Minnesota Sports Forum

It's not complicated. You should always have a business plan that can ultimately result in a championship. As long as that plan exists and you are focused on efficiently executing it, i can handle 55 win seasons, 40 win seasons, or 25 win seasons. What I can't get behind is what you saw with Thibs. Even with Butler we had absolutely no chance of winning a championship, and there was no conceivable plan of how we were going to improve. Butler, KAT, and Wig were going to take up our cap and limit our maneuverability. Thibs boxed himself in the night of the Butler trade. Competence is fine, but there also needs to be hope.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

WolvesFan21 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

WolvesFan21 wrote:The Wolves likely make the playoffs last season had RoCo stayed healthy.

However, that didn't happen. Saying that, just making the playoffs isn't a big deal. The Wolves do need more talent so having both the 11 pick hit while having Wiggins return to acceptable and having the other young guys improve is what would be a good season.

While I largely agree with this for most organizations... this isn't any organization.

Over and over again, we hear about this "Well if it's not a championship, who cares!" mantra. I care. Sure, a championship is the pinnacle. It's awesome. But it's still fleeting.

I follow basketball as a fan to be entertained. And consistent competence STILL has a place in modern sports. Watching a team win more than they lose is entertaining. Being a "good" team still has merit. Do you think Portland fans think the franchise has failed miserably? Utah?

You know who pushes the "championship or bust" mantra the most? Regimes buying time while they suck balls (See The Process) so they can keep collecting million dollar paychecks for as long as possible. And the media... because they write about those championship teams. And championship teams or teams in disarray are the bread-and-butter of their business.

ESPN isn't making money (eyeballs + clicks) from covering Utah and Portland every year. But go sit in one of those arenas. Talk to the fans. Do you really think they're lamenting lengthy runs of competence vs. the remote chance they could have struck gold with a re-re-build or three?

I agree it's much more fun winning more games and making the playoffs. But that will get old as well when they constantly don't get close to winning it all.

I also never said the Wolves are in tank mode nor they should be. I specifically said they would have likely made the playoffs last year had their second best player stayed on the court.

Going forward we have no guarantees most can stay healthy all year either and yes the Wolves do need more talent to build a winner to make up for injuries.

Fine. Let it get "old" in 2028 or whenever.

The Wolves have one playoff appearance (and ONE win) in 14 fucking years.

Let's not put the proverbial cart before the horse just yet...



[Note: I'm not really disagreeing with you. Just pointing out how just being competent is a huge first step for this organization.]

I assume you are making points to my previous anti-Butler trade posts (trading Lavine, Markkannen plus Dunn for Butler/what ended up being Patton).

While Markannen and Dunn have not excelled enough to make the potential KAT/Markannen/Wigs/LaVine/Dunn have a much higher upside then we have now, I would have continued to roll younger with those guys and continued to build with higher draft picks. Just maybe the Wolves end up with Zion or Ja instead of being stuck at 11 this draft (we will never know).

Mortgaging the future (for the most part) at that time was a mistake. I also said trade Wiggins and not LaVine and we saw how that worked for us too.

Making the playoffs for one season wasn't great, especially knowing Butlers age, ability and salary he would be demanding. The Wolves would never win it all with Butler. He's not good enough and a locker room disaster.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:It's not complicated. You should always have a business plan that can ultimately result in a championship. As long as that plan exists and you are focused on efficiently executing it, i can handle 55 win seasons, 40 win seasons, or 25 win seasons. What I can't get behind is what you saw with Thibs. Even with Butler we had absolutely no chance of winning a championship, and there was no conceivable plan of how we were going to improve. Butler, KAT, and Wig were going to take up our cap and limit our maneuverability. Thibs boxed himself in the night of the Butler trade. Competence is fine, but there also needs to be hope.

LOL, I wrote that simultaneously as you. 100 percent agree, of course.

To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

I agree, a blue chip player like Wiggins was shouldn't have had to rely on coaching to realize his potential. Players seem to be getting to much of a pass here.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:It's not complicated. You should always have a business plan that can ultimately result in a championship. As long as that plan exists and you are focused on efficiently executing it, i can handle 55 win seasons, 40 win seasons, or 25 win seasons. What I can't get behind is what you saw with Thibs. Even with Butler we had absolutely no chance of winning a championship, and there was no conceivable plan of how we were going to improve. Butler, KAT, and Wig were going to take up our cap and limit our maneuverability. Thibs boxed himself in the night of the Butler trade. Competence is fine, but there also needs to be hope.

I agree completely, Cool. I'll offer a slight rephrasing of your point by saying that the Wolves had a plan but it was a bad, incoherent plan. Trading young assets for Butler was not part of a sensible, coherent plan for several reasons:

1. Butler was at least 6 years older than the two young foundational pieces, Wiggins and KAT, who Thibodeau decided pair with Butler. It's even worse that Butler had a reputation for alienating teammates, especially younger ones. Butler was a bad fit. Adding him didn't align with the foundational talent we already had.

