forward.

Regarding there being no reason not to have the Memphis deal done prior to the draft, that is a difficult one for me. We had to have Miller in the deal and have Jaric in the deal for us to consider doing it and Memphis did not budge until we were midway into the second round. This in my mind would not have affected what we did in the second round at 34 anyway. We got the best big man in Europe at 31 and for me I did not feel it would be prudent to add two more rookies to our team this year. We will have Pekovic in two years and he is already a player who can come in and play for us. I generally put rookies into three categories. Projects, prospects and players. Peckovic is a player. Chalmers is between a project and a prospect because he is not a natural point guard. Chris Douglas Roberts is a prospect in my view because he has a natural ability as a scorer but my feeling is that he is nowhere close to Miller, McCants, or Brewer in terms of fitting into our team and having a chance to supplant one of them. Being a rookie is another hurdle for him to overcome and he will have to go through a lot of the growing pains that McCants and Brewer have already been through. McCants while he knows he must get better defensively, really seemed to find his niche coming off the bench for us last year. He averaged 15 points in just under 27 mpg and also shot almost 41 percent from the three point line which was in the top five percentage wise in the league among players with more than four attempts per game. I can assure you James a lot of ground work was layed leading up to the draft to position the deal we did with Memphis but we needed Memphis to be a participant and they did not feel it was something they could do until we worked a couple more angles which I cannot get into.

DeAndre Jordan is a project in my view meaning he has not one discernible NBA skill at this point in time. Getting Pekovic who can step on an NBA floor right now and be productive was a much better option for us than Jordan.

We will have a player who in two years can step in and play for us.With Jordan I did not like his profile. He has some red flags in terms of desire and work ethic that were of concern to me to go along with his underdeveloped skill level. We also received two second round picks for 34 and a hefty sum of cash which will help us in adding players to our team in the future.

Please be assured we in the front office are always discussing the type of team we want to have that will give us our best chance to compete for a championship. My view is that we want players who come from winning programs who are very competitive by nature and who want to play in Minnesota and be a part of what we are building. As far as style of play we want to be a team who can play inside out and play a power game through Al Jefferson in the post while putting periimeter shooting around him to make teams pay for over commiting to him. Getting Miller and Love not only upgrades our shooting but also gives us two team guys who are excellent passers and guys who have high basketball IQ's. We want to play uptempo when the opportunity presents itself but I believe we have the type of team that can also sit in the half court and make things happen with Foye, Jefferson, McCants, Miller, Gomes as focal points. Defensively our challenge is to collectively play as a unit. We have to play team defense.This involves trust and effort which I believe we will get effort and having the same core of guys back will help our continuity and build more trust.Building momentum and confidence by everyone being on the same page will be a challenge for our coaches to make sure they are teaching our players properly and staying consistent with their message.

As for O.J.Mayo I feel he will be a solid pro. He is undersized a little at the two guard being only a shade over 6'4" and about 195. Mayo is a shot maker who can defend and brings some versatility in terms of playing both backcourt spots. However in my view he does not have what we call blow by speed to get by people off the dribble and was not very effective getting to the foul line. He does not turn the corner consistently off the dribble and was turnover prone at times when he forced the issue. I was content with him because of his shooting and defense and he has a great work ethic but he can be over run physically at the off guard spot. To me when Memphis came back to us with the Love/Miller deal it filled too many holes for us to pass up. To add Jaric in was icing on the cake as it really sets the table for us moving forward into free agency the next couple years.

In closing, I hope I have addressed some of your concerns. We take everything we do here very seriously I certainly value your support and hope you will stay the course with us. It will be an exciting time for us as move into the future.

Sincerely, Jim Stack

[mandurugo]

That didn't seem to realistic to me. It did successfully combine several positions expressed by people in favor of the moves, but beyond that seemed unlikely at best. As far as the opinions expressed, I didn't see anything that would change the mind of people who weren't already supportive of the moves. My concerns about the defensive end remain, I'm afraid I have to disagree with "Jim Stack" about Al's defensive ability. It seemed he tacitly agreed that Love would not be a factor on the defensive end. Just my take on one aspect of the letter.

