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The way the Wolves are playing now raises the very real possibility that by season's end they might finish outside the top six picks.

So what would you do at this juncture:

a. Start tanking badly so that our final record is no better than third-worst in the league, increasing our chances of landing Wall, Turner, or Johnson but diminishing our development as a team.

b. Play at .500 or so the rest of the way so that we wind up picking somewhere between, say, 5 and 8.

c. Play .600-plus ball the rest of the way so that we finish 11th in the lottery and surrender our pick to the Clips--getting it over with in a year when we have two other first-round picks.

Personally, I'm tired of living in a future fantasy world of trades and lottery balls. I hope this team wins all the games it can--even if that costs us our lottery pick--because that will mean we've turned the corner competitively.

This 4 game win streak is fun and all, but don't get used to it. Our depth is horrible and won't hold up. In order for us to keep winning, guys like Gomes and Hollins are going to have to keep playing out of their minds. That won't last forever.

I'm guessing that we'll end up between the 4th and the 2nd worst record. Sorry to be a buzz-kill.

I just hope we finish with a better record than Sacramento and Golden State. Their fans are annoying. It must be something in the water up there in Norcal.

I really don't care where we end up in the lottery. Because we shouldn't just hope to lose, sure it's easy to say before a game but once it starts I'm cheering for us to win! If we keep winning maybe the lotto gods will be nice to us for once.

Just try to be as competitive as possible and hope we'll have luck in the lottery just once.

I have seen how one player can totally turn a franchise a around. Look at Tyreke Evans and Sacramento or Brandon Jennings and Milwaukee. I would love for the wolves to get a player that does that but I don't think tanking is the answer. Every time we do something like that we get screwed out of our draft position anyway. I think its important for this team to start winning games and continue learning what it takes to persevere.

Calinks wrote:I have seen how one player can totally turn a franchise a around. Look at Tyreke Evans and Sacramento or Brandon Jennings and Milwaukee. I would love for the wolves to get a player that does that but I don't think tanking is the answer. Every time we do something like that we get screwed out of our draft position anyway. I think its important for this team to start winning games and continue learning what it takes to persevere.

Have you seen the standings lately? Milwaukee and Sacramento are going to end exactly where they were last year in the lottery. The Kings about 4th and the Bucks about 10th.

PeeDee wrote:

"Our depth is horrible and won't hold up."

Really? With Love, Sessions, and Ellington coming off the bench, I rather like our depth. I agree, though: Hollins and Gomes have to keep it up.

I would trade Gomes for someone who has more potential but needs to be developed. This way we make ourselves worse and possibly improve the future.

I hope they continue playing well but I agree with PeeDee that they won't be able to keep it up and, even if they do, I don't see them winning more than 50% of their games. Even .500 the rest of the way would put them at only 28-29 wins so I can't see them dropping too far.

I would love to see them play somewhere around .500 ball the rest of the way out but I would guess they end up slightly below that with about 24 wins or so which as others have said would put us anywhere from 3-7. As long as they keep playing consistently and don't have stretches of games where they look like a D-league team I will be happy.

Winning is good because it validates the idea that our young players actually have talent, but I can't see this team playing .500 ball for 30+ games. This team won't tank for the same reasons we haven't tanked the last 2 years. We're already playing all our young players, we can't tank without sacrificing development.

I'll also add that winning, while decreasing our lottery chances, increases our appeal to free agents.

Without any real statistics to back it up, it seems like the sweet spot to win the lottery is ending up somewhere between pick 3 and 7. Portland was 6th I believe when they got Durant... I mean Oden.. and the clippers were 4th I believe last year.

I don't want to do it, but it would be interesting to see the actual percentages of which slot ended up with the top 3 picks.

Regardless, even if they play .500 the rest of the way, we are still in a decent draft position. It is a deep draft and we have lots of other assets that can be moved around to get THE guy if its possible. I would rather see these guys starting to develop a winners mentality and killer instincts.

Next year my hope is that, if gomes doesnt get traded, he takes wilkins place on the bench and is replaced by a go to SF (Rudy Gay perhaps or draft) and Hollins becomes our 4th big where he belongs and is replaced by an athletic, defensive minded 7 footer (or 6'11).

???? - Jefferson - Hollins
Jefferson - Love
????? - Gomes
Brewer - Ellington
Flynn - Sessions

Worm Guts wrote:Winning is good because it validates the idea that our young players actually have talent

Eh, I'm not so sure that's a good thing. Losing validates the idea that our players don't really have that much talent and shows Kahn that we need more talented players.

prefuse73 wrote:Without any real statistics to back it up, it seems like the sweet spot to win the lottery is ending up somewhere between pick 3 and 7. Portland was 6th I believe when they got Durant... I mean Oden.. and the clippers were 4th I believe last year.

I don't want to do it, but it would be interesting to see the actual percentages of which slot ended up with the top 3 picks.

Let's not get silly, the best place to be for the lottery is the spot with the most chances to win.

I believe we've discussed at length that winning is not our #1 team priority. Management is mostly concerned with establishing a clear picture of what players they'd like to retain long-term, likewise, keeping focus on cap management. If we win a few games in the process, so be it.

This is a stressful time of the year for players with the trade deadline coming up ... some are playing at a higher level than normal and I would assume some are playing poorly as a result. Hard to know, but I certainly think we're currently feeling a sense of false success ... let the lottery be with us!

Dewey wrote:I believe we've discussed at length that winning is not our #1 team priority. Management is mostly concerned with establishing a clear picture of what players they'd like to retain long-term, likewise, keeping focus on cap management. If we win a few games in the process, so be it.

This is a stressful time of the year for players with the trade deadline coming up ... some are playing at a higher level than normal and I would assume some are playing poorly as a result. Hard to know, but I certainly think we're currently feeling a sense of false success ... let the lottery be with us!

Here's the way I' paraphrase it---

With the players we have winning is our number one priority. All that other stuff just helps us win in the long term. Most importantly though, is to build a culture of winners. You don't want to end up like the Clippers where no matter what players you put in there the team always seems to lose.

with our lottery luck, i don't care if we have the most losses, i have no hope of winning that #1 pick. I think its in everyone who will be with us next years interest to win as many games as possible. would also send a better message to free agents are aren't just trying to tread water like the clippers had done for so long.

casey wrote:

Worm Guts wrote:Winning is good because it validates the idea that our young players actually have talent

Eh, I'm not so sure that's a good thing. Losing validates the idea that our players don't really have that much talent and shows Kahn that we need more talented players.

I think the fact that it took us 48 games to officially remove ourselves from the worst record of all-time discussion is enough to do that.