Game 60 : Timberwolves vs Grizzlies, 7:00 pm CST

[shrink]

(I don’t want that to sound like Towns and DLo aren’t good friends. In fact, if you watch the Towns interview on Bally right now, they show coverage of him actually showing up at his high school when they retired his number. DLo came. There’s really no reason for a 25 year old millionaire to go do this, other than to celebrate and honor his friend.)

[life_saver]

Also, ever since the trade, I have heard posters here and on other boards say, “well, if MIN didn’t trade for DLo, Towns would have asked for a trade!” This is said like a fact, a logical certainty, when we really have no way of knowing even the factors of Towns loyalty, the strength of his friendship with DLo, whether the team would improve, or any of the other countless reasons a star player likes or dislikes his team.

I will say this. Towns has been loyal. When Towns was going through the Jimmy Butler saga, with Jimmy and everyone popping off to the media, he answered every question professionally. Everything was about him and the future of the Timberwolves. He has done the same thing through years of losing, and years of people using the media to call him “soft.” Still professional. He didn’t like that RoCo, his best friend on the team, got traded, but he stayed professional. And even though Towns was very loyal to the Saunders family, he did not rush to the media to complain when Ryan was fired. People like to treat this like, “well he’s due!” rather than treating it as evidence of the consistency of his character. I do not think that KAT would have demanded a trade off the Wolves if we hadn’t traded for DLo.

Agree...people do overstate the KAT-DLo friendship angle. They are friends yes but it's not like KAT was gonna leave if DLo wasn't here. I am still very glad Wolves made that trade though...that team needed a change as it was going no where and fanbase was also very low after 2017, 2018..Wolves also likely weren't gonna have a chance to draft Ant if they didn't make that trade.

[winforlose]

makes KAT happy, and Wiggins without KAT is a Wolves team without a prayer. Losing Kuminga hurt, but overall we won that trade.

I think both teams made a trade they needed. I mentioned in the other thread that we weren’t trading 2022 GSW Wiggins .. we were trading 2020 MIN Wiggins, who was considered one of the worst contracts in the league. I do not think staying here would have caused him to become 2022 GSW Wiggins either - he was more valuable to them than us. And meanwhile, GSW never wanted DLo on a max deal themselves - he was their only option to preserve their payroll for future trades, rather than Durant simply signing in BRK for nothing. With Curry there, DLo was also more valuable to us than them.

To me, the issue isn’t which team won the trade (they both did), but who got more value from it. I think that’s clearly GSW. After the deal, the Warriors front office claimed victory, saying they used the leverage of KAT and DLo’s friendship to ram home a good deal. However, there really weren’t any other destinations for Russell. DLo’s numbers have never been good, and other teams already had their starting PG, or had invested a lottery pick into the PG of their future.

Of course, there might have been nobody who would take on Wiggins too, and they could have jumped over the cliff together, strangling each other trying to make the other team flinch. I think this deal worked out for both teams. However, I don’t think this was a good piece of GMing, and we shouldn’t change the history books whenever DLo or Wiggins have a good game now.

Wiggins isn’t that much better now than before. Outside of GSW I don’t think you find a lot players or fans who think Wig is a legit All Star. The exposure of Wiggins to the casual fan base and the stupid way in which fan voting takes place is what got Wiggins in. His shooting is better but that could have happened here or anywhere. The biggest difference is GSW is okay paying 300 mil plus per year and we are not. They don’t need Wiggins to be anything more than the leagues most expensive role player. Take Curry away for any stretch and even with Klay GSW cannot win. It isn’t rewriting history to say Wiggins is more or less the same player just with less responsibility and pressure.

[shrink]

Last thing .. I promise.

When Towns came back into the game with 5 fouls, he did not seem mentally ready for the moment. I think DLo tried him once or twice, but I was glad to see them stick with Russell and his hot hand.

