Minnesota Sports Forum

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

Unless I had some indication that Butler would bolt, I would not trade him. It's a risk I could lose him next year, but it is also a risk I drop back into the lottery without Butler on my team. I am having a hard time understanding why I would not stay the course and see how far it can take me.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

I don't agree that Jimmy should be moved. Name a team that trades away their best player and wins? Does Oladipo make Indiana a contender? How'd the Clippers do with the CP3 deal? Are they gonna be a contender any time soon with those pieces? How'd Cleveland do with the Kyrie deal? They got whooped even harder in the finals after barely making it there against a decimated Boston team while almost losing to Oladipo in the first round. I would say Oladipo has been the best case scenario and he's neither better than PG13 nor is he helping Indiana win a title so what have they gained? Just a solid team which we already have and which isn't good enough for your expectations anyway.

As for Thibs I don't have any strong preferences. Everyone hates him for getting his guys and yet this team has only been able to win more than 50% of their games when Thib's guys have been playing so I'm not as positive as most of you here that no Thibs and no Jimmy is ever gonna result in more wins. There's nothing that gives me hope that would be the case. I think we'd just be a mediocre team needing to win every game 130-129 because they just can't defend and that's been there since before Thibs. I'm not trying to pull out the floor to have a perceived ceiling high enough to win a title because I put those odds at less than 10% given where Wiggins and Towns are.

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

I don't agree that Jimmy should be moved. Name a team that trades away their best player and wins? Does Oladipo make Indiana a contender? How'd the Clippers do with the CP3 deal? Are they gonna be a contender any time soon with those pieces? How'd Cleveland do with the Kyrie deal? They got whooped even harder in the finals after barely making it there against a decimated Boston team while almost losing to Oladipo in the first round. I would say Oladipo has been the best case scenario and he's neither better than PG13 nor is he helping Indiana win a title so what have they gained? Just a solid team which we already have and which isn't good enough for your expectations anyway.

As for Thibs I don't have any strong preferences. Everyone hates him for getting his guys and yet this team has only been able to win more than 50% of their games when Thib's guys have been playing so I'm not as positive as most of you here that no Thibs and no Jimmy is ever gonna result in more wins. There's nothing that gives me hope that would be the case. I think we'd just be a mediocre team needing to win every game 130-129 because they just can't defend and that's been there since before Thibs. I'm not trying to pull out the floor to have a perceived ceiling high enough to win a title because I put those odds at less than 10% given where Wiggins and Towns are.

Are you satisfied with battling for a playoff spot every year with virtually no hope once the playoffs start? If you are then I get your point. I just think we are wasting time with Butler here. The longer he stays the less we get for him. I want to be a real contender, and that ain't happening with Jimmy here. But if we were to parlay him into several assets at least we would have a chance.

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

I don't agree that Jimmy should be moved. Name a team that trades away their best player and wins? Does Oladipo make Indiana a contender? How'd the Clippers do with the CP3 deal? Are they gonna be a contender any time soon with those pieces? How'd Cleveland do with the Kyrie deal? They got whooped even harder in the finals after barely making it there against a decimated Boston team while almost losing to Oladipo in the first round. I would say Oladipo has been the best case scenario and he's neither better than PG13 nor is he helping Indiana win a title so what have they gained? Just a solid team which we already have and which isn't good enough for your expectations anyway.

As for Thibs I don't have any strong preferences. Everyone hates him for getting his guys and yet this team has only been able to win more than 50% of their games when Thib's guys have been playing so I'm not as positive as most of you here that no Thibs and no Jimmy is ever gonna result in more wins. There's nothing that gives me hope that would be the case. I think we'd just be a mediocre team needing to win every game 130-129 because they just can't defend and that's been there since before Thibs. I'm not trying to pull out the floor to have a perceived ceiling high enough to win a title because I put those odds at less than 10% given where Wiggins and Towns are.

Are you satisfied with battling for a playoff spot every year with virtually no hope once the playoffs start? If you are then I get your point. I just think we are wasting time with Butler here. The longer he stays the less we get for him. I want to be a real contender, and that ain't happening with Jimmy here. But if we were to parlay him into several assets at least we would have a chance.

Cool, doesn't your argument apply to Wiggins much more than Butler? It is so dang hard to acquire or develop players of Butler's caliber. We finally have a couple high caliber players in Butler and Towns. We have some hurdles to clear next offseason, but unless there are indicators we will stumble over those hurdles, why would we abandon this path after one year when it is already a clear improvement from where we have been for more than a decade?

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:

khans2k5 wrote:

CoolBreeze44 wrote:Just commenting on Cam's point about the time to trade Jimmy was on draft night. That would have been preferred, But i still think there is a window to move him up until training camp. And then of course at the deadline, but I'm sure his trade value would be much less at that point.

Thibs is here and Jimmy is here. Just let that pipe dream die. At best Thibs would be fired at the deadline and that would require a disaster of a start which isn't happening because we have a good team. It's just not happening.

But don't you agree that he SHOULD be moved? I just fail to see the upside of keeping him

I don't agree that Jimmy should be moved. Name a team that trades away their best player and wins? Does Oladipo make Indiana a contender? How'd the Clippers do with the CP3 deal? Are they gonna be a contender any time soon with those pieces? How'd Cleveland do with the Kyrie deal? They got whooped even harder in the finals after barely making it there against a decimated Boston team while almost losing to Oladipo in the first round. I would say Oladipo has been the best case scenario and he's neither better than PG13 nor is he helping Indiana win a title so what have they gained? Just a solid team which we already have and which isn't good enough for your expectations anyway.