2. Butler was added to our young foundation of Wiggins and KAT before they had established themselves as a solid platform to build on. The Sixers didn't go after Kawhi and eventually sign Butler until their young core had already led them to a 50+ win season. You add an older vet as a major piece to a younger team until your young core has established itself as a winning core. Then you add the older vet to push your team over the hump. It's basic stuff.

3. Thibodeau gave up the wrong assets, including the team's best 3-point shooter, and too many assets to get Butler.

But Thibodeau wasn't the first Wolves PBO to fly by the seat of his pants with an incoherent or nonsensical plan. McHale and Saunders during the KG era went with the aging and often-injured Terrell Brandon over Chauncey Billups who was about the same age as KG and could have developed into the star he became alongside Garnett. Not surprisingly, Brandon's injuries quickly caught up with him. The Wolves made a last ditch effort to salvage the KG era with the acquisitions of Sprewell and Cassell. That team produced one trip to the Western Conference finals, after which things quickly fell apart.

A coherent plan going forward will build around KAT by adding young high-upside players around KAT's age via the draft, free agency and trades. That might mean trading the 28 year old Covington. It should include keeping Okogie and KBD and being patient with them. It should mean drafting the best high-upside prospect available and possibly trading up to get a potential star or trading down for multiple first round picks to increase the odds of getting an elite player. It should mean not selling any of our picks for cash. We'll see what Rosas comes up with.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

See I don't think you can have it both ways. You can't be on here on a weekly basis pounding on how bad of a player Wiggins is, and then say the plan was for Wiggins to be part of a big 3. If he's that bad, than he should never be counted on to be part of your championship level core.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

See I don't think you can have it both ways. You can't be on here on a weekly basis pounding on how bad of a player Wiggins is, and then say the plan was for Wiggins to be part of a big 3. If he's that bad, than he should never be counted on to be part of your championship level core.

Why would my opinion about whether or not Wiggins should be part of that plan be in any way relevant to this discussion...

The plan was not mine. I'm not a Timberwolves employee. They never asked me my thoughts on Wiggins or Butler... I'm merely stating that obviously the team THOUGHT that Wiggins would improve, and was part of the long-term plan... otherwise they wouldn't have given him $146M.

If they gave him that contract while thinking he'd reach his peak... they're the worst franchise in the history of sports.

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

See I don't think you can have it both ways. You can't be on here on a weekly basis pounding on how bad of a player Wiggins is, and then say the plan was for Wiggins to be part of a big 3. If he's that bad, than he should never be counted on to be part of your championship level core.

Why would my opinion about whether or not Wiggins should be part of that plan be in any way relevant to this discussion...

The plan was not mine. I'm not a Timberwolves employee. They never asked me my thoughts on Wiggins or Butler... I'm merely stating that obviously the team THOUGHT that Wiggins would improve, and was part of the long-term plan... otherwise they wouldn't have given him $146M.

If they gave him that contract while thinking he'd reach his peak... they're the worst franchise in the history of sports.

Well we know they're the worst franchise in the history of sports. But to your main point, even a Wiggins supporter like me knew the potential was capped the night of the Butler trade. So I"M telling YOU, there was no viable plan going forward to make us a championship contender. YOU can certainly disagree with that and argue that Thibs had a championship plan. But i think it makes YOU look hypocritical.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:To be fair, it's disingenuous to say there was no "conceivable plan" to improve.

The Timberwolves gave Andrew Wiggins a max contract AFTER trading for Butler. Obviously, they didn't expect him to regress. And it's not like every single fan or poster disagreed with the move. Again, we're blaming Thibodeau for everything and letting woefully underwhelming and disappointing players off the hook.

This isn't absolving Thibodeau of everything. Only pointing out that the plan was for KAT + Butler + Wiggins be a Big 3. Turns out Wiggins has been a below-average player instead. Blame Thibs for that? In some ways... sure. But you have to blame the player too for not improving and actually getting worse.

See I don't think you can have it both ways. You can't be on here on a weekly basis pounding on how bad of a player Wiggins is, and then say the plan was for Wiggins to be part of a big 3. If he's that bad, than he should never be counted on to be part of your championship level core.

Why would my opinion about whether or not Wiggins should be part of that plan be in any way relevant to this discussion...

The plan was not mine. I'm not a Timberwolves employee. They never asked me my thoughts on Wiggins or Butler... I'm merely stating that obviously the team THOUGHT that Wiggins would improve, and was part of the long-term plan... otherwise they wouldn't have given him $146M.

If they gave him that contract while thinking he'd reach his peak... they're the worst franchise in the history of sports.

Well we know they're the worst franchise in the history of sports. But to your main point, even a Wiggins supporter like me knew the potential was capped the night of the Butler trade. So I"M telling YOU, there was no viable plan going forward to make us a championship contender. YOU can certainly disagree with that and argue that Thibs had a championship plan. But i think it makes YOU look hypocritical.

No offense. But you're not making much sense right now.




[Note: If you knew it was capped then... it's interesting that you waited nearly two years to finally admit that Wiggins sucked balls.]