Now hey, I’m not mentioning this to bash Towns. Without his great second quarter, we aren’t even in that game in the fourth. And most players (unlike maybe PatBev) can instantly turn it on mentally. But what struck me here was .. we didn’t need him! This team has always struggled in the fourth quarter without a true, ball-handling creator. And if Towns hadn’t put us in position with 3-4 good quarters, we had no chance. But this year, we have a more talented roster. If KAT and Ant struggle a little, DLo,or someone off the bench can pick them up

I think this is critical for the team, and particularly for the emotional well-being of Towns. Towns is a great player, but sometimes the pressure gets to be too much for him. He also tends to dwell on his personal mistakes, and, at least to the media, was taking responsibility for every loss. I think by having more talent around him, in a situation he trusts, it’s allowed him to be more aggressive without all the pressure, and that should really help us grow.

[shrink]

makes KAT happy, and Wiggins without KAT is a Wolves team without a prayer. Losing Kuminga hurt, but overall we won that trade.

I think both teams made a trade they needed. I mentioned in the other thread that we weren’t trading 2022 GSW Wiggins .. we were trading 2020 MIN Wiggins, who was considered one of the worst contracts in the league. I do not think staying here would have caused him to become 2022 GSW Wiggins either - he was more valuable to them than us. And meanwhile, GSW never wanted DLo on a max deal themselves - he was their only option to preserve their payroll for future trades, rather than Durant simply signing in BRK for nothing. With Curry there, DLo was also more valuable to us than them.

To me, the issue isn’t which team won the trade (they both did), but who got more value from it. I think that’s clearly GSW. After the deal, the Warriors front office claimed victory, saying they used the leverage of KAT and DLo’s friendship to ram home a good deal. However, there really weren’t any other destinations for Russell. DLo’s numbers have never been good, and other teams already had their starting PG, or had invested a lottery pick into the PG of their future.

Of course, there might have been nobody who would take on Wiggins too, and they could have jumped over the cliff together, strangling each other trying to make the other team flinch. I think this deal worked out for both teams. However, I don’t think this was a good piece of GMing, and we shouldn’t change the history books whenever DLo or Wiggins have a good game now.

Wiggins isn’t that much better now than before. Outside of GSW I don’t think you find a lot players or fans who think Wig is a legit All Star. The exposure of Wiggins to the casual fan base and the stupid way in which fan voting takes place is what got Wiggins in. His shooting is better but that could have happened here or anywhere. The biggest difference is GSW is okay paying 300 mil plus per year and we are not. They don’t need Wiggins to be anything more than the leagues most expensive role player. Take Curry away for any stretch and even with Klay GSW cannot win. It isn’t rewriting history to say Wiggins is more or less the same player just with less responsibility and pressure.

Good post. Wiggins is no longer forced to toss up contested 19 footers, with GSW’s passing and floor-spreading.

However, we’d agree that Wiggins trade value is higher now than when we traded him in 2019, right? And when we look back on trades, we can’t assign new trade values .. the price at the time was the price.

[winforlose]

I think both teams made a trade they needed. I mentioned in the other thread that we weren’t trading 2022 GSW Wiggins .. we were trading 2020 MIN Wiggins, who was considered one of the worst contracts in the league. I do not think staying here would have caused him to become 2022 GSW Wiggins either - he was more valuable to them than us. And meanwhile, GSW never wanted DLo on a max deal themselves - he was their only option to preserve their payroll for future trades, rather than Durant simply signing in BRK for nothing. With Curry there, DLo was also more valuable to us than them.

To me, the issue isn’t which team won the trade (they both did), but who got more value from it. I think that’s clearly GSW. After the deal, the Warriors front office claimed victory, saying they used the leverage of KAT and DLo’s friendship to ram home a good deal. However, there really weren’t any other destinations for Russell. DLo’s numbers have never been good, and other teams already had their starting PG, or had invested a lottery pick into the PG of their future.

Of course, there might have been nobody who would take on Wiggins too, and they could have jumped over the cliff together, strangling each other trying to make the other team flinch. I think this deal worked out for both teams. However, I don’t think this was a good piece of GMing, and we shouldn’t change the history books whenever DLo or Wiggins have a good game now.

