Minnesota Sports Forum

FNG wrote:

AbeVigodaLive wrote:I thought it was discussed/hinted at the time that Taylor fell on the sword for McHale a bit with the Joe Smith dealings... because McHale was deemed a lot more indispensable to the Wolves on-court product.

And when it was obvious that the "I know I'm the GM but I don't really know the contracts" excuse was flimsy at best... McHale accepted the "leave of absence" instead of longer suspension as a plea bargain of sorts... as evidenced by the league giving the Wolves a pick back. (Hello Ndudi Ebi!)

AbeVigodaLive wrote:I thought it was discussed/hinted at the time that Taylor fell on the sword for McHale a bit with the Joe Smith dealings... because McHale was deemed a lot more indispensable to the Wolves on-court product.

And when it was obvious that the "I know I'm the GM but I don't really know the contracts" excuse was flimsy at best... McHale accepted the "leave of absence" instead of longer suspension as a plea bargain of sorts... as evidenced by the league giving the Wolves a pick back. (Hello Ndudi Ebi!)

It might have been a cover up to protect McHale, Abe, but all we have for facts are Kevin's statements. I don't know of course, but I believe them because of what I have heard about Glen's character. It seems likely to me that he would have kept Kevin out of the discussions for two reasons: 1)fear that McHale might try to stop a stupid action by Glen that he really wanted and 2) to protect Kevin if the deal went south, as it of course did. As for Kevin signing contracts he didn't read...totally believable. Kevin might have a good basketball mind, but he's not the kind of guy to read, much less understand, a wordy legal contract put in front of him. Let's just say Kevin probably didn't do too well in his Contract Law class at the U of M.

I think the writing was on the wall with that one, FNG. There's no way an owner is pulling off such a move on the sly without the GM knowing.

"Hey Kevin... don't ask me how... but I just talked Joe Smith into taking a huge pay cut, costing himself many millions of dollars, as he nears his prime. Thank me in the morning."

Both were complicit. Taylor took the fall. Everything else was PR spin.

Sheer stupidity by Taylor anyway you look at it. Circumventing the rules in such a traceable and obvious way to save a few bucks in the short term. This is the character of our owner. Trying to pin this shady manuever on McHale who clearly never knew anything about business has seemed like Taylor's mission ever since.It would have been a lot better for this team had the league forced him to sell. McHale is now suing him, KG thinks he's a snake. The guy sucks as a human and an owner as far as I can tell.

Well, no matter how you slice it, the vast majority of the worst mistakes in the history of this franchise, including the Joe Smith debacle, would not have happed if Glen had simply hired competent executives to run the organization's basketball operations.

I doubt McHale was as unaware of the Joe Smith arrangement as he claims. In any event, Glen would not have gone out of his way to keep Joe Smith if McHale hadn't prioritized keeping Smith - and that was a bad basketball judgment if not thing else. Flip told me it was McHale's decision to trade Marbury while Flip was advocating to keep him on the assumption that winning would convince Marbury to change his mind and stay. Flip also confirmed for me that it was his decision to let Billups go in favor of Brandon and that McHale deferred to him. Glen wasn't involved in either case.

Glen didn't choose Flynn over Curry or DeRozan and he didn't decide to draft West Johnson and Derrick Williams or sign Darko to a multi-year contract; those decisions were all made entirely by David Kahn. Glen didn't choose Kris Dunn over Murray or Hield and he didn't choose Patton over John Collins or Anunoby; Thibs made those judgments as well as the decision to trade for Butler. We'll never know for sure whether it was Glen or Thibs who wanted to keep Wiggins out of the Butler deal. A good source I heard from told me it was Thibodeau's call based on his view that Wiggins had the higher ceiling and could, unlike LaVine who was out with an ACL tear, help Thibodeau achieve his desire to win right away. I was also told, not surprisingly, that Glen did not want to trade Rubio and replace him with Teague.

All owners meddle to some extent. We should expect that from anyone who eventually buys the team from Glen. My only point, like a broken record, Glen's limited meddling hasn't been the main problem with this franchise. The problem has always been Glen's poor judgment, primarily in his PBO hiring decisions. No doubt, Glen's poor judgment was on full display when he agreed to a written agreement memorializing the illegal Joe Smith deal. But even that act of stupidity would have been avoided if Glen had hired a high quality PBO who would have traded Joe rather than recommend or support extraordinary (in this case illegal) measures to keep him here. Glen didn't have any special personal relationship with or affinity for Joe Smith. What he did had to have been based on the judgment and recommendation of McHale. And that's where McHale is being really coy and disingenuous.

Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

PorkChop wrote:Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

Good point, Pork!

lipoli390 wrote:

PorkChop wrote:Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

Good point, Pork!

I don't know about that, It sounds like Pork is conflating the relative career contributions of Okogie, Culver and Rubio. It seems to me that even the most casual of NBA fans could discern a difference between last night's unwatchable discombobulated mess and most of the other games the Wolves have played during their promising (for them) 5-7 record since the break. I wonder what the difference was last night...

PorkChop wrote:Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

Culver should be better, but JO was a later first so while Thibs was an embarrassment and disaster as PBO you can't blame him too much for JO being borderline unplayable most of the time.

Khan as we all know blew the Rubio pick and will go down in history as one of the greatest blunders in the draft. You drafted two PG's and one was NOT Steph?

FNG wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:

PorkChop wrote:Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

Good point, Pork!

I don't know about that, It sounds like Pork is conflating the relative career contributions of Okogie, Culver and Rubio. It seems to me that even the most casual of NBA fans could discern a difference between last night's unwatchable discombobulated mess and most of the other games the Wolves have played during their promising (for them) 5-7 record since the break. I wonder what the difference was last night...

We've lost plenty of games in blowout fashion with Ricky Rubio in the lineup too... Personally, I think Malik Beasley shooting 2-12 and only scoring five points made more of a difference than not having Rubio on the floor, but that's just how I see it. But to your point last night was messy and this Wolves team absolutely needs to be at full strength sooner rather than later.

Camden wrote:

FNG wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:

PorkChop wrote:Shouldn't we be more concerned with the fact that we currently have three first round picks in Okogie, Culver and Rubio that remain on the roster and bring nothing to the table. That's more upsetting to me than things that happened 20 years ago.

Good point, Pork!

I don't know about that, It sounds like Pork is conflating the relative career contributions of Okogie, Culver and Rubio. It seems to me that even the most casual of NBA fans could discern a difference between last night's unwatchable discombobulated mess and most of the other games the Wolves have played during their promising (for them) 5-7 record since the break. I wonder what the difference was last night...

We've lost plenty of games in blowout fashion with Ricky Rubio in the lineup too... Personally, I think Malik Beasley shooting 2-12 and only scoring five points made more of a difference than not having Rubio on the floor, but that's just how I see it. But to your point last night was messy and this Wolves team absolutely needs to be at full strength sooner rather than later.

No question that we have been on the wrong side of blowouts this season far too often regardless of who is on the court. I agre that poor shooting by our two best 3-point shooters was the biggest factor last night, but Dane Moore made a great observation about that on Twitter. Shooters need to receive the ball at the right time in the right place in order to feel in rhythm, and that just wasn't happening last night. Our PGs did a decent job at protecting the ball, but they just didn't deliver it to KAT and Beasley in a manner that optimized their shooting.

"KAT and DLO on the Block" sounds like a nifty album title for a 2 man boy band.