Minnesota Sports Forum

monsterpile wrote:Also In my mind Kareem is one of the greatest players of all time and he doesn't get talked about as such enough. In addition his longevity was pretty amazing.

I agree. Kareem gets far less attention in discussions about the best players of all time than Jordan, Magic and LeBron and even less than Bill Russell and Larry Bird. Yet, at the end of the day, Kareem remains the NBA's all-time leading scorer. Part of that was, of course, longevity, but that's part of what made him so great. Longevity, consistency and reliability were three hallmarks of Kareem's great career.

Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

crazy-canuck wrote:Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

Good points. I'll also add that a number of times Flip said that this team in some ways was too nice.

Flip was building a family, sure, but Flip also fucked up several times and that hindered what could have been done with that nucleus he was growing.

- Acquiring Anthony Bennett as a significant piece in the Kevin Love trade. The whole "Minnesota receives two No. 1 overall picks for their star" headline must have been on replay in his head. That aspect of the trade was a failure. Bennett is the worst top overall pick in NBA history and he wasn't suitable for an NBA bench even when we acquired him. At the time, I pushed for the Wolves to demand getting back Tristan Thompson or Dion Waiters in addition to the No. 1 overall pick and future first [that was dealt for Thaddeus Young]. That did not happen.

- Trading Thaddeus Young for less than 10 games of a late 30's Kevin Garnett. Young received his fair share of criticism on this board, but the consensus should be that he could have garnered a lot more than what Flip settled for. He let old feelings and emotions get in the way of his role as PBO. He should have dealt Young to a contender or fringe playoff team looking for a bit of a push for assets in the form of future draft pick(s) or a young player that could grow with the new core. Young's value went from a top-10 protected first round pick to a 37-year old with Father Time working against him and the reason why is Flip. He could have signed KG the following summer. Just a brutal waste of an asset.

- Unnecessarily trading a future first-round pick for the bum that is Adreian Payne. This continues to be one of the most head-scratching trades that I can remember. We didn't need Payne, the timing (mid-season) was weird, and his price tag was never what Flip gave up for him. Payne wasn't even in the Hawks rotation, for crying out loud. Atlanta bent Flip over and gave it to him viciously on that one, sad to say.

There are others but I feel like I'm including too much negativity surrounding a loved personality in Minnesota sports. Flip did well to rightfully select Towns and managed a tough situation with Love in the best way he probably could have, but he missed a lot of opportunities himself and made plenty of poor decisions along the way.

crazy-canuck wrote:Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

crazy-canuck wrote:Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

They were too young, plain and simple. Recall also that Flip didn't coach during KAT's rookie season. Flip coached only two seasons and in his last season he was coaching Wiggins and LaVine as rookies along with Gorgui and Bazz as second year players. I you want to see the results of chemistry starting to click in, look at the last third if Sam Mitchell's season as head coach. Thibs first season as head coach was clearly a step back from the end of the previous season under Sam. I wasn't a fan of Sam as head coach, but you could see the players gelling together down the stretch that season.

lipoli390 wrote:

crazy-canuck wrote:Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

crazy-canuck wrote:Prior to jimmy coming aboard.flip was building a family. Everyone was close. Zach, wiggs, and Kat were tight. Rubio played the cool uncle role. When Wiggy went to europe, he hung out with ricky. Everyone liked each other.During the summers, kat, bazz, and wiggs were known to stay back after the season to just hang together in minny. But, they werent winning as much as they should. Were they too young or just not good enough.

Thibs and now jimmy have instilled a new environment; this is work. You dont need to be friends, you just have to do your job. And I think that does take some of the joy out of playing. Yes, they get paid millions, but most of these guys are still kids. Flip was their (especially kat and wiggs) introduction to the league, so its going to take some time to grow into what thibs wants right now.

They were too young, plain and simple. Recall also that Flip didn't coach during KAT's rookie season. Flip coached only two seasons and in his last season he was coaching Wiggins and LaVine as rookies along with Gorgui and Bazz as second year players. I you want to see the results of chemistry starting to click in, look at the last third if Sam Mitchell's season as head coach. Thibs first season as head coach was clearly a step back from the end of the previous season under Sam. I wasn't a fan of Sam as head coach, but you could see the players gelling together down the stretch that season.

Flip only coached one season. Remember this group had a different coach every year for 3-4 seasons depending on what player was Here. That's pretty crazy and...I might add none of that was Glen's fault. Looks back at those years it was a truely sad set of circumstances that led us to where we are now.

Edit: Glen hired Flip in May of 2014 and in October of 2016 he passed away. Unbelievable.

Camden wrote:Flip was building a family, sure, but Flip also fucked up several times and that hindered what could have been done with that nucleus he was growing.

- Acquiring Anthony Bennett as a significant piece in the Kevin Love trade. The whole "Minnesota receives two No. 1 overall picks for their star" headline must have been on replay in his head. That aspect of the trade was a failure. Bennett is the worst top overall pick in NBA history and he wasn't suitable for an NBA bench even when we acquired him. At the time, I pushed for the Wolves to demand getting back Tristan Thompson or Dion Waiters in addition to the No. 1 overall pick and future first [that was dealt for Thaddeus Young]. That did not happen.

- Trading Thaddeus Young for less than 10 games of a late 30's Kevin Garnett. Young received his fair share of criticism on this board, but the consensus should be that he could have garnered a lot more than what Flip settled for. He let old feelings and emotions get in the way of his role as PBO. He should have dealt Young to a contender or fringe playoff team looking for a bit of a push for assets in the form of future draft pick(s) or a young player that could grow with the new core. Young's value went from a top-10 protected first round pick to a 37-year old with Father Time working against him and the reason why is Flip. He could have signed KG the following summer. Just a brutal waste of an asset.

- Unnecessarily trading a future first-round pick for the bum that is Adreian Payne. This continues to be one of the most head-scratching trades that I can remember. We didn't need Payne, the timing (mid-season) was weird, and his price tag was never what Flip gave up for him. Payne wasn't even in the Hawks rotation, for crying out loud. Atlanta bent Flip over and gave it to him viciously on that one, sad to say.

There are others but I feel like I'm including too much negativity surrounding a loved personality in Minnesota sports. Flip did well to rightfully select Towns and managed a tough situation with Love in the best way he probably could have, but he missed a lot of opportunities himself and made plenty of poor decisions along the way.

I agree with all your points, Cam. I really liked Flip and liked the spirit he brought to the organization, but he made a number of serious misjudgments in his PBO role. I'll add to your list the trade that ended up in Bazz rather that McCollum as well as the sale of our first round pick, which could and should have been used to draft Rudy Gobert. But Flip was the sort of head coach players would like to play for and he understood how to build a culture that would build chemistry among players and between players and management.

There are too many bad judgments by Flip and Thibodeau even if evaluated modestly against what some of us on this message board would have done at the time without resorting to hindsight. And those poor judgments are ultimately reflected in the team's performance. I also think hiring Thibodeau was a bad ownership decision. But of course we don't get to go back and re-do what's been done.

I've done more than my share of looking back, so I'm ready to just look forward. That's why I like your Buddy Hield trade idea. Even though I'm not sure I'd do that deal, I like the idea of looking ahead at what we can do going forward to improve the team over the long term. I'd seek to trade Butler, our 2019 2nd round pick from Miami, and Gorgui to the Celtics for Hayward, Jaylen Brown and the Kings' 2019 first round pick they got from the Sixers last summer. Pehaps the Celtics would do that as part of ensuring that Kyrie Irving stays after this next season. Otherwise, I'd seek to trade Butler to the Sixers for Covington, Fultz or Saric and a future first round pick.