As usual, Chad Ford gets his dig in...

Esohny · Post #1 » by **Esohny** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 5:41 pm

Taking into account all offseason moves, including the draft, trades, and free agency, Ford has us 29 out of 30, ahead of only the Grizzlies. "Wow," is all I have to say. He apparently doesn't know what an expiring contract is either.

29. Timberwolves

Key additions: Jonny Flynn, Wayne Ellington, Oleksiy Pecherov, Etan Thomas, Darius Songaila

Key subtractions: Randy Foye, Mike Miller

In limbo: Ricky Rubio (???), Rodney Carney (U), Shelden Williams (U)

The Timberwolves had one of the weirdest drafts in NBA history, including the selection of point guards with both of their lottery picks. Two weeks later, we keep waiting to hear about a trade that explains where one of the two -- Rubio or Flynn -- is really going to land, but instead we have Minnesota GM David Kahn saying he wants to keep both of them. Meanwhile, Rubio is threatening to sign with a European team for the next two or three years.

So, to recap: The Wolves sent away two key players on their roster, Foye and Miller, in exchange for some undesirable contracts and a player -- Rubio -- who is threatening that he won't play for the Wolves. If Kahn sorts all of this out, either via trade or by persuading Rubio to come and try his mad experiment, the Wolves will move up in these rankings and I may even call Kahn a genius.

But for now, the team appears to be in disarray and considerably worse off than it was going into the draft. Not a great start for Kahn.

Post #2 » by **Calinks** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:00 pm

That sucks, I don't see how drafting 2 possible future PG's makes your off-season bad. It also seems bad to me that the Grizz are ranked 30. Surly there has to be teams that did nothing this off-season. How could they be ranked higher? I know peopel don't like the Randolph deal but regardless, he is a 20 and 10 player. Getting Thabeet as well has to count for something.

Esohny · Post #3 » by **Esohny** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:05 pm

He's wildly inconsistent. I mean, he's got the knicks in the top 11, claiming that although they missed out on the players they wanted/needed in the draft, they got "best players available" in Hill and Douglas. He also ignores the fact that they haven't re-signed Lee and Robinson.

The only rank I agree with is the Spurs as #1.

Edit: Typo, the knicks were 11. The point about his inconsistency still stands.

GopherIt! · Post #4 » by **GopherIt!** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:10 pm

Yeah, he isn't making much sense here. He's grading Minny as if Rubio is never coming over which is nonsense. I grant him the point on Kahn taking a (calculated) risk drafting PGs back-to-back with high picks but there is no way MN should be 29th.

MN Die Hard · Post #5 » by **MN Die Hard** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:12 pm

Esohny wrote:
So, to recap: The Wolves sent away two key players on their roster, Foye and Miller, in exchange for some undesirable contracts and a player -- Rubio --

Funny, if they had done nothing he probably would have blasted them for keeping the key players on the 30-win team.

Post #6 » by **Calinks** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:14 pm

LMAO, he's got the Knicks in the top ten? Come on, on paper the Knicks vastly improved their team over the Grizzlies? As far as number one goes I don't even know about that. I might put the Lakers over the Spurs, getting Artest is huge and they didn't lose much in the process. SA still has gaps to fill.

Post #7 » by **The J Rocka** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:38 pm

Ford is a Dbag, he has never liked the wolves, he only likes the top teams that do well, the rest he doesn't care about, he's ur typical bandwagon 'fan' just like anybody else on espn

GopherIt! · Post #8 » by **GopherIt!** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 6:57 pm

Plus the Knicks are probably going to lose Lee and Nate without compensation.

what a tool. lol

HL Slamdunk · Post #9 » by **HL Slamdunk** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:07 pm

Esohny wrote:Taking into account all offseason moves, including the draft, trades, and free agency, Ford has us 29 out of 30, ahead of only the Grizzlies. "Wow," is all I have to say. He apparently doesn't know what an expiring contract is either.

29. Timberwolves

Key additions: Jonny Flynn, Wayne Ellington, Oleksiy Pecherov, Etan Thomas, Darius Songaila

Key subtractions: Randy Foye, Mike Miller

In limbo: Ricky Rubio (???), Rodney Carney (U), Shelden Williams (U)

The Timberwolves had one of the weirdest drafts in NBA history, including the selection of point guards with both of their lottery picks. Two weeks later, we keep waiting to hear about a trade that explains where one of the two -- Rubio or Flynn -- is really going to land, but instead we have Minnesota GM David Kahn saying he wants to keep both of them. Meanwhile, Rubio is threatening to sign with a European team for the next two or three years.

