Jimmy Butler

[KGdaBom]

I personally think he had every reason to do it, which is fair enough.

On the contrary, it sets the best of examples.

One post fake account troll. He had zero reason to do it. Honor your contract. You are not worth my time and on iggy already. Is that the quickest iggy of all time.

Are you against all players that don't honor their contract and request a trade or just Jimmy? Of all the egregious trade demands in sports history, stating that you have no intention of resigning with 1 year left on your contract is pretty damn low on the list. The coach looked/was out of date with the current NBA and his teammates didn't want to put in the amount of work needed to have a deep run in the playoffs.

I'm against all players that don't honor their contract. I have zero problems with a player requesting a trade. I have a huge problem with a player demanding a trade. Jimmy not only demanded a trade, but he went into unbelievably inappropriate behavior to try to get his way. The Wolves should have been able to sue him for everything he's got for the antics he went into. He embarrassed the team and himself. A person who does what he did to get his way IMO is a POS.

[KGdaBom]

One post fake account troll. He had zero reason to do it. Honor your contract. You are not worth my time and on iggy already. Is that the quickest iggy of all time.

Are you against all players that don't honor their contract and request a trade or just Jimmy? Of all the egregious trade demands in sports history, stating that you have no intention of resigning with 1 year left on your contract is pretty damn low on the list. The coach looked/was out of date with the current NBA and his teammates didn't want to put in the amount of work needed to have a deep run in the playoffs.

What Jimmy did was out of the ordinary, it's not the same as everyone else, everyone else shuts their mouths and lets it get done behind the scenes, that wasn't going to happen with Thibs and Butler knew it. It was a unique situation.

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

[Jedzz]

Oh, my lil friend who cant even remember a name of country in Europe where I live. You might feel so lonely in my ignore list. But you are always welcome there! I encourage you to do the same: just ignore me.

Why would I ignore such wonderful responses. And why would I know what actual country you are posting from today when you are often posting from such wonderful vacation or work trips all over?

Jamal Murray is one answer to your ridiculous filtered request btw. West, drafted since Towns was, has helped his team reach the playoffs and competes at a high level in them. I'm sure there are less exciting players we could also dig up. But this should satisfy. Oh wait now you can claim Denver has proper management and coaching. Oh I see how this works... Ok. Doncic. Next. I;'m sure there is some more. But oh wait, you said only Superstars! Oh yes that arbitrary label. Fun! We should really talk about how players should earn that label, shouldn't we?


Expand it to the entire league and it's also a nice list I'm certain. But I realize you also want to hide Towns behind a West situational excuse. So many levels of excuse filters in that response! Never stopped a Towns team from losing to east teams all these years and destroying chances at reaching playofffs. Where they could have at least performed better against their supposedly weaker East foes and used that to increase the record at the very least.

Everyone knows what Towns is capable of, and what have appeared to be a couple weaknesses along the way. No reason for feeling like we need to excuse it all. No reason to assume he can't improve his weaknesses shown. If people want to describe one of those weaknesses as he's been soft at times, so be it. I would admit there has been games in the books to support that. I wouldn't say he's normally playing soft by any means. But there is playing soft, and their is playing soft mentally as well. Might be some evidence of that at times as well. You want to claim there isn't. Ok. So these people are telling you there are examples of players that don't exhibit as much of this. Either you are open to the examples or you aren't.

It's not a ridiculously filtered list.

Playoffs are done by conference (until the finals) and there are often disparities in the strengths of conferences meaning it is often easier to get into the playoffs in one conference then the other.
Good coaching makes it easier to get into the playoffs.
Good organizations makes it easier to get into the playoffs.

The type of players that have playoff runs with mediocre (or worse) coaches/organizations are LeBron. The types that get to the playoffs under similar circumstances are AD. These are players that are tier(s) better than KAT.

This is why you're crying about "ridiculously filtered". This is why you're naming players who aren't even the best player on their team (Murray) and play for good coaches and well run organizations (Luka). This is also probably why the OP hasn't responded.

Players like KAT don't do the things you're expecting of him.

Just heard on Give and Go radio they were applauding AD's final game 2 shot and talking about whether you would want Jokic or AD taking that shot. Mentioned AD's over 48% from 3 in the final 24 seconds of games. They talked about other bigs you would have take that shot. Towns never came up, at least for the period I listened to. It's because he's gotten his points across the full game period, he hasn't been the guy to take those final shots that much. He was deferring to Wiggins for years, then Butler/Wiggins, etc. Aside from manning up other centers and rim protecting stronger, or busting through some of those larger centers on offense, another way for Towns to become seen as more of a clutch performer, strong willed team leader is to use his shooting skills on final game situation shots more. The guys on radio talked a lot about the playoff/regular season difference with these. Well, getting to the playoffs more gets you in the conversation more as well. It can be done, he can get that done, they just have to want to compete all season to get there more, and allow Towns in on the final 24 seconds of the games more.

Why do you continue to cite a shot that was the result of a blown defensive play and was drawn up for a wing player (LeBron) to push the awful idea of your C being your closer?

Let me apologize beforehand for being crass, judgemental, and short here. Without the time to show you your misteps on this one I have no choice. You are maybe a little bit too ignorant on this context for me to bother blowing time on this. Of course, if you were a regular here that I knew, and that I believed should be aware of all context involved here, and you also wore red shoes, I might sometime later create the time to better address your questions.

[AirP.]

Are you against all players that don't honor their contract and request a trade or just Jimmy? Of all the egregious trade demands in sports history, stating that you have no intention of resigning with 1 year left on your contract is pretty damn low on the list. The coach looked/was out of date with the current NBA and his teammates didn't want to put in the amount of work needed to have a deep run in the playoffs.

What Jimmy did was out of the ordinary, it's not the same as everyone else, everyone else shuts their mouths and lets it get done behind the scenes, that wasn't going to happen with Thibs and Butler knew it. It was a unique situation.

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

1. Towns wanted Butler gone probably to the point where he got a verbal agreement he'd be gone before signing his extension, he even waited on signing his extension for some reason.
2. Thibodeau wasn't going to trade Butler and probably told Butler he could fix the situation with Towns which Butler probably didn't believe.
3. Butler mentioned in his R.Nichols interview that basically EVERYONE seemed to ignore because of how they viewed Butler and didn't know at the time that Towns wanted him gone.

Nichols: Is it fixable?

Butler: It could be. It could be. But do I think so? No. Because you got to be honest. I’m being honest. Do I think so? No. I’m being honest with you. But is everybody gonna be honest? No. No, everybody’s not gonna be honest.

3. Butler wants to win but with Towns wanting him out, the environment wasn't conducive to winning because the locker room would be divided. He'd already seen how that works in Chicago when he and Noah basically didn't talk to each other that last year.

From Shams...

Karl-Anthony Towns, who’s one of the top talents in the league, has yet to sign to sign his rookie max extension, which should be a no-brainer. And I’m told there won’t be any decision on that until this Jimmy Butler situation resolves itself.

Read on Twitter

How Butler tried to force his trade was bad, I think we all agree to that but I also believe Butler thought that was the only way he could get out of that situation. He knew he wasn't going to win with a divided locker room so he should have just held out instead of going public to force a trade.

