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...not just from the standpoint of the move the Wolves did make, but also from the perspective of what they gained or lost by mostly standing pat.

I give the Wolves a solid B. They improved the two greatest needs on the roster (PG and defensive big) without sacrificing future flexibility. I would have liked to see them also go after a couple of the veterans out there who could have complemented out young core - Hinrich, Chandler and Dalembert were all guys who were out there and, IMO, would be very nice complementary pieces to our Foye/Jefferson/Love core.

Land one of those guys and I'd say A+, but I am still looking forward to what Williams and Brown can do the rest of this year.

I was cool with not making any major moves. I also like that none of our rivals got any better lol.

I looked at it same as you. Pretty low risk moves that could pay off that didn't hurt our future flexibility. I'd have gone higher than a B if it was for more potential impact players where I see these as decent rotational players with some upside.

B for filling minor needs. We got back-up depth at our two shallowest positions, PG and C. Love gets to continue to develop at PF for the rest of the season. Bobby Brown is worth a look at the bargain price. We may have some addition by subtraction if McCants attitude was hurting the team.

A++ from me for not wasting our valuable cap space money early on Kirk Hinrich.

TMo519 wrote:I also like that none of our rivals got any better lol.

Good point. A lot of useful assets (expirings) went by the wayside at this deadline. That doesn't mean that the cap room in the future won't be useful for teams like the Blazers, Jazz and Thunder, but they sure didn't get any better this year.

I heard one poster say the winner of the Trade Deadline was BOS.

CLE and LAL didn't get any better, and the Celtics are going to get to add Joe Smith and maybe Marbury for the play-offs.

I'd say A, I'm not necessarily against bringing in higher paid vet players with longer contracts, but I was firmly against it if MN used capspace to do so. The FO made the smart\safe play and I can't argue against it.

Next season will be the season I could see the wolves making a big splash. 17m in expirings, several young pieces, and picks.

shrink wrote:A++ from me for not wasting our valuable cap space money early on Kirk Hinrich.

I agree shrink. I went to look at our roster for entering next season, and it got me really exicted. (I am defining long term vs. short term as anyone staying past next year, since that is when the huge FA market is, and we will likely see the shape of our team start to really be formed)

Starters that I view as around for the long term:
PG:???
SG: Foye (RFA in '10 I believe)
SF: ???
PF: Love
C: Jefferson

Solid Bench Players around for longer term
Brewer (SG/SF)
Gomes (SF)
Telfair (PG)

Expiring Contracts for next year: there are a lot here to play with next year at the deadline.
Cardinal
Miller
Smith
Madsen
Brown

Draft Picks:
MIN 1st 2009
MIA first 2009
BOS 1st 2009
MIN 1st 2010 (potentially)
UTH 1st 2010 (potentially)
Various 2nd rounders

Thats it! There are NO bad contracts next year that don't have extreme value as expirings. We were wondering what Miller/Cardinal would get this year. Imagine next year if Miller is more comfortable here and putting up better numbers. What could his talent plus the fact that both he and Cardinal are expirings get us? It should be a heck of a lot more than a has been Szczerbiak and a really late (and excessive) first round pick. I know that the rest of this season isn't going to be pretty, but boy compared to where we were 2 years ago, there is a lot of opportunity for things to improve.

The thought I keep having, and maybe this is worthy of it's own thread, I don't know, but it just continues off what shrink's been saying...

Mike Miller, especially, but even Brian Cardinal, Craig Smith, and Mark Madsen just saw their value sky rocket. Assuming we sign a MLE type free agent and our draft picks this off-season, we're sitting right around the salary cap, maybe a little over, but still under the lux.

So let's say we fast forward to next year's deadline assuming we're not in play-off contention, we can move Miller and/or Cardinal/Smith/Madsen to someone looking to clear 2010 cap space for a longer deal.

Take Captain Kirk for example. If we move Miller to Chicago for Kirk, we can probably get additional value because Miller would be a great wing to pair with Rose and potentially Gordon. So now we're getting back a cheaper Kirk, potentially a draft pick or prospect because Miller's expiring ends up being one of the best in the league; almost 10mil in cap savings while getting a player who actually improves a play-off run. And if we play it right, we're then looking at around 23mil in cap space in the summer 0f 2010, take away Hinrich's deal, and we're still looking at close to max money.

So you're looking at a chance to add Kirk Hinrich and Joe Johnson to the team.

C - Thabeet/Love
PF - Jefferson/Gomes
SF - Brewer/Summers
SG - Johnson/Foye
PG - Hinrich/Telfair

Great ball movement, great defense, dynamic wing scorer, scorer off the bench, we'd look solid.