Wiggins isn’t that much better now than before. Outside of GSW I don’t think you find a lot players or fans who think Wig is a legit All Star. The exposure of Wiggins to the casual fan base and the stupid way in which fan voting takes place is what got Wiggins in. His shooting is better but that could have happened here or anywhere. The biggest difference is GSW is okay paying 300 mil plus per year and we are not. They don’t need Wiggins to be anything more than the leagues most expensive role player. Take Curry away for any stretch and even with Klay GSW cannot win. It isn’t rewriting history to say Wiggins is more or less the same player just with less responsibility and pressure.

Good post. Wiggins is no longer forced to toss up contested 19 footers, with GSW’s passing and floor-spreading.

However, we’d agree that Wiggins trade value is higher now than when we traded him in 2019, right? And when we look back on trades, we can’t assign new trade values .. the price at the time was the price.

I think trade value is a function of a lot of things. Wiggins current value increase is because his contract is ending. A 33 million dollar expiring is valuable in bringing in a true max player. That said, the value was always going to increase the closer to the end of the contract he got. Beasley is in a similar boat. Wiggins as a player will never make max money again, all star or not. He just isn’t worth it. Put in a situation where he is expected to be a star he will likely fail again, because while his contract value has increased his player value has not.

The problem with your argument is that you reject my premise that the true value of the Dlo trade was KAT staying. Dlo is hands down better than Wiggins, both in fit and talent. Wiggins could explode for 40 and then suck for 3 games. Standrew was a well earned nickname. Dlo in a down shooting year is still more valuable as his defensive floor general skills and facilitating are essential for us. Add in Kaminga and things get more complicated. Let’s not forget we also got Spellman who could have been something for us. Did Rosas know the dumb **** would throw a hissy fit and sabotage his career, who knows. Spellman fit our needs and had he kept his weight and ego under control I think would have been happy here. Or at least retained some value and been trade bait.

[shrink]

Wiggins isn’t that much better now than before. Outside of GSW I don’t think you find a lot players or fans who think Wig is a legit All Star. The exposure of Wiggins to the casual fan base and the stupid way in which fan voting takes place is what got Wiggins in. His shooting is better but that could have happened here or anywhere. The biggest difference is GSW is okay paying 300 mil plus per year and we are not. They don’t need Wiggins to be anything more than the leagues most expensive role player. Take Curry away for any stretch and even with Klay GSW cannot win. It isn’t rewriting history to say Wiggins is more or less the same player just with less responsibility and pressure.

Good post. Wiggins is no longer forced to toss up contested 19 footers, with GSW’s passing and floor-spreading.

However, we’d agree that Wiggins trade value is higher now than when we traded him in 2019, right? And when we look back on trades, we can’t assign new trade values .. the price at the time was the price.

I think trade value is a function of a lot of things. Wiggins current value increase is because his contract is ending. A 33 million dollar expiring is valuable in bringing in a true max player. That said, the value was always going to increase the closer to the end of the contract he got. Beasley is in a similar boat. Wiggins as a player will never make max money again, all star or not. He just isn’t worth it. Put in a situation where he is expected to be a star he will likely fail again, because while his contract value has increased his player value has not.

The problem with your argument is that you reject my premise that the true value of the Dlo trade was KAT staying. Dlo is hands down better than Wiggins, both in fit and talent. Wiggins could explode for 40 and then suck for 3 games. Standrew was a well earned nickname. Dlo in a down shooting year is still more valuable as his defensive floor general skills and facilitating are essential for us. Add in Kaminga and things get more complicated. Let’s not forget we also got Spellman who could have been something for us. Did Rosas know the dumb **** would throw a hissy fit and sabotage his career, who knows. Spellman fit our needs and had he kept his weight and ego under control I think would have been happy here. Or at least retained some value and been trade bait.

Weird. I totally agree with your first paragraph. I wrote the same thing, twice, about holding contract length constant, but it looks like I didn’t include it in my edit, or I switched devices and never got the phrase in.

Yes, I do reject the true value of DLo is KAT staying. I’ve never bought that line, for reasons I explained in a previous post.