So, to recap: The Wolves sent away two key players on their roster, Foye and Miller, in exchange for some undesirable contracts and a player -- Rubio -- who is threatening that he won't play for the Wolves. If Kahn sorts all of this out, either via trade or by persuading Rubio to come and try his mad experiment, the Wolves will move up in these rankings and I may even call Kahn a genius.

But for now, the team appears to be in disarray and considerably worse off than it was going into the draft. Not a great start for Kahn.

Just another thing pulled from thin air by ESPN. Nowhere did Rubio ever threaten to sign with a team from Europe. It was discussed as a possibility, but he never threatened to go somewhere else.

With basically not enough cap room to sign a decent free agent, I think the T-wolves did a pretty good job this offseason. We were able to trade two players who wouldn't be here long term, for the 5th pick in the draft. We then made a trade in the draft for Charlotte's 2010 pick (top 12 protected I believe), and we got the second best shooter in the draft (Ellington) at 28. We were able to retain almost all of our cap space for 2010, and we still were able to gear ourselves toward the future. Now there comes decent criticism for drafting Flynn at #6. Those criticisms are understandable, but looking at who was available at that pick, I just don't know who the Wolves should have picked instead. But, to say that the Wolves had the 29th best offseason is ridiculous. There is more than one team that did worse than us this offseason. Ford is just out to get us because we screwed up his mock draft.

TaxI · Post #10 » by **TaxI** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:13 pm

lol at you bitching about ford, then you trying to **** on the knicks.that's not hypocritical at all.

HL Slamdunk · Post #11 » by **HL Slamdunk** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:16 pm

TaxI wrote:lol at you bitching about ford, then you trying to **** on the knicks.that's not hypocritical at all.

It's not. Ford said that the Knicks had the 10th best offseason. BS. They are going to lose a couple of major pieces and they didn't do anything decent this offseason. Yeah they geared up for 2010 cap space, but that was a long time ago when they did that.

TaxI · Post #12 » by **TaxI** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:27 pm

key pieces (who might have been trade bait for you know who) most posters here trash.

Post #13 » by **Calinks** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:34 pm

Nobody trash David Lee, we jsut don't have a need for another PF. The logic doesn't stack up. Nate Robinson is a good player but not someone most wolves fans are overly interested in. We trash on the offers because they are not good for the team we are trying to build.

tvwolves7 · Post #14 » by **tvwolves7** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:35 pm

TaxI wrote:key pieces (who might have been trade bait for you know who) most posters here trash.

What?

I do not have the article to see where he ranked every team. But I do not see for instance, the Bucks having a better offseason then us. They had to trade an all-star caliber player in R. Jeff for nothing to save cash, they did not draft Flynn who they wanted and ended up with Jennings who has already made some mistakes without even taking the court. A player that was also assumed to be not in the lottery anymore. Let Villenouva leave town.

Another team you could even name, again no idea where he ranked them, but the blazers. They went after Hedo and lost out, it was a chance for them to make a strong improvement. They made some trades during the draft but nothing out of the ordinary.

GopherIt! · Post #15 » by **GopherIt!** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 7:42 pm

TaxI wrote:lol at you bitching about ford, then you trying to **** on the knicks.that's not hypocritical at all.

Nobody is ****ing on the Knicks, we're just ####ing with them.

joking aside. nobody here is trying to disrespect your NY team.

WallyWorld · Post #16 » by **WallyWorld** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 8:17 pm

Admittedly, there are ways in which this draft could become an epic fail. Flynn and Rubio will not be able to coexist in a starting backcourt. Conventional wisdom or not, it just will not work out for a winning team.

Lets remember the only thing Rubio-wise we have to go off of is ongoing speculation. As of now, I think Kahn has taken a fantastic approach by not putting pressure on the kid, in which case Joventut will feel the pressure to lower his buyout. We will have to wait and see what happens, but there is most definately going to be a polar shift in opinion on David Kahn in the next few months, for better or worse.

Remember though, as of TODAY, Rubio is not here yet, Jonny Flynn was a questionable selection at 6, we have no offense from our backcourt, and we have no coach. As of TODAY and RIGHT now, thats not a pretty picture and its tough to disagree with Chad Ford really. However, and as he cites, Kahn has some chances to make this work and as such the outlook on Minny should improve.

