RealGM

The Minnesota Timberwolves are actively shopping Ricky Rubio.

The Timberwolves have attached Rubio to multiple offers with Shabazz Muhammad to several teams around the NBA.

The Sacramento Kings have had a strong interest in acquiring Rubio, but there’s no traction on a deal between those two teams. 

Minnesota has been searching for a "bridge" guard in return to start in the short-term but ultimately back up Kris Dunn.

Rubio, 26, is the highest paid player on the young Timberwolves roster this season. He is making $13.5 million for 2016-17 and will be owed $29 million through the end of his contract in 2019.

Via Adrian Wojnarowski/The Vertical

Euphonetiks wrote:I hope the Pels can figure out a way to move Jrue and/or Tyreke and end up with Rubio.

IAMZOOTED wrote:

Euphonetiks wrote:I hope the Pels can figure out a way to move Jrue and/or Tyreke and end up with Rubio.

You'd rather have Rubio than Jrue?

kenwood3333 wrote:Don't quite understand the intention from the Wolves side. Dunn is not ready to start. Rubio is the glue of their offense. Without Rubio the wolves will lose more games. The wolves have enough young talent to develop. They need to instill a winning culture.

Marty McFly wrote:

kenwood3333 wrote:Don't quite understand the intention from the Wolves side. Dunn is not ready to start. Rubio is the glue of their offense. Without Rubio the wolves will lose more games. The wolves have enough young talent to develop. They need to instill a winning culture.

tanking purposes obviously.

MJallday59 wrote:DJ Augustin would be perfect.

Sam195 wrote:

Marty McFly wrote:

kenwood3333 wrote:Don't quite understand the intention from the Wolves side. Dunn is not ready to start. Rubio is the glue of their offense. Without Rubio the wolves will lose more games. The wolves have enough young talent to develop. They need to instill a winning culture.

tanking purposes obviously.

Yeah dude answered his own question. Thibs has probably come to realize that even if wolves go on a roll and slide into the playoffs - they will just get it handed to them by the warriors or the spurs. There better off getting another high pick especially if reports are true that the 2017 draft has similar talent to the 2012 draft class. Wolves will be a superpower soon but they need more talent in their small market and lock down their anchors in Towns and Wiggins to extensions asap. I could see a 3 team trade scenario working out where rubio and some other assets land in philly while okafor/noel go to a third team and the wolves also pick up something of value.

Mr Gametime wrote:Rubio for Derick Rose works under the trade checker. The wolves get to try out Rose to see if he's the missing piece that they need and if not he's off the books at the end of the season. The Knicks get a younger PG that won't demand max money.

oceanlife wrote:

Sam195 wrote:

Marty McFly wrote:
tanking purposes obviously.

Yeah dude answered his own question. Thibs has probably come to realize that even if wolves go on a roll and slide into the playoffs - they will just get it handed to them by the warriors or the spurs. There better off getting another high pick especially if reports are true that the 2017 draft has similar talent to the 2012 draft class. Wolves will be a superpower soon but they need more talent in their small market and lock down their anchors in Towns and Wiggins to extensions asap. I could see a 3 team trade scenario working out where rubio and some other assets land in philly while okafor/noel go to a third team and the wolves also pick up something of value.

I used to be 100% on board with the tank/rebuild strategy, but it seems like as more and more teams are willing to tank that the strategy is losing its effectiveness. The type of talents that come along in the draft who can change a franchise are rare as is, but increasingly the franchise changing talents are coming outside of the top 3 picks and becoming great because of coaching and development (Ex: Kawhi/Curry).

In fact if you break the numbers down, tanking is a really bad way to build statistically.

To illustrate this point let's take the top 3 picks from 2003-2012 Drafts and see how many of them brought their team to a championship level (which I define as their team at least once reaching the finals). Stick with me on this one. This is far enough back that it captures a good sample size of players without diluting it with players under 4 years of experience.