[deeney0]

Whether it's real or not, it's well written and makes a lot of good points. But I'm still convinced OJ can be among the very best guards in this league in a few years. Until I become convinced otherwise, no amount of talking up what we got back in the trade is going to make me forget about what we gave up.

[shrink]

Whether it's real or not, it's well written and makes a lot of good points.

I agree. Here are my Top Ten interesting points (in chronological order):

1. Our near term goals are to make the team as competitive as possible right now so we will be attractive to free agents over the next two years.

2. In talking to teams around the league it was clear to me that we would have to include one or possibly two of our young players in any deal with Walker involved to maybe have a chance at taking on a player who probably has underachieved with his previous team.

3. Coupled with the fact that Antoine was becoming a distraction in our locker room with Al Jefferson using Al to push for playing time for himself. Buckner was a pro in every sense of the word.

4. In order to get Collins who I think has shown he can play as he has been on some playoff caliber teams as a starting center, it was a deal I felt like we had to make. Collins is also a great guy and will fit in well with the culture we are building.

5. Mike Miller is an elite level shooter who is in the prime of his career and can start or come off the bench as demonstrated by his sixth man of the year a few years back.

6. Corey Brewer can defend elite wings right now in our league and as his shooting develops he will be a really good role player for us.

7. While Chalmers did play some point he was primarily a defender and scorer for the Jayhawks last year and at 6'1" is a very undersized two guard who showed some ability to play the point in certain situations. The other important point to consider is that being a rookie in the NBA next year at a position that he only played part time and is the most difficult position in the league to learn, there will definitely be a long learning curve for him to adjust to playing this position on a more full time basis. I think you saw that last year with Telfair who has been a point guard his whole life where there were some real growing pains for him before he found his groove and started playing better down the stretch of the season.

8. I generally put rookies into three categories. Projects, prospects and players. Peckovic is a player. Chalmers is between a project and a prospect because he is not a natural point guard. Chris Douglas Roberts is a prospect in my view because he has a natural ability as a scorer but my feeling is that he is nowhere close to Miller, McCants, or Brewer in terms of fitting into our team and having a chance to supplant one of them. DeAndre Jordan is a project in my view meaning he has not one discernible NBA skill at this point in time. He has some red flags in terms of desire and work ethic that were of concern to me to go along with his underdeveloped skill level.

9. Being a rookie is another hurdle for him to overcome and he will have to go through a lot of the growing pains that McCants and Brewer have already been through. McCants while he knows he must get better defensively, really seemed to find his niche coming off the bench for us last year. He averaged 15 points in just under 27 mpg and also shot almost 41 percent from the three point line which was in the top five percentage wise in the league among players with more than four attempts per game.

10. My view is that we want players who come from winning programs who are very competitive by nature and who want to play in Minnesota and be a part of what we are building.

1. Realization that previous free agents have turned MIN down?

2. I valued Walker's expiring more than the league, it seems.

3. Walker was influencing Al? Is Al a leader?

4. Collins is more than just an expiring contract

5. Mike Miller is the second most talented player on the team, and we're still aware he can come off the bench. I'm glad that we are aware that some of our youth (or FA acquisition) might be better. We're not locking in.

6. Corey Brewer may DEVELOP into a ROLE PLAYER? Did Corey kill high expectations last year?

7. With all the Chalmers hype, I was glad to here the other side.

8. I like learning others perception of rookies

9. He seems high on McCants, but praising him for his work as a sixth man. Is he staying there? I agree that it is a talent -- some players simply can't adjust to coming off the bench.

10. Good info on the type of player we're looking for.

[casey]

Just looking at the length of it and that it was supposedly sent to somebody on the ESPN message boards, it's clearly fake.