Now after typing this up I read bruceallen's post, and I think he's saying what I'm saying.

B- just for getting rid of McCancer. Make it a B+ for filling two positions of need with basically free looks.

A+ because they didn't take any stupid contracts (Nocioni etc), filled a couple needs without effecting our lottery balls. Plus I'm a big Landlord homer and I didn't expect Brown to be available, I was thinking Booth/McCants for Landlord/ Douby, but Brown is even better. Much better in fact.

Williams/Love/Gomes/Foye/Telfair

Madsen/Smith/Miller/Carney/Brown

I want to watch those 10

more I talk to people about Brown the more they are shocked he was available too.

A+ Traded two players that weren't helping the team for two guys that could be starting soon. Or in Brown's case, should be starting soon. Also they didn't have to have trade any picks or take on long term salary (less than a mil. at the most).

Devilzsidewalk wrote:A+ because they didn't take any stupid contracts (Nocioni etc), filled a couple needs without effecting our lottery balls. Plus I'm a big Landlord homer and I didn't expect Brown to be available, I was thinking Booth/McCants for Landlord/ Douby, but Brown is even better. Much better in fact.

Williams/Love/Gomes/Foye/Telfair

Madsen/Smith/Miller/Carney/Brown

I want to watch those 10

Samesies. Too bad the game tonight isn't on TV.

I've never been too big on the Landlord, but I've been curious about Brown since his junior year when I first read about him at DX. I'm glad we get the chance to give him a look.

john2jer wrote:So you're looking at a chance to add Kirk Hinrich and Joe Johnson to the team.

C - Thabeet/Love
PF - Jefferson/Gomes
SF - Brewer/Summers
SG - Johnson/Foye
PG - Hinrich/Telfair

Great ball movement, great defense, dynamic wing scorer, scorer off the bench, we'd look solid.

Now after typing this up I read bruceallen's post, and I think he's saying what I'm saying.

Ya, we pretty much have the same view on this. Sometimes I think people get a little caught up in the rise and fall in players value. Who knows what player will be on the outs with their team within the next year. Player values are fairly volatile and theres so many factors even when considering trading for star level talent, but expiring contracts have even more value, because once a teams "untouchable" becomes touchable that team always wants expirings.

Take hinrich for example. If I was going to create a team which included big Al and love in the paint hinrich is probably my #1 most wanted PG. But as it stands now Hinrich's value can't go up to much. Unless Rose gets injured and Kirk starts putting up a killer stat line his value will not go up. It has already been established that they will take expirings for Kirk and we have plenty next year! The bulls already know what MN is willing to pay, and will wait to see if better offers roll around. I doubt they will to be honest, but I'm I wouldn't be to shocked to see a Cards + x + pick at the draft

I'm warming to this trade a bit. I'd give it a B. I would have liked to see a little more activity, though. Something like the Mihm deal with Memphis would have been nice.

horaceworthy wrote: Too bad the game tonight isn't on TV.

The four players probably won't get their physicals taken in time anyway.

I'd have graded it higher if we had traded Collins for a 2-year deal and an asset.

He would have been a good start on a trade to the Wizards. I guess there wasn't anything worth spending the extra $6 mil on.

shrink wrote:I'd have graded it higher if we had traded Collins for a 2-year deal and an asset.

He would have been a good start on a trade to the Wizards. I guess there wasn't anything worth spending the extra $6 mil on.

I wonder if they would have went for Collins and Ollie for Mike James and McGee.

Actually, I don't know if we would want James back; he probably would give up some money in a buyout at least, and I think McGee would fit in real nice with the players we have here.

skorff26 wrote:

shrink wrote:I'd have graded it higher if we had traded Collins for a 2-year deal and an asset.

He would have been a good start on a trade to the Wizards. I guess there wasn't anything worth spending the extra $6 mil on.

I wonder if they would have went for Collins and Ollie for Mike James and McGee.

Actually, I don't know if we would want James back; he probably would give up some money in a buyout at least, and I think McGee would fit in real nice with the players we have here.

I think Collins + Ollie for Etan + ______________ ? would have made sense.

There were rumors on draft day that there was a lot of offers on Collins, even late in the day, when Hinrich was rejected. It would have taken a lot for me to trade him for a 3-4 year deal, but a 2-year deal + incentive worth $6 mil would be fine with me, aligning our salaries.

Still, this Summer when Collins expiring, coming off the books with Hudson and Juwon's buy-outs, we'll have about $3 mil in cap space, even if we draft three players. We also have the cap space to use it, and not push ourselves into financial problems.

I would hope that we could trade this $3 mil in raw cap space to a cap-starved team for an expiring and a pick or prospect, similar to the PHI deal we did for Carney + 1st.