2003: LeBron/Darko/Carmelo (3 Trips)
2004: Dwight/Emeka/B.Gordon (1 Trip)
2005: Bogut/M.Williams/D.Williams (0 Trips)
2006: Bargnani/LaMarcus/Adam Porn Stache Morrison (0 Trips)
2007: Oden/Durant/Horford (1 Trip)
2008: Rose/Beasley/Mayo (0 Trips)
2009: B.Griffin/Thabeet/Harden (0 Trips)
2010: Wall/Evan Turner/Favors (0 Trips)
2011: Irving/Derrick Williams/Kanter (2 Trips)
2012: A.Davis/MKG/Beal (0 Trips)

In short, if you were a tanking team there were 30 possible top 3 picks over the course of 10 years. LeBron has of course dominated this list by bringing 3 finals trips to the Cavs. His teammate Irving was on board for 2 of them, whether you count that is up for debate. Then outside of those two only Durant and Dwight brought their teams to the championships season.

If you decided to tank as a team any season between '03 and '12 in order to get a top 3 pick then there was a 10-13% chance that you would get a player that would take you to the championship at least once. But remember, there's only a 64.3% chance that the worst team would get in the top 3. So you're looking at a 6.5-8.4% chance of a full on tank getting your team the super star player needed to get to the championship. That's assuming your team has the worst record, if your team wins a few games by accident that 6.5-8.4% chance falls under 3%.

In short, getting an NBA championship is hard and tanking is not always the best way to go. It might actually be better to develop the elusive "winning culture" and pray to the free agency gods.

Source for Odds: http://www.tankathon.com

Note30 wrote:

oceanlife wrote:

Sam195 wrote:
Yeah dude answered his own question. Thibs has probably come to realize that even if wolves go on a roll and slide into the playoffs - they will just get it handed to them by the warriors or the spurs. There better off getting another high pick especially if reports are true that the 2017 draft has similar talent to the 2012 draft class. Wolves will be a superpower soon but they need more talent in their small market and lock down their anchors in Towns and Wiggins to extensions asap. I could see a 3 team trade scenario working out where rubio and some other assets land in philly while okafor/noel go to a third team and the wolves also pick up something of value.

I used to be 100% on board with the tank/rebuild strategy, but it seems like as more and more teams are willing to tank that the strategy is losing its effectiveness. The type of talents that come along in the draft who can change a franchise are rare as is, but increasingly the franchise changing talents are coming outside of the top 3 picks and becoming great because of coaching and development (Ex: Kawhi/Curry).

In fact if you break the numbers down, tanking is a really bad way to build statistically.

To illustrate this point let's take the top 3 picks from 2003-2012 Drafts and see how many of them brought their team to a championship level (which I define as their team at least once reaching the finals). Stick with me on this one. This is far enough back that it captures a good sample size of players without diluting it with players under 4 years of experience.

2003: LeBron/Darko/Carmelo (3 Trips)
2004: Dwight/Emeka/B.Gordon (1 Trip)
2005: Bogut/M.Williams/D.Williams (0 Trips)
2006: Bargnani/LaMarcus/Adam Porn Stache Morrison (0 Trips)
2007: Oden/Durant/Horford (1 Trip)
2008: Rose/Beasley/Mayo (0 Trips)
2009: B.Griffin/Thabeet/Harden (0 Trips)
2010: Wall/Evan Turner/Favors (0 Trips)
2011: Irving/Derrick Williams/Kanter (2 Trips)
2012: A.Davis/MKG/Beal (0 Trips)

In short, if you were a tanking team there were 30 possible top 3 picks over the course of 10 years. LeBron has of course dominated this list by bringing 3 finals trips to the Cavs. His teammate Irving was on board for 2 of them, whether you count that is up for debate. Then outside of those two only Durant and Dwight brought their teams to the championships season.

If you decided to tank as a team any season between '03 and '12 in order to get a top 3 pick then there was a 10-13% chance that you would get a player that would take you to the championship at least once. But remember, there's only a 64.3% chance that the worst team would get in the top 3. So you're looking at a 6.5-8.4% chance of a full on tank getting your team the super star player needed to get to the championship. That's assuming your team has the worst record, if your team wins a few games by accident that 6.5-8.4% chance falls under 3%.

In short, getting an NBA championship is hard and tanking is not always the best way to go. It might actually be better to develop the elusive "winning culture" and pray to the free agency gods.

Source for Odds: http://www.tankathon.com