To me, Towns was holding the franchise hostage, not to become a better team, but to get rid of a player so he could be happier, probably thinking the offense would run through him. Hate Butler all you want but he's been honest about the reasons he's went where he's went and for some reason he KEEPS saying this over and over about working hard and teammates sacrificing, to me I believe he's trying to drive a point home to "someone", possibly multiple people. Butler just walked away from a huge 5 year contract(40+mil that last year) with Philly because he heard someone said "can you handle him" which meant they weren't completely on board with him, so he went somewhere where they were happy to have him... and it cost him millions upon millions of dollars to do so.

You can hate him all you want, but he sacrificed a lot of money to be in a situation where he'd be in an organization who tried to only get players who cared about winning.

I wish it all worked out better, Minnesota had the chance to be something special for the next 5-10 years.

[Klomp]

What Jimmy did was out of the ordinary, it's not the same as everyone else, everyone else shuts their mouths and lets it get done behind the scenes, that wasn't going to happen with Thibs and Butler knew it. It was a unique situation.

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

1. Towns wanted Butler gone probably to the point where he got a verbal agreement he'd be gone before signing his extension, he even waited on signing his extension for some reason.
2. Thibodeau wasn't going to trade Butler and probably told Butler he could fix the situation with Towns which Butler probably didn't believe.
3. Butler mentioned in his R.Nichols interview that basically EVERYONE seemed to ignore because of how they viewed Butler and didn't know at the time that Towns wanted him gone.
3. Butler wants to win but with Towns wanting him out, the environment wasn't conducive to winning.

How Butler tried to force his trade was bad, I think we all agree to that but I also believe Butler thought that was the only way he could get out of that situation. He knew he wasn't going to win with a divided locker room so he should have just held out instead of going public to force a trade.

To me, Towns was holding the franchise hostage, not to become a better team, but to get rid of a player so he could be happier, probably thinking the offense would run through him. Hate Butler all you want but he's been honest about the reasons he's went where he's went and for some reason he KEEPS saying this over and over about working hard and teammates sacrificing, to me I believe he's trying to drive a point home to "someone", possibly multiple people. Butler just walked away from a huge 5 year contract(40+mil that last year) with Philly because he heard someone said "can you handle him" which meant they weren't completely on board with him, so he went somewhere where they were happy to have him... and it cost him millions upon millions of dollars to do so.

You can hate him all you want, but he sacrificed a lot of money to be in a situation where he'd be in an organization who tried to only get players who cared about winning.

You're close. But I believe it was Thibs holding the franchise hostage by refusing to trade Butler until it got blown up in the media (by Butler) to where Glen Taylor had to step in and basically order Layden to handle the trade negotiations because Thibs wouldn't do it. I blame Thibs more than I blame Butler.

[minimus]

It was reported when Miami was trying to acquire Butler from Minnesota that Towns had went to the owner(G.Taylor) and asked for Thibodeau to be fired, what's interesting about that is the timeframe, he did it when Minnesota was around 3rd in the West and were looking good.

Could you please provide proof?

...

We were at 3rd in West in Nov 2017, and four days in Jan 2018. But no rumors about Butler wanting out at that moment were not reported. Butler went down on Feb 23, 2018. At that moment MIN were winning and were looking good, were 3rd in West on Feb 24, 26-28 and Mar. 1. However,

1) it has nothing to do with KAT contract extension talks. It happened in offseason 2018. Also the question was not fire Thibs, the request was to handle properly Butler situation.

Towns reportedly won’t sign his rookie-scale extension until Minnesota handles the Butler situation, and the standoff apparently isn’t at all over haggling about contract terms, particularly what would happen if Towns qualifies next season for the super-max. Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN

2) MIA could not try to acquire Butler at that moment, by the time Butler was down with injury, it was already past trade deadline in NBA. No trade talks started before Glen forced Thibs to listen offers in autumn 2018.

Assumption is a mother of all mistakes. It was not KAT who destroyed MIN with Thibs and Jimmy. It was a bad management, bad coaching, bad decision making. MIA prepared a foundation for this year success, Thibs did not bring same vision, same culture. Spoestra and Riley have found and developed Robinson, Herro, Bam, Nunn. Thibs brought washed up veterans, wasted all resources, traded young players, did not developed a single player from gleague, undrafted etc. He left this organisation in a complete mess. That team was doomed long before Butler asked for a trade.

KAT has been blamed for lack of leadership, toughness. But I will ask you why a great coach motivator Doc Rivers could not fix toxic LAC locker room this year? Why Kawhi Leonard could not elevate LAC in playoffs like he did in TOR? Building a winning organization takes a lot more that simply one great player. Butler understands it that is why he did not want to stay in CHI, MIN and PHI. He joined MIA, he did not build MIA culture.

P.S. It also is not true that KAT did not try to sacrifice his his game in order to win, when Butler was there. It is simply not true.

Towns sacrificed to make Butler comfortable last season. He led Minnesota in true shooting percentage (64.6 percent) by 3.6 points, but he was only fifth in usage rate, behind Butler, Andrew Wiggins, Derrick Rose, and Jamal Crawford. While Towns still put up big individual numbers (21.3 points on 54.5 percent shooting, 12.3 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and 1.4 blocks per game), he averaged 3.8 fewer points per game than the season before, and 3.7 fewer field goal attempts. Thibodeau didn’t build a team that would (or even could) feature Towns. Butler, Wiggins, Rose, and Crawford are all used to being primary options on offense.

https://www.theringer.com/nba/2018/9/27/17910312/karl-anthony-towns-tom-thibodeau-wolves

[KGdaBom]

What Jimmy did was out of the ordinary, it's not the same as everyone else, everyone else shuts their mouths and lets it get done behind the scenes, that wasn't going to happen with Thibs and Butler knew it. It was a unique situation.

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

1. Towns wanted Butler gone probably to the point where he got a verbal agreement he'd be gone before signing his extension, he even waited on signing his extension for some reason.
2. Thibodeau wasn't going to trade Butler and probably told Butler he could fix the situation with Towns which Butler probably didn't believe.
3. Butler mentioned in his R.Nichols interview that basically EVERYONE seemed to ignore because of how they viewed Butler and didn't know at the time that Towns wanted him gone.

Nichols: Is it fixable?

Butler: It could be. It could be. But do I think so? No. Because you got to be honest. I’m being honest. Do I think so? No. I’m being honest with you. But is everybody gonna be honest? No. No, everybody’s not gonna be honest.

3. Butler wants to win but with Towns wanting him out, the environment wasn't conducive to winning because the locker room would be divided. He'd already seen how that works in Chicago when he and Noah basically didn't talk to each other that last year.

From Shams...

Karl-Anthony Towns, who’s one of the top talents in the league, has yet to sign to sign his rookie max extension, which should be a no-brainer. And I’m told there won’t be any decision on that until this Jimmy Butler situation resolves itself.

Read on Twitter

How Butler tried to force his trade was bad, I think we all agree to that but I also believe Butler thought that was the only way he could get out of that situation. He knew he wasn't going to win with a divided locker room so he should have just held out instead of going public to force a trade.