And no need for us all to overreact on the major media frenzy of arrogance towards Minnesota. They have no pull in any of this.

SSUBluesman · Post #17 » by **SSUBluesman** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 8:21 pm

ESPN is garbage

Esohny · Post #18 » by **Esohny** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 9:40 pm

WallyWorld wrote:Admittedly, there are ways in which this draft could become an epic fail. Flynn and Rubio will not be able to coexist in a starting backcourt. Conventional wisdom or not, it just will not work out for a winning team.

Lets remember the only thing Rubio-wise we have to go off of is ongoing speculation. As of now, I think Kahn has taken a fantastic approach by not putting pressure on the kid, in which case Joventut will feel the pressure to lower his buyout. We will have to wait and see what happens, but there is most definately going to be a polar shift in opinion on David Kahn in the next few months, for better or worse.

Remember though, as of TODAY, Rubio is not here yet, Jonny Flynn was a questionable selection at 6, we have no offense from our backcourt, and we have no coach. As of TODAY and RIGHT now, thats not a pretty picture and its tough to disagree with Chad Ford really. However, and as he cites, Kahn has some chances to make this work and as such the outlook on Minny should improve.

And no need for us all to overreact on the major media frenzy of arrogance towards Minnesota. They have no pull in any of this.

I understand your points about overreacting, but I don't really agree with some of your analysis. In regards to the draft, I find it highly unlikely that it could be an epic failure, even in the short term(definitely not in the long term). At worst the Wolves "screwed up" one of their top 2 picks, but either way, the new PG will be a major upgrade to Bassy. They took a step back at SG, but I can't see a Flynn-Ellington backcourt(assuming no Rubio this year) being worse than a Bassy-Foye backcourt, even with 2 rookies getting major playing time. Of course, I find Telfair to be absolutely brutal as a starter, so upgrading that position helps us more than losing at SG hurts us; in my opinion.

Post #19 » by **Calinks** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 9:48 pm

I think Foye and Mike Miller a little underrated. They weren't world beaters but Miller did a lot for this team with his playmaking and rebounding. When Foye was not slumping he was a good offensive piece. We do have some holes to fill for sure. We need Offense like a mother.

WallyWorld · Post #20 » by **WallyWorld** » Wed Jul 8, 2009 10:03 pm

Esohny wrote:
WallyWorld wrote:Admittedly, there are ways in which this draft could become an epic fail. Flynn and Rubio will not be able to coexist in a starting backcourt. Conventional wisdom or not, it just will not work out for a winning team.

Lets remember the only thing Rubio-wise we have to go off of is ongoing speculation. As of now, I think Kahn has taken a fantastic approach by not putting pressure on the kid, in which case Joventut will feel the pressure to lower his buyout. We will have to wait and see what happens, but there is most definately going to be a polar shift in opinion on David Kahn in the next few months, for better or worse.

Remember though, as of TODAY, Rubio is not here yet, Jonny Flynn was a questionable selection at 6, we have no offense from our backcourt, and we have no coach. As of TODAY and RIGHT now, thats not a pretty picture and its tough to disagree with Chad Ford really. However, and as he cites, Kahn has some chances to make this work and as such the outlook on Minny should improve.

And no need for us all to overreact on the major media frenzy of arrogance towards Minnesota. They have no pull in any of this.

I understand your points about overreacting, but I don't really agree with some of your analysis. In regards to the draft, I find it highly unlikely that it could be an epic failure, even in the short term(definitely not in the long term). At worst the Wolves "screwed up" one of their top 2 picks, but either way, the new PG will be a major upgrade to Bassy. They took a step back at SG, but I can't see a Flynn-Ellington backcourt(assuming no Rubio this year) being worse than a Bassy-Foye backcourt, even with 2 rookies getting major playing time. Of course, I find Telfair to be absolutely brutal as a starter, so upgrading that position helps us more than losing at SG hurts us; in my opinion.

Ok. True, however I never stated the draft itself was an epic fail. I said that there are ways the draft could BECOME an epic fail, based on how the Rubio situation plays out, etc. We are being graded on the current offseason as we stand today. And right now, if you think the current active roster wins more than 20 games you are kidding yourself. The grades are not his projection of the team itself, it is nmerely a current state as it stands this very second.

Thats NOT to say things cant and will not get better. Hence the offseason power ranking. If and when Rubio comes over there will be a polar shift change in attitude towards our team.