I do not believe DLo is hands down better than Wiggins. Both were one-time, undeserving All Stars, and only when put in perfect roles for them. Neither are in the top half of starters for their position, though Wiggins is probably closer. I disagree on fit too. Wiggins as a 6-9 wing, can fit on any team - PG’s are easier to find. Heck, I feel we were within inches of having Darius Garland

DLo was never a “defensive floor general” when we traded for him. Pretty much the opposite.

In the end though, I think we agree this trade improved the Wolves. If we kept Wiggins on a max deal, we would be continuing to try to give him a max-worthy role, and he has proven time and again that he can’t handle that. I think the trade (eventually) allowed us to move off that treadmill of losing. But we lost plenty with KAT and DLo, just like we did with KAT and Wiggins. I give most of the credit for our new winning culture and chemistry to Finch and Beverley.

[winforlose]

Good post. Wiggins is no longer forced to toss up contested 19 footers, with GSW’s passing and floor-spreading.

However, we’d agree that Wiggins trade value is higher now than when we traded him in 2019, right? And when we look back on trades, we can’t assign new trade values .. the price at the time was the price.

I think trade value is a function of a lot of things. Wiggins current value increase is because his contract is ending. A 33 million dollar expiring is valuable in bringing in a true max player. That said, the value was always going to increase the closer to the end of the contract he got. Beasley is in a similar boat. Wiggins as a player will never make max money again, all star or not. He just isn’t worth it. Put in a situation where he is expected to be a star he will likely fail again, because while his contract value has increased his player value has not.

The problem with your argument is that you reject my premise that the true value of the Dlo trade was KAT staying. Dlo is hands down better than Wiggins, both in fit and talent. Wiggins could explode for 40 and then suck for 3 games. Standrew was a well earned nickname. Dlo in a down shooting year is still more valuable as his defensive floor general skills and facilitating are essential for us. Add in Kaminga and things get more complicated. Let’s not forget we also got Spellman who could have been something for us. Did Rosas know the dumb **** would throw a hissy fit and sabotage his career, who knows. Spellman fit our needs and had he kept his weight and ego under control I think would have been happy here. Or at least retained some value and been trade bait.

Weird. I totally agree with your first paragraph. I wrote the same thing, twice, about holding contract length constant, but it looks like I didn’t include it in my edit, or I switched devices and never got the phrase in.

Yes, I do reject the true value of DLo is KAT staying. I’ve never bought that line, for reasons I explained in a previous post.

I do not believe DLo is hands down better than Wiggins. Both were one-time, undeserving All Stars, and only when put in perfect roles for them. Neither are in the top half of starters for their position, though Wiggins is probably closer. I disagree on fit too. Wiggins as a 6-9 wing, can fit on any team - PG’s are easier to find. Heck, I feel we were within inches of having Darius Garland

DLo was never a “defensive floor general” when we traded for him. Pretty much the opposite.

In the end though, I think we agree this trade improved the Wolves. If we kept Wiggins on a max deal, we would be continuing to try to give him a max-worthy role, and he has proven time and again that he can’t handle that. I think the trade (eventually) allowed us to move off that treadmill of losing. But we lost plenty with KAT and DLo, just like we did with KAT and Wiggins. I give most of the credit for our new winning culture and chemistry to Finch and Beverley.

When we first traded for Dlo in 19-20 how many games did they have together? Between Dlo being banged up coming in and KAT missing games before the season was cancelled saying we lost plenty with KAT and Dlo doesn’t apply to 19-20. So let’s look to 20-21. Game 2 a win over Utah KAT hurts his wrist and misses a chunk of games. Of course he comes back to get Covid and miss more games. He takes two more off in garbage time of the season to mourn his mother (her 1 year anniversary I believe,) and he misses 22 games out of 72. Dlo played 42 games in that season and missed quite a few with KAT. By the time he returned and KAT was healthy we were well out of playoff contention and if memory serves we won a chunk of games. So we did plenty of losing doesn’t apply then either. Now in 21-22 we are 32 and 28 with the most successful season since Butler in 17-18. I would argue based on the above that KAT and Dlo is a winning pairing.