To me, Towns was holding the franchise hostage, not to become a better team, but to get rid of a player so he could be happier, probably thinking the offense would run through him. Hate Butler all you want but he's been honest about the reasons he's went where he's went and for some reason he KEEPS saying this over and over about working hard and teammates sacrificing, to me I believe he's trying to drive a point home to "someone", possibly multiple people. Butler just walked away from a huge 5 year contract(40+mil that last year) with Philly because he heard someone said "can you handle him" which meant they weren't completely on board with him, so he went somewhere where they were happy to have him... and it cost him millions upon millions of dollars to do so.

You can hate him all you want, but he sacrificed a lot of money to be in a situation where he'd be in an organization who tried to only get players who cared about winning.

I wish it all worked out better, Minnesota had the chance to be something special for the next 5-10 years.

There's no excuse for his behavior. NONE.

[KGdaBom]

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

1. Towns wanted Butler gone probably to the point where he got a verbal agreement he'd be gone before signing his extension, he even waited on signing his extension for some reason.
2. Thibodeau wasn't going to trade Butler and probably told Butler he could fix the situation with Towns which Butler probably didn't believe.
3. Butler mentioned in his R.Nichols interview that basically EVERYONE seemed to ignore because of how they viewed Butler and didn't know at the time that Towns wanted him gone.
3. Butler wants to win but with Towns wanting him out, the environment wasn't conducive to winning.

How Butler tried to force his trade was bad, I think we all agree to that but I also believe Butler thought that was the only way he could get out of that situation. He knew he wasn't going to win with a divided locker room so he should have just held out instead of going public to force a trade.

To me, Towns was holding the franchise hostage, not to become a better team, but to get rid of a player so he could be happier, probably thinking the offense would run through him. Hate Butler all you want but he's been honest about the reasons he's went where he's went and for some reason he KEEPS saying this over and over about working hard and teammates sacrificing, to me I believe he's trying to drive a point home to "someone", possibly multiple people. Butler just walked away from a huge 5 year contract(40+mil that last year) with Philly because he heard someone said "can you handle him" which meant they weren't completely on board with him, so he went somewhere where they were happy to have him... and it cost him millions upon millions of dollars to do so.

You can hate him all you want, but he sacrificed a lot of money to be in a situation where he'd be in an organization who tried to only get players who cared about winning.

You're close. But I believe it was Thibs holding the franchise hostage by refusing to trade Butler until it got blown up in the media (by Butler) to where Glen Taylor had to step in and basically order Layden to handle the trade negotiations because Thibs wouldn't do it. I blame Thibs more than I blame Butler.

Thibs shouldn't have traded Butler. He was under contract and had no right to demand a trade. Butler should have honored his contract. The Wolves would have paid Butler very well the next year or Butler could have chosen to go elsewhere. I personally thought that when Thibs did trade Butler he got very good value in RoCo and Saric.

[AirP.]

Spoiler:

That's why Butler is a POS. A player under contract does not have the right to demand a trade. Requesting one is fine. When his contract expires then he can go wherever he wants.

1. Towns wanted Butler gone probably to the point where he got a verbal agreement he'd be gone before signing his extension, he even waited on signing his extension for some reason.
2. Thibodeau wasn't going to trade Butler and probably told Butler he could fix the situation with Towns which Butler probably didn't believe.
3. Butler mentioned in his R.Nichols interview that basically EVERYONE seemed to ignore because of how they viewed Butler and didn't know at the time that Towns wanted him gone.
3. Butler wants to win but with Towns wanting him out, the environment wasn't conducive to winning.

How Butler tried to force his trade was bad, I think we all agree to that but I also believe Butler thought that was the only way he could get out of that situation. He knew he wasn't going to win with a divided locker room so he should have just held out instead of going public to force a trade.

To me, Towns was holding the franchise hostage, not to become a better team, but to get rid of a player so he could be happier, probably thinking the offense would run through him. Hate Butler all you want but he's been honest about the reasons he's went where he's went and for some reason he KEEPS saying this over and over about working hard and teammates sacrificing, to me I believe he's trying to drive a point home to "someone", possibly multiple people. Butler just walked away from a huge 5 year contract(40+mil that last year) with Philly because he heard someone said "can you handle him" which meant they weren't completely on board with him, so he went somewhere where they were happy to have him... and it cost him millions upon millions of dollars to do so.

You can hate him all you want, but he sacrificed a lot of money to be in a situation where he'd be in an organization who tried to only get players who cared about winning.

You're close. But I believe it was Thibs holding the franchise hostage by refusing to trade Butler until it got blown up in the media (by Butler) to where Glen Taylor had to step in and basically order Layden to handle the trade negotiations because Thibs wouldn't do it. I blame Thibs more than I blame Butler.

I also believe Thibodeau wouldn't have traded Butler had it been up to him, so if you consider that holding the franchise hostage fine. From a roster construction standpoint Thibs could only make Minnesota worse by trading Butler, I always hate seeing the best player by far being traded away from a team unless they're going to do a complete rebuild(which I really don't believe in). If Towns said he didn't/wouldn't play with Butler then he forced the franchise to completely change course from becoming a winning franchise to a franchise he had control of which is holding the franchise hostage to me and now there's whispers he's talking about an exit plan in the future(maybe a few years down the road).

Here's my thing and this is with G.Taylor, I believe he made a verbal agreement with Towns although we may never know if that's true, it just logically makes sense to me. What G.Taylor could have done with Butler is tell him, if you play well and up your value to the point where we get good value back, we'll move you, if you sit around and tank your value you'll be here all year(which he may not have been able to say if he made a verbal agreement to Towns). Like I mentioned back in 2018, you could still do a sign and trade(like what Philly did) if your forced Butler to stay and play out his last year, something I suspect Thibodeau thought also. Then of course Miami gave up Richardson, Whiteside, 1st just to acquire Butler when he was a free agent, well, that's doable unless you made a verbal agreement with Towns.

[KGdaBom]

Could you please provide proof?

...

We were at 3rd in West in Nov 2017, and four days in Jan 2018. But no rumors about Butler wanting out at that moment were not reported. Butler went down on Feb 23, 2018. At that moment MIN were winning and were looking good, were 3rd in West on Feb 24, 26-28 and Mar. 1. However,

1) it has nothing to do with KAT contract extension talks. It happened in offseason 2018. Also the question was not fire Thibs, the request was to handle properly Butler situation.

Towns reportedly won’t sign his rookie-scale extension until Minnesota handles the Butler situation, and the standoff apparently isn’t at all over haggling about contract terms, particularly what would happen if Towns qualifies next season for the super-max. Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN

2) MIA could not try to acquire Butler at that moment, by the time Butler was down with injury, it was already past trade deadline in NBA. No trade talks started before Glen forced Thibs to listen offers in autumn 2018.

Assumption is a mother of all mistakes. It was not KAT who destroyed MIN with Thibs and Jimmy. It was a bad management, bad coaching, bad decision making. MIA prepared a foundation for this year success, Thibs did not bring same vision, same culture. Spoestra and Riley have found and developed Robinson, Herro, Bam, Nunn. Thibs brought washed up veterans, wasted all resources, traded young players, did not developed a single player from gleague, undrafted etc. He left this organisation in a complete mess. That team was doomed long before Butler asked for a trade.