As for Thibs I don't have any strong preferences. Everyone hates him for getting his guys and yet this team has only been able to win more than 50% of their games when Thib's guys have been playing so I'm not as positive as most of you here that no Thibs and no Jimmy is ever gonna result in more wins. There's nothing that gives me hope that would be the case. I think we'd just be a mediocre team needing to win every game 130-129 because they just can't defend and that's been there since before Thibs. I'm not trying to pull out the floor to have a perceived ceiling high enough to win a title because I put those odds at less than 10% given where Wiggins and Towns are.

Are you satisfied with battling for a playoff spot every year with virtually no hope once the playoffs start? If you are then I get your point. I just think we are wasting time with Butler here. The longer he stays the less we get for him. I want to be a real contender, and that ain't happening with Jimmy here. But if we were to parlay him into several assets at least we would have a chance.

I would rather make the playoffs and get knocked out for the next few years until Towns and Wiggins are in their prime than have another failed rebuild immediately after we finally started winning some games. You are making a <10% chance play for it all and I just have no interest in watching this team be in the lottery again so soon. Either you believe Towns and Wiggins are championship building blocks in which case someone will join them when the time is right or they aren't good enough and you're blowing it up for a failed experiment and we go back to the cellar again (aka put the franchise back another decade). I think they could be title contending players, but there aren't there yet so I'm just gonna let things play out for another couple years, win a bunch of games and when they are in their prime they'll either be there and we'll be able to get the help we need or they won't and I will at least have been able to cheer for a good team for a few years before we have to blow it up again.

You are just playing extremely high risk, high reward when we just don't have to do that. We can win and then use as much data as possible to decide if they are good enough to win a title and build around them at that time or start over after a solid, but not championship level run. We'll have Tyus, Okogie, a Dieng expiring maybe, maybe Patton is a useful rotation guy. That could be enough to land a star player from a desperate team. Titles aren't built on paper and as you can see across the league, guys are joining winning situations for the most part. If Towns and Wiggins are good enough someone will join them, otherwise we aren't winning a title anyway. Is Boston trading in all their chips to build around Brown and Tatum? No. They are playing the long and the short game and that's what good teams do. The Spurs did the same with Kawhi and Duncan, Parker and Ginobili. We're finally in a situation where we can play both short and long-term and people want to make high risk, low percentage moves to raise a perceived ceiling rather than win now and go all in on winning a title when Towns and Wiggins are in their prime and the current crop of top talent ages out. You're too focused on winning a title before games are played and that's just not how it works.

I'm surprised and slightly annoyed at how easily fans are dismissing Justin Patton. Perhaps it's because he missed all but a handful of NBA minutes during his rookie season, but the skills he has aren't going anywhere. He's a Walmart-brand version of Karl-Anthony Towns, which is still a pretty good package of tools.

I think some people are assuming our franchise is like the Pacers or Bulls a year ago. IMO its not. The Bulls other than Butler had no building blocks. Last year they didn't even have a high draft pick to get better with Jimmy. The Pacers at least had Myles Turner but a year later he doesn't seem like a star but maybe a piece of the core. The Wolves have Towns a possible HOF offensive player and very good rebounder. The also have Teague and Taj who are legit NBA starting level players that can help you win games now. Wiggins is looking overpaid and all that stuff but he is still a starting level wing with all the physical attributes you can ask for and he can score. Its not like he is some guy that's about to be out of the league or something and he is 23. If those teams didn't move their guys they would have been screwed and in the Bulls case had nothing more than average-ish starters at best left. The Pacers got absolutely Reamed by almost everyone for that deal and I'll be honest VO is a heck of player. IF he can keep shooting the ball well...IDK if he is that far behind PG in terms of value. His advanced stats last year are eye-popping. 17th in the entire NBA in RPM. His ability to create shots for himself and others with his ball handling is pretty nice. Sabonis turned out to be the solid player this board was expecting and at worst seems to be a nice young and cheap rotation player. Oh and they made the playoffs last year. I don't think you could have asked for a better return and this deal isn't why that franchise isn't closer to being a contender but that deal is why they have any kind of chance of getting there. Most of the time that doesn't happen especially so quickly. VO could easily regress but if he doesn't or even gets better... So there is a path to win one of these types of deals. Usually you don't thats why people got so excited about that Denver Carmelo deal to the Knicks. That GM is very well thought of around the league for more than that deal.

The idea that we can win a deal moving Butler is challenging and I personally don't think we have to be that desperate. The Wolves salary situation is challenging but it is for most teams that are good. They don't have any other problems like lack of draft picks etc. The Wolves basically have only Wiggins Towns (assuming he signs an extension) and Dieng as long term contracts (other than rookie scale guys) because Thibs and Layden have gone for short term contracts. Yes they will have a ton of cap space taken up by those guys BUT there is SOME value in that.

I'm hoping I add to the conversation about this which I think has had some really good back and forth on these subjects of where this franchise will or should or could go the past couple days. Its just another example of why this board is a great place to contribute and intake people's thoughts and opinions etc.

I'm with Cool in believing we should trade Jimmy before training camp, although I think the best time to deal him was on draft night. But I wouldn't trade him just to trade him. It would depend on the value we can get in return.

Why trade Jimmy? I've given my reasons a number of times, but it boils down to 4 things: (1) Jimmy's age doesn't match up well with the age of our other allstar, KAT, which means they won't be peaking at the same time; (2) we're better off peaking as a team in 3-4 years given where the Warriors are and where the Lakers are likely to be with LeBron the next 4 years and Jimmy's age doesn't fit that window particularly well; (3) Jimmy's injury propensity; and (4) Butler's ability to walk as a free agent next summer couple with rumblings of his dissatisfaction with his young teammates. But again, I'd have to get the right return to trade him.

But as we all know, Thibodeau won't trade him and Thibs isn't going