Dlo at the time of trade was a better 3 point shooter (something we badly needed,) the best PG the wolves had since Cassel and outside of maybe Marbury the best we ever had. We were SF heavy with JO and Culver both trying to play the 3 and Beasley coming in to play the 2. Also worth throwing in that Dlo fits very nicely as a PNR PG and we badly need to run more PNR.

We could go round and round, but the bottom line is Kaminga is the only real variable in the deal. If he goes on to become an all star people will say we missed out. If he flames out then we didn’t lose much.

[MN7725]

Also, ever since the trade, I have heard posters here and on other boards say, “well, if MIN didn’t trade for DLo, Towns would have asked for a trade!” This is said like a fact, a logical certainty, when we really have no way of knowing even the factors of Towns loyalty, the strength of his friendship with DLo, whether the team would improve, or any of the other countless reasons a star player likes or dislikes his team.

I will say this. Towns has been loyal. When Towns was going through the Jimmy Butler saga, with Jimmy and everyone popping off to the media, he answered every question professionally. Everything was about him and the future of the Timberwolves. He has done the same thing through years of losing, and years of people using the media to call him “soft.” Still professional. He didn’t like that RoCo, his best friend on the team, got traded, but he stayed professional. And even though Towns was very loyal to the Saunders family, he did not rush to the media to complain when Ryan was fired. People like to treat this like, “well he’s due!” rather than treating it as evidence of the consistency of his character. I do not think that KAT would have demanded a trade off the Wolves if we hadn’t traded for DLo.

Agree...people do overstate the KAT-DLo friendship angle. They are friends yes but it's not like KAT was gonna leave if DLo wasn't here. I am still very glad Wolves made that trade though...that team needed a change as it was going no where and fanbase was also very low after 2017, 2018..Wolves also likely weren't gonna have a chance to draft Ant if they didn't make that trade.

KAT and Russell don't seem to be any closer than KAT and Wiggins were

I've never understood that argument of Wolves needed to get KAT"s buddy to make him happy, when they traded someone he was close with already to get that player

The two teammates KAT seemed to be really close with just observing from a distance/social media were Tyus and RCov

[winforlose]

Also, ever since the trade, I have heard posters here and on other boards say, “well, if MIN didn’t trade for DLo, Towns would have asked for a trade!” This is said like a fact, a logical certainty, when we really have no way of knowing even the factors of Towns loyalty, the strength of his friendship with DLo, whether the team would improve, or any of the other countless reasons a star player likes or dislikes his team.

I will say this. Towns has been loyal. When Towns was going through the Jimmy Butler saga, with Jimmy and everyone popping off to the media, he answered every question professionally. Everything was about him and the future of the Timberwolves. He has done the same thing through years of losing, and years of people using the media to call him “soft.” Still professional. He didn’t like that RoCo, his best friend on the team, got traded, but he stayed professional. And even though Towns was very loyal to the Saunders family, he did not rush to the media to complain when Ryan was fired. People like to treat this like, “well he’s due!” rather than treating it as evidence of the consistency of his character. I do not think that KAT would have demanded a trade off the Wolves if we hadn’t traded for DLo.

Agree...people do overstate the KAT-DLo friendship angle. They are friends yes but it's not like KAT was gonna leave if DLo wasn't here. I am still very glad Wolves made that trade though...that team needed a change as it was going no where and fanbase was also very low after 2017, 2018..Wolves also likely weren't gonna have a chance to draft Ant if they didn't make that trade.

KAT and Russell don't seem to be any closer than KAT and Wiggins were

I've never understood that argument of Wolves needed to get KAT"s buddy to make him happy, when they traded someone he was close with already to get that player

The two teammates KAT seemed to be really close with just observing from a distance/social media were Tyus and RCov

KAT, Dlo, and Booker were self described best friends. They all wanted to play together at some point in their careers. I don’t know what else to tell you.

First links I found on Google.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/fadeawayworld.net/.amp/nba-media/dangelo-russell-and-karl-anthony-towns-have-only-played-in-five-games-together-since-they-teamed-up-one-year-ago