KAT has been blamed for lack of leadership, toughness. But I will ask you why a great coach motivator Doc Rivers could not fix toxic LAC locker room this year? Why Kawhi Leonard could not elevate LAC in playoffs like he did in TOR? Building a winning organization takes a lot more that simply one great player. Butler understands it that is why he did not want to stay in CHI, MIN and PHI. He joined MIA, he did not build MIA culture.

P.S. It also is not true that KAT did not try to sacrifice his his game in order to win, when Butler was there. It is simply not true.

Towns sacrificed to make Butler comfortable last season. He led Minnesota in true shooting percentage (64.6 percent) by 3.6 points, but he was only fifth in usage rate, behind Butler, Andrew Wiggins, Derrick Rose, and Jamal Crawford. While Towns still put up big individual numbers (21.3 points on 54.5 percent shooting, 12.3 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and 1.4 blocks per game), he averaged 3.8 fewer points per game than the season before, and 3.7 fewer field goal attempts. Thibodeau didn’t build a team that would (or even could) feature Towns. Butler, Wiggins, Rose, and Crawford are all used to being primary options on offense.

https://www.theringer.com/nba/2018/9/27/17910312/karl-anthony-towns-tom-thibodeau-wolves

Minimus Air P was saying that KAT wanted Thibs fired at that time not that Butler was being pursued by Miami at that time or wanted out at that time. This came out during the time after that season when Miami was pursuing Butler.

[AirP.]

We were at 3rd in West in Nov 2017, and four days in Jan 2018. But no rumors about Butler wanting out at that moment were not reported. Butler went down on Feb 23, 2018. At that moment MIN were winning and were looking good, were 3rd in West on Feb 24, 26-28 and Mar. 1. However,

1) it has nothing to do with KAT contract extension talks. It happened in offseason 2018. Also the question was not fire Thibs, the request was to handle properly Butler situation.

I remember the info about KAT going to G.Taylor being in February. I'll continue to search for that podcast but it's tough searching through all those 2018 podcasts for that summer and fall.

2) MIA could not try to acquire Butler at that moment, by the time Butler was down with injury, it was already past trade deadline in NBA. No trade talks started before Glen forced Thibs to listen offers in autumn 2018.

What? I'm talking about the summer and fall, not the 2018 season, I'm saying the info of Towns going to G.Taylor about firing Thibs happened in Feb 2018 and it actually may have been Towns telling his agent to tell G.Taylor. Towns initiate the talk but may have had someone else deliver the message.

Assumption is a mother of all mistakes. It was not KAT who destroyed MIN with Thibs and Jimmy. It was a bad management, bad coaching, bad decision making. MIA prepared a foundation for this year success, Thibs did not bring same vision, same culture. Spoestra and Riley have found and developed Robinson, Herro, Bam, Nunn. Thibs brought washed up veterans, wasted all resources, traded young players, did not developed a single player from gleague, undrafted etc. He left this organisation in a complete mess. That team was doomed long before Butler asked for a trade.

Towns is still destroying the Timberwolves, you now traded Wiggins and a 1st round pick(could be a high lottery pick) just to add a friend of Towns. IT'S STILL HAPPENING!!!! And now there's whispers of him being as good as gone which would be just horrific since he's forced his will so much on this franchise(get rid of Butler, bring in Russell).

KAT has been blamed for lack of leadership, toughness. But I will ask you why a great coach motivator Doc Rivers could not fix toxic LAC locker room this year? Why Kawhi Leonard could not elevate LAC in playoffs like he did in TOR?

Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. It worked in Toronto because he just replaced DeRozen, the rest of the team was almost intact so the chemistry was already there plus a mercenary. In LA the team wasn't really a team, they lost a bunch of key players in the PG trade(not a fan of PG other than he puts up stats, not a winner) and before that, earlier in that season they moved T.Harris for assets. That team was in flux vs Toronto which had been pretty steady for years.

Building a winning organization takes a lot more that simply one great player. Butler understands it that is why he did not want to stay in CHI, MIN and PHI. He joined MIA, he did not build MIA culture.

Chicago - Butler wanted to stay in Chicago, he wanted to be a lifer, but the Bulls did their huge 180 turn going from tough coach(Thibs) to a player's coach in Hoiberg(they've been flip flopping like that that for years with their coaching). It's odd how Chicago just changed the coaching so drastically each time, no way for continuity that way.

Minnesota - Towns didn't want to play with Butler and Butler's mentioned since then he wants to be somewhere he's wanted, that was Philly and now Miami.

Philly - He said it came down to hearing that someone asked if they could... "handle him", finding out about that he was gone from Philly, he said that told him they weren't sure about wanting him so he gave up that 5th year balloon payment and went to Miami. Butler didn't make Miami's culture, it was already there and he fit in it perfectly. Didn't say he made Miami's culture/environment, he just fit in perfectly.

P.S. It also is not true that KAT did not try to sacrifice his his game in order to win, when Butler was there. It is simply not true.

He did sacrifice his game that first year, he didn't want to continue to sacrifice his game.

Towns sacrificed to make Butler comfortable last season. He led Minnesota in true shooting percentage (64.6 percent) by 3.6 points, but he was only fifth in usage rate, behind Butler, Andrew Wiggins, Derrick Rose, and Jamal Crawford. While Towns still put up big individual numbers (21.3 points on 54.5 percent shooting, 12.3 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and 1.4 blocks per game), he averaged 3.8 fewer points per game than the season before, and 3.7 fewer field goal attempts. Thibodeau didn’t build a team that would (or even could) feature Towns. Butler, Wiggins, Rose, and Crawford are all used to being primary options on offense.

https://www.theringer.com/nba/2018/9/27/17910312/karl-anthony-towns-tom-thibodeau-wolves[/quote]
Right? Towns was utilized as a 3pt shooter because of 2 things, they didn't have enough good 3pt shooters and Towns was a great 3pt shooter. Town's lack of defense as the center made Thibodeau go with Gibson who lacks a decent 3pt shot and with that kept Town away from the basket even more.

Could Towns have been utilized like Bam on offense, sure but Minnesota would have been a worse team because Towns' defense as the center was lacking which means you have to have stronger defensive wings rather than look for better 3pt shooting wings. Bam erases a lot of defensive mistakes, something Towns should be able to do with his athletic ability but doesn't.

Towns is an incredible offensive talent, if you told me he's going to average 30 ppg next year(and the next year, and the next year) I'd think that's absolutely possible, but until he figures out it's the defensive end that wins games, he's going to be a great stats/bad team guy. It's basically the inverse of Ben Simmons, great defense yet refuses to shoot the ball from mid-range and further and with that, makes the halfcourt offense much more difficult on his teammates even though he's extremely talented.

I had just wished that Minnesota had continued to build and became a powerhouse, the potential was there even with Wiggins under-performing with his lack of effort(which may change with the whole organization in GS on him to give consistent effort).

[minimus]

We were at 3rd in West in Nov 2017, and four days in Jan 2018. But no rumors about Butler wanting out at that moment were not reported. Butler went down on Feb 23, 2018. At that moment MIN were winning and were looking good, were 3rd in West on Feb 24, 26-28 and Mar. 1. However,

1) it has nothing to do with KAT contract extension talks. It happened in offseason 2018. Also the question was not fire Thibs, the request was to handle properly Butler situation.

I remember the info about KAT going to G.Taylor being in February. I'll continue to search for that podcast but it's tough searching through all those 2018 podcasts for that summer and fall.