[Kestrel]

Whether it's real or not, it's well written and makes a lot of good points....

That included several multiple sentence fragments and awkward constructions, which puts it in the area of informal e-mail English in my book. It's plausible to think Jim Stack's wearing down in the process of personally responding to fan feedback, but frankly, I'm having trouble believing it. I mean,

"Coupled with the fact that Antoine was becoming a distraction in our locker room with Al Jefferson using Al to push for playing time for himself. Buckner was a pro in every sense of the word."

That first bit's a pretty extreme thing to leak to a fan, and it's also a sentence fragment. It's followed by a non sequitur. Saying 'Toine was corrupting Al Jefferson reflects poorly on Al too. Do we think Stack is this reckless? I also wonder whether he'd commit player evaluations to the record in fan correspondence this way. Running down DeAndre Jordan the way this did would be... gratuitous, I guess would be the word. That reads much, much more like a board-level fan.

The only way I could imagine this being real is if Stack was seriously impressed by the season ticket holder for some reason, and responding to him as a sort of influential figure on the Wolves' scene.

[revprodeji]

That didn't seem to realistic to me. It did successfully combine several positions expressed by people in favor of the moves, but beyond that seemed unlikely at best. As far as the opinions expressed, I didn't see anything that would change the mind of people who weren't already supportive of the moves. My concerns about the defensive end remain, I'm afraid I have to disagree with "Jim Stack" about Al's defensive ability. It seemed he tacitly agreed that Love would not be a factor on the defensive end. Just my take on one aspect of the letter.

We can argue Al's defense on another thread, but the fact remains that there are only a small amount of points that are different then things we have heard here or in various interviews.

But I'm still convinced OJ can be among the very best guards in this league in a few years. Until I become convinced otherwise, no amount of talking up what we got back in the trade is going to make me forget about what we gave up.

cool, I respect that...

3. Coupled with the fact that Antoine was becoming a distraction in our locker room with Al Jefferson using Al to push for playing time for himself. Buckner was a pro in every sense of the word.
4. In order to get Collins who I think has shown he can play as he has been on some playoff caliber teams as a starting center, it was a deal I felt like we had to make. Collins is also a great guy and will fit in well with the culture we are building.
6. Corey Brewer can defend elite wings right now in our league and as his shooting develops he will be a really good role player for us.

3. Walker was influencing Al? Is Al a leader?
4. Collins is more than just an expiring contract
6. Corey Brewer may DEVELOP into a ROLE PLAYER? Did Corey kill high expectations last year?
7. With all the Chalmers hype, I was glad to here the other side.

#3---Walker was the vet in Boston, and Al was the young guy there. There is a good chance that Walker abused that relationship when he got here in order to promote himself. Not saying he did, but there is a chance.
#4--yup. As a back up big body with limited minutes he fits ok. I guess his defensive BBIQ is decent.
#6--No, he says "he WILL be" not that he "might" develop into a role player. But he will be a really good role player....might develop into more?
#7--yup, I think he is the most overhyped 2nd rd pick I have seen on these boards.

Just looking at the length of it and that it was supposedly sent to somebody on the ESPN message boards, it's clearly fake.

Thats funny, the truth is we do not know. But there is not much new info on here anyway.

That included several multiple sentence fragments and awkward constructions, which puts it in the area of informal e-mail English in my book. It's plausible to think Jim Stack's wearing down in the process of personally responding to fan feedback, but frankly, I'm having trouble believing it. I mean,
.

Not saying this is real, but you are correct in the wording being awkward. Another aspect is we do not know what kind of speaker Stack is. Maybe he talks like that? Who knows.

[MN Die Hard]

7. With all the Chalmers hype, I was glad to here the other side.

#7--yup, I think he is the most overhyped 2nd rd pick I have seen on these boards.

Yeah I agree with this. For all the crying we've seen about the Chalmers trade you'd think he's the second-coming of Chris Paul or something.