It was never reported that KAT went to Taylor before Butler trade demand.

2) MIA could not try to acquire Butler at that moment, by the time Butler was down with injury, it was already past trade deadline in NBA. No trade talks started before Glen forced Thibs to listen offers in autumn 2018.

What? I'm talking about the summer and fall, not the 2018 season, I'm saying the info of Towns going to G.Taylor about firing Thibs happened in Feb 2018 and it actually may have been Towns telling his agent to tell G.Taylor. Towns initiate the talk but may have had someone else deliver the message.

That why I say it is an assumptions which your logical chain incorrect. No facts, just assumptions.

Assumption is a mother of all mistakes. It was not KAT who destroyed MIN with Thibs and Jimmy. It was a bad management, bad coaching, bad decision making. MIA prepared a foundation for this year success, Thibs did not bring same vision, same culture. Spoestra and Riley have found and developed Robinson, Herro, Bam, Nunn. Thibs brought washed up veterans, wasted all resources, traded young players, did not developed a single player from gleague, undrafted etc. He left this organisation in a complete mess. That team was doomed long before Butler asked for a trade.

Towns is still destroying the Timberwolves, you now traded Wiggins and a 1st round pick(could be a high lottery pick) just to add a friend of Towns. IT'S STILL HAPPENING!!!!

AirP. you came here out of nowhere, but let me kindly remind you that Thibs was POBO and HC, his responsibility were

1) managing every basketball operations, namely trades, negotiations with FA and MIN RFA,
2) scouting and developing young players
3) coaching

Now lets go through all three tasks and asses results

1) managing trades: completely me messed up Butler trade by refusing to perform trade in offseason, when teams had assets and cap space
2) negotiation with FA: overpaid EVERY FA he signed Hill, Aldrich, Dieng, Teague, Gibson, JC. None of them was considered as a positive trade asset, all of them lost their value playing in MIN. Rose re-gained some value but it did bring any advantages for MIN.
3) negotiation with MIN RFA: Wiggins was overpaid by Thibs in the same way Thibs overpaid every other player. I doubt Thibs did even perform negotiations. Bjelica and Tyus were never offered extensions even if they wanted to stay here
4) scouting: Dunn, Patton are considered as busts so far. Okogie is a backup, KBD not in rotation in DEN
5) developing young players: no player made significant jump in development. No one from gleague, SL league made a main MIN team
6) we played outdated offense and defense

So no. KAT IS NOT DESTROYING THIS TEAM. The damage was already done by Thibs and Butler.

KAT has been blamed for lack of leadership, toughness. But I will ask you why a great coach motivator Doc Rivers could not fix toxic LAC locker room this year? Why Kawhi Leonard could not elevate LAC in playoffs like he did in TOR?

Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. It worked in Toronto because he just replaced DeRozen, the rest of the team was almost intact so the chemistry was already there plus a mercenary. In LA the team wasn't really a team, they lost a bunch of key players in the PG trade(not a fan of PG other than he puts up stats, not a winner) and before that, earlier in that season they moved T.Harris for assets. That team was in flux vs Toronto which had been pretty steady for years.

Or now you tell me that Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. So what's the difference between Kawhi and Butler?

Building a winning organization takes a lot more that simply one great player. Butler understands it that is why he did not want to stay in CHI, MIN and PHI. He joined MIA, he did not build MIA culture.

Minnesota - Towns didn't want to play with Butler and Butler's mentioned since then he wants to be somewhere he's wanted, that was Philly and now Miami.

Once again. The issue DID NOT started with KAT. It was Thibs who valued Butler over everyone else AND Butler who did not want to play in MIN. KAT used his voice only ONCE in this situation, as he postponed contract extension negotiations until Butler trade demand was heard.

P.S. It also is not true that KAT did not try to sacrifice his his game in order to win, when Butler was there. It is simply not true.

He did sacrifice his game that first year, he didn't want to continue to sacrifice his game.

Towns sacrificed to make Butler comfortable last season. He led Minnesota in true shooting percentage (64.6 percent) by 3.6 points, but he was only fifth in usage rate, behind Butler, Andrew Wiggins, Derrick Rose, and Jamal Crawford. While Towns still put up big individual numbers (21.3 points on 54.5 percent shooting, 12.3 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and 1.4 blocks per game), he averaged 3.8 fewer points per game than the season before, and 3.7 fewer field goal attempts. Thibodeau didn’t build a team that would (or even could) feature Towns. Butler, Wiggins, Rose, and Crawford are all used to being primary options on offense.

https://www.theringer.com/nba/2018/9/27/17910312/karl-anthony-towns-tom-thibodeau-wolves

Right? Towns was utilized as a 3pt shooter because of 2 things, they didn't have enough good 3pt shooters and Towns was a great 3pt shooter. Town's lack of defense as the center made Thibodeau go with Gibson who lacks a decent 3pt shot and with that kept Town away from the basket even more.

Could Towns have been utilized like Bam on offense, sure but Minnesota would have been a worse team because Towns' defense as the center was lacking which means you have to have stronger defensive wings rather than look for better 3pt shooting wings. Bam erases a lot of defensive mistakes, something Towns should be able to do with his athletic ability but doesn't.

Towns is an incredible offensive talent, if you told me he's going to average 30 ppg next year(and the next year, and the next year) I'd think that's absolutely possible, but until he figures out it's the defensive end that wins games, he's going to be a great stats/bad team guy. It's basically the inverse of Ben Simmons, great defense yet refuses to shoot the ball from mid-range and further and with that, makes the halfcourt offense much more difficult on his teammates even though he's extremely talented.

I had just wished that Minnesota had continued to build and became a powerhouse, the potential was there even with Wiggins under-performing with his lack of effort(which may change with the whole organization in GS on him to give consistent effort).

You just saw offensive minded guys such as Jokic, Murray, Doncic playing well in playoffs. You see one of the worst shooters in NBA named Butler and non shooter Bam playing well in playoffs. The problem with Thibs way of thinking is that instead of building around KAT and Butler, instead of adopting best things of modern offense and defense to put your best players in position to succeed, Thibs tried to implement his outdated ISO heavy offense and ICE defense in a lumberjack way. I will ask you one question. What do you think Thibs would do with Jamal Murray if he drafted him in MIN? Or with Doncic? Or KP? Or Jokic?

[AirP.]

I remember the info about KAT going to G.Taylor being in February. I'll continue to search for that podcast but it's tough searching through all those 2018 podcasts for that summer and fall.

It was never reported that KAT went to Taylor before Butler trade demand.

If you're arguing about the timeframe, let me ask you this, why would Towns ask for Butler to be moved if Butler already made the trade request? The issue with Butler was that Towns didn't want him there.

2) MIA could not try to acquire Butler at that moment, by the time Butler was down with injury, it was already past trade deadline in NBA. No trade talks started before Glen forced Thibs to listen offers in autumn 2018.

What? I'm talking about the summer and fall, not the 2018 season, I'm saying the info of Towns going to G.Taylor about firing Thibs happened in Feb 2018 and it actually may have been Towns telling his agent to tell G.Taylor. Towns initiate the talk but may have had someone else deliver the message.

That why I say it is an assumptions which your logical chain incorrect. No facts, just assumptions.

Based off information I heard from a reporter who said a Minnesota beat writer told him. I actually listen/read for information from podcasts that aren't only Minnesota centric.

Assumption is a mother of all mistakes. It was not KAT who destroyed MIN with Thibs and Jimmy. It was a bad management, bad coaching, bad decision making. MIA prepared a foundation for this year success, Thibs did not bring same vision, same culture. Spoestra and Riley have found and developed Robinson, Herro, Bam, Nunn. Thibs brought washed up veterans, wasted all resources, traded young players, did not developed a single player from gleague, undrafted etc. He left this organisation in a complete mess. That team was doomed long before Butler asked for a trade.

Towns is still destroying the Timberwolves, you now traded Wiggins and a 1st round pick(could be a high lottery pick) just to add a friend of Towns. IT'S STILL HAPPENING!!!!

AirP. you came here out of nowhere, but let me kindly remind you that Thibs was POBO and HC, his responsibility were

1) managing every basketball operations, namely trades, negotiations with FA and MIN RFA,
2) scouting and developing young players
3) coaching

Now lets go through all three tasks and asses results

1) managing trades: completely me messed up Butler trade by refusing to perform trade in offseason, when teams had assets and cap space
2) negotiation with FA: overpaid EVERY FA he signed Hill, Aldrich, Dieng, Teague, Gibson, JC. None of them was considered as a positive trade asset, all of them lost their value playing in MIN. Rose re-gained some value but it did bring any advantages for MIN.
3) negotiation with MIN RFA: Wiggins was overpaid by Thibs in the same way Thibs overpaid every other player. I doubt Thibs did even perform negotiations. Bjelica and Tyus were never offered extensions even if they wanted to stay here
4) scouting: Dunn, Patton are considered as busts so far. Okogie is a backup, KBD not in rotation in DEN
5) developing young players: no player made significant jump in development. No one from gleague, SL league made a main MIN team
6) we played outdated offense and defense

So no. KAT IS NOT DESTROYING THIS TEAM. The damage was already done by Thibs and Butler.

1. He wanted to keep the best asset in the trade, good lord, Miami traded more for a S&T with Philly then Minnesota got from Philly. Miami moved Richardson, Whiteside, 1st round pick to acquire Butler through multiple moves which they had to do to create space. I'd argue keeping him the year and S&T him was a better option and there would have been a chance that Towns and him finally got on the same page(although unlikely)
2. I wasn't following Minnesota at the time but from what I read it seemed everyone was good with the Dieng contract. Good lord you were even praising toe signing at the time in the Dieng/Shabazz signing thread.

Good job! Shabazz situation is understandable too.

Once he gets better PnR defender this deal will be called bargain.

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=1464744&start=100

Teague didn't work out as well but Thibs got a commitment from him before free agency so he went that route, Gibson was an overpayment for less years and JC... he was the best you could get at the time and that was bad in itself, Minnesota just had no other options.
3. The Wiggins contract? The contract G.Taylor(not Thibodeau) went to the media and said he wanted to talk to Wiggins before signing? The same Wiggins who Thibodeau was talking about trading to Chicago for Butler before Taylor said he couldn't be traded. The same Wiggins Thibodeau minimized his role the next season. No, that was 100% G.Taylor overruling Thibodeau as he did many times which caused a lot of issues for the franchise. One might say the only constant for those 13 straight season missing the playoffs.
4. Dunn was drafted to get Butler. Chicago had talked to Boston about moving up to #3 to get him. Patton ended up a bust because of injuries, KDB was a late 2nd round pick and players drafted there are lucky to be in the league, Okogie was a mid 1st round pick so being a rotation player is what you expect. No, Thibodeau did not make any great picks, I'll give you that.

KAT has been blamed for lack of leadership, toughness. But I will ask you why a great coach motivator Doc Rivers could not fix toxic LAC locker room this year? Why Kawhi Leonard could not elevate LAC in playoffs like he did in TOR?

Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. It worked in Toronto because he just replaced DeRozen, the rest of the team was almost intact so the chemistry was already there plus a mercenary. In LA the team wasn't really a team, they lost a bunch of key players in the PG trade(not a fan of PG other than he puts up stats, not a winner) and before that, earlier in that season they moved T.Harris for assets. That team was in flux vs Toronto which had been pretty steady for years.

Or now you tell me that Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. So what's the difference between Kawhi and Butler?[/quote]
Maybe not a whole lot except Butler tries to make his teammates better, it's one of the reasons he keeps having young players workout with him in the offseason. Him having Herro basically attached to the hip with him was a big story in Miami, in Chicago it was McDermott.

Building a winning organization takes a lot more that simply one great player. Butler understands it that is why he did not want to stay in CHI, MIN and PHI. He joined MIA, he did not build MIA culture.

Minnesota - Towns didn't want to play with Butler and Butler's mentioned since then he wants to be somewhere he's wanted, that was Philly and now Miami.

Once again. The issue DID NOT started with KAT. It was Thibs who valued Butler over everyone else AND Butler who did not want to play in MIN. KAT used his voice only ONCE in this situation, as he postponed contract extension negotiations until Butler trade demand was heard.

Butler was the better player, not as good offensively but a better OVERALL player vs Towns. Butler was fine in Minnesota as long as everyone was working hard... but that wasn't happening. Towns made his voice heard multiple times. You'll have to find out that information from reporters outside of Minnesota because airing out the laundry on Towns may make their jobs more difficult.

Right? Towns was utilized as a 3pt shooter because of 2 things, they didn't have enough good 3pt shooters and Towns was a great 3pt shooter. Town's lack of defense as the center made Thibodeau go with Gibson who lacks a decent 3pt shot and with that kept Town away from the basket even more.

Could Towns have been utilized like Bam on offense, sure but Minnesota would have been a worse team because Towns' defense as the center was lacking which means you have to have stronger defensive wings rather than look for better 3pt shooting wings. Bam erases a lot of defensive mistakes, something Towns should be able to do with his athletic ability but doesn't.

Towns is an incredible offensive talent, if you told me he's going to average 30 ppg next year(and the next year, and the next year) I'd think that's absolutely possible, but until he figures out it's the defensive end that wins games, he's going to be a great stats/bad team guy. It's basically the inverse of Ben Simmons, great defense yet refuses to shoot the ball from mid-range and further and with that, makes the halfcourt offense much more difficult on his teammates even though he's extremely talented.

I had just wished that Minnesota had continued to build and became a powerhouse, the potential was there even with Wiggins under-performing with his lack of effort(which may change with the whole organization in GS on him to give consistent effort).

You just saw offensive minded guys such as Jokic, Murray, Doncic playing well in playoffs. You see one of the worst shooters in NBA named Butler and non shooter Bam playing well in playoffs. The problem with Thibs way of thinking is that instead of building around KAT and Butler, instead of adopting best things of modern offense and defense to put your best players in position to succeed, Thibs tried to implement his outdated ISO heavy offense and ICE defense in a lumberjack way. I will ask you one question. What do you think Thibs would do with Jamal Murray if he drafted him in MIN? Or with Doncic? Or KP? Or Jokic?

You need a rim protector, since KAT wasn't good at that T.Gibson was brought in, if Towns was utilized like Bam he'd only have 2 out his 4 teammates able to space the floor. Had Towns been able to defend the basket better you could have used a better shooting 4 instead of Gibson. Losing out on P.Milsap as a free agent and having to go with Gibson(for defense) really changed what you could do with the offense. The key to unlocking Towns on offense was Towns playing better defense allowing more options offensively. Once again, sure Thibs could have played through Towns but the team wouldn't have been nearly as efficient. Butler not being a good 3pt shooter was also a limitation for the offense.

[SSUBluesman]

Why would I ignore such wonderful responses. And why would I know what actual country you are posting from today when you are often posting from such wonderful vacation or work trips all over?

Jamal Murray is one answer to your ridiculous filtered request btw. West, drafted since Towns was, has helped his team reach the playoffs and competes at a high level in them. I'm sure there are less exciting players we could also dig up. But this should satisfy. Oh wait now you can claim Denver has proper management and coaching. Oh I see how this works... Ok. Doncic. Next. I;'m sure there is some more. But oh wait, you said only Superstars! Oh yes that arbitrary label. Fun! We should really talk about how players should earn that label, shouldn't we?


Expand it to the entire league and it's also a nice list I'm certain. But I realize you also want to hide Towns behind a West situational excuse. So many levels of excuse filters in that response! Never stopped a Towns team from losing to east teams all these years and destroying chances at reaching playofffs. Where they could have at least performed better against their supposedly weaker East foes and used that to increase the record at the very least.

Everyone knows what Towns is capable of, and what have appeared to be a couple weaknesses along the way. No reason for feeling like we need to excuse it all. No reason to assume he can't improve his weaknesses shown. If people want to describe one of those weaknesses as he's been soft at times, so be it. I would admit there has been games in the books to support that. I wouldn't say he's normally playing soft by any means. But there is playing soft, and their is playing soft mentally as well. Might be some evidence of that at times as well. You want to claim there isn't. Ok. So these people are telling you there are examples of players that don't exhibit as much of this. Either you are open to the examples or you aren't.

It's not a ridiculously filtered list.

Playoffs are done by conference (until the finals) and there are often disparities in the strengths of conferences meaning it is often easier to get into the playoffs in one conference then the other.
Good coaching makes it easier to get into the playoffs.
Good organizations makes it easier to get into the playoffs.

The type of players that have playoff runs with mediocre (or worse) coaches/organizations are LeBron. The types that get to the playoffs under similar circumstances are AD. These are players that are tier(s) better than KAT.

This is why you're crying about "ridiculously filtered". This is why you're naming players who aren't even the best player on their team (Murray) and play for good coaches and well run organizations (Luka). This is also probably why the OP hasn't responded.

Players like KAT don't do the things you're expecting of him.

Just heard on Give and Go radio they were applauding AD's final game 2 shot and talking about whether you would want Jokic or AD taking that shot. Mentioned AD's over 48% from 3 in the final 24 seconds of games. They talked about other bigs you would have take that shot. Towns never came up, at least for the period I listened to. It's because he's gotten his points across the full game period, he hasn't been the guy to take those final shots that much. He was deferring to Wiggins for years, then Butler/Wiggins, etc. Aside from manning up other centers and rim protecting stronger, or busting through some of those larger centers on offense, another way for Towns to become seen as more of a clutch performer, strong willed team leader is to use his shooting skills on final game situation shots more. The guys on radio talked a lot about the playoff/regular season difference with these. Well, getting to the playoffs more gets you in the conversation more as well. It can be done, he can get that done, they just have to want to compete all season to get there more, and allow Towns in on the final 24 seconds of the games more.

Why do you continue to cite a shot that was the result of a blown defensive play and was drawn up for a wing player (LeBron) to push the awful idea of your C being your closer?

Let me apologize beforehand for being crass, judgemental, and short here. Without the time to show you your misteps on this one I have no choice. You are maybe a little bit too ignorant on this context for me to bother blowing time on this. Of course, if you were a regular here that I knew, and that I believed should be aware of all context involved here, and you also wore red shoes, I might sometime later create the time to better address your questions.

That's one way to say "I'm wrong but am not big enough to admit it."

The important thing is that we both know you took the L on this and are moving on.

[SSUBluesman]

There are 2 things that blow my mind that somehow escape people's understanding:

1. His preseason/regular season actions are unacceptable and indefensible. You don't want to be here? Fine, than stay home.

2. Jimmy is a my-way-or-the-highway type who puts himself before the team and if the fit is not absolutely perfect (such as that is understood that it's "his team") he will cause drama, as he did here and with 2 separate rosters in Chicago. He hides behind "hard work" and "wanting to win" to justify being an unrelenting ***hole. These factors made it difficult, if not impossible for him to stay in MN.

1. Absolutely but he knew Thibs wouldn't have traded him if it were completely up to him. No matter what Butler thought about the situation, that 5th year that ONLY Minnesota could offer him would be too important for not only him but his group of people around him. Yes, he should have taken the short term loss of not playing. Also, if you remember, he said he wanted the Minnesota fans to boo him(because it put more pressure on the owner).

Spoiler:

Read on Twitter

In a normal situation, a star player asks to get out, stays quiet and the team usually takes a huge loss in the trade(unless there's a circumstance like LA needing P.George to land Kawhi) but this wasn't a normal situation. Butler was pretty quiet in Chicago and in Philly, only Minnesota did he really cause a public issue because he had to(IMO).

2. His way is hard work and not just expecting things to be handed to players and with that, only a handful of teams probably met that criteria. Miami was at the top of the list because D.Wade let him know how it was different while they were teammates in Chicago.

I completely get people seeing him as an ***hole, he involved the fans but I also think there's some context to the situation which I mentioned earlier. Butler doesn't name names all that often so he never mentioned Towns nor did he mention the 76er(non-player I suspect) who asked if they could handle him if he were resigned(which when he heard that he decided he wasn't resigning with Philly).

1. There is no "but" to him going full Karen on the franchise. Jimmy is in control of Jimmy, not Thibs, not Taylor, not KAT.

2. Your response to my first point supports what I said here: When given the choice to just sit out and let things take its course he opted to sabotage the team to get what he wanted. Part of (I would argue most of in some situations) working in a team environment is your soft skills with people. It's clear that he didn't put any work in this area nor did he care to, as he put it in CHI: "I don't give a **** if you like me or not. I'm here to win."

[karch34]

Butler was one of my favorite players and was very excited when we got him. I didn't like how he went about his dissatisfaction at the end, didn't think Thibs was ever looking to develop what he inherited despite his proclamations of what he learned from other teams while unemployed, and Wolves management has not engendered confidence in my lifetime. So don't think thers a diffinitive finger to point.

While I love the way he plays, I have a bad taste in my mouth from his time here. I will say he burned through 3 organizations in as many years which should account for something. Maybe it's as simple as MN was supposed to be KAT and Wiggins and PHL was Simmons and Embid as future that rubbed him wrong way and being in Miami, while some would argue (now) that Bam is their best player he's in a place that works for him since he's not questioned as the franchise and that's made the difference.

[minimus]

I remember the info about KAT going to G.Taylor being in February. I'll continue to search for that podcast but it's tough searching through all those 2018 podcasts for that summer and fall.

It was never reported that KAT went to Taylor before Butler trade demand.

If you're arguing about the timeframe, let me ask you this, why would Towns ask for Butler to be moved if Butler already made the trade request? The issue with Butler was that Towns didn't want him there.

KAT asked FO/owner to HANDLE Butler trade demand properly. See the difference?

What? I'm talking about the summer and fall, not the 2018 season, I'm saying the info of Towns going to G.Taylor about firing Thibs happened in Feb 2018 and it actually may have been Towns telling his agent to tell G.Taylor. Towns initiate the talk but may have had someone else deliver the message.

That why I say it is an assumptions which your logical chain incorrect. No facts, just assumptions.

Based off information I heard from a reporter who said a Minnesota beat writer told him. I actually listen/read for information from podcasts that aren't only Minnesota centric.

Without source, it is just your opinion.

No, that was 100% G.Taylor overruling Thibodeau as he did many times which caused a lot of issues for the franchise. One might say the only constant for those 13 straight season missing the playoffs.

"G.Taylor overruling Thibodeau" is another BS that comes pretty often from non-MIN fans. A major part of fans doesn't like Taylor as an owner but even they don't write this. The reality is Thibs was given total control of everything in MIN. Did Taylor overrule Thibs when Thibs overpaid every single FA he brought here? Hill, Aldrich did NOT play at all! Teague, Gibson, Dieng were straight negative contracts. Or maybe it was Taylor who gave Shabazz horrible 40mil/4yrs extension? Or maybe Taylor did overrule Thibs when Tyus, Bjelica were offered no extension? The problem I have with Taylor is that he had too much faith in Thibs, letting Tom do everything.

Or now you tell me that Kawhi isn't a leader, he's basically a mercenary doing his own thing. So what's the difference between Kawhi and Butler?

Maybe not a whole lot except Butler tries to make his teammates better, it's one of the reasons he keeps having young players workout with him in the offseason. Him having Herro basically attached to the hip with him was a big story in Miami, in Chicago it was McDermott.

Butler also tries to throw his teammates under the bus, when something goes wrong. At least Kawhi...

Towns made his voice heard multiple times. You'll have to find out that information from reporters outside of Minnesota because airing out the laundry on Towns may make their jobs more difficult.

So why KAT who had all support from local media NEVER commented Butler saga? You keep saying non MIN reporters. But I dont see any source you provided.

You need a rim protector, since KAT wasn't good at that T.Gibson was brought in, if Towns was utilized like Bam he'd only have 2 out his 4 teammates able to space the floor. Had Towns been able to defend the basket better you could have used a better shooting 4 instead of Gibson. Losing out on P.Milsap as a free agent and having to go with Gibson(for defense) really changed what you could do with the offense. The key to unlocking Towns on offense was Towns playing better defense allowing more options offensively. Once again, sure Thibs could have played through Towns but the team wouldn't have been nearly as efficient. Butler not being a good 3pt shooter was also a limitation for the offense.

AirP. you are an external observer, I wonder how many games of MIN you watch. KAT's biggest problem in defense is not rim protection, it is defense against PnR. He is okay shot blocker, he is okay post defender. He is not worse in these areas than Jokic. We did not need Gibson as a rim protector. who averaged 0.7bpg in 2017-18. We needed versatile defender who could defend in space and hit 3pt shot.

To sum up:
You based your "opinion" on the wrong assumption that KAT went in Feb to Taylor when we were 3rd in West asking to fire Thibs. Hence KAT does not care about winning, hence he is a bad leader, hence he started the entire Butler saga, hence he is destroying MIN.

This statement is not correct for a number of reasons:

0) there are no proofs, no reports of it.
1) It did not make any sense to do it for KAT in the middle of the winning season
2) In Feb, it does not make any sense to ask the owner to fire HC/POBO. The trade deadline is over, firing HC/POBO at that point
would not change anything

According to you, poor HC/POBO Thibs was a victim of KATs immaturity and Glen Taylor, who overruled Thibs' basketball decisions. As a POBO Thibs did everything right in managing/developing/scouting/coaching. He had bad luck in multiple basketball decisions, such as drafting Dunn, signing Teague, overpaying FAs etc. Or how about drafting Dunn to get Butler ONE YEAR before the Jimmys trade? That's a brilliant GM move! Moreover, Thibs intentionally refused to talk with Butler about Jimmy's trade demand, because he wanted to increase Jimmy's trade value! Incredible! Waited until all teams had no cap space, used their draft picks, signed their rookies. Genius! But something went wrong and "famous practice with 3rd stringers" happened. Let's not mention that as HC Thibs could have more success if his strategic schemes were fully implemented by young MIN players, so we could hear ICE ICE in every possession.

[KJauger]

I don't wish Jimmy any success. Not after the crap he pulled on us. It's a shame that good things are coming to him. It sets a bad example.

I personally think he had every reason to do it, which is fair enough.

On the contrary, it sets the best of examples.

One post fake account troll. He had zero reason to do it. Honor your contract. You are not worth my time and on iggy already. Is that the quickest iggy of all time.

I'm not a troll. I've supported this team since Randy Foye and i've seen a lot of bad Timberwolves teams.

Based on Butler's mentality and approach to the game, i'm not surprised he did what he did. Was it right? Was it wrong? Not really the point after Thibs sat on his request for the longest of time hoping it would blow over.

The lack of accountability, Wiggins' contract, KAT showing that he's a busted flush whose all talk, and possibly more are all valid reasons for why Jimmy acted the way he did.

Someone who plays hard, and the 'right' way will always have my respect.

[AirP.]

KAT asked FO/owner to HANDLE Butler trade demand properly. See the difference?

It was reported already he said he no longer wanted to play with Butler, I posted the podcast already in this thread from an NBA beat reporter with 20+ years experience who got the info from multiple Minnesota beat reporters.

Based off information I heard from a reporter who said a Minnesota beat writer told him. I actually listen/read for information from podcasts that aren't only Minnesota centric.

Without source, it is just your opinion.

I gave you the source(beat writers exchanging info), but if you need "a name" from the Minnesota source that wasn't given, well sorry about that, sometimes it's unnamed sources and you have to look at who is giving the unnamed info and why, it was trying to figure out why Butler wanted out and could be traded to Miami. I can say Jon Krawczynski did an hour podcast with five reason sports, near that time SVG was also on the show talking about the Butler situation.. So if this is your stance, you won't believe any info you don't like unless there's a name of the actual source to information, continuing talking with you is a waste of time. Enjoy your time as a Towns fan.

[Worm Guts]

KAT asked FO/owner to HANDLE Butler trade demand properly. See the difference?

It was reported already he said he no longer wanted to play with Butler, I posted the podcast already in this thread from an NBA beat reporter with 20+ years experience who got the info from multiple Minnesota beat reporters.

Based off information I heard from a reporter who said a Minnesota beat writer told him. I actually listen/read for information from podcasts that aren't only Minnesota centric.

Without source, it is just your opinion.

I gave you the source, but if you need "a name" from the Minnesota source that wasn't given. I can say Jon Krawczynski did an hour podcast with him before that. So if this is your stance, you won't believe any info you don't like unless there's a name of the actual source to information, continuing talking with you is a waste of time. Enjoy your time as a Towns fan.

It was also reported that Butler slept with Towns girlfriend at the time. And that would go to Butler being a **** teammate, if you going to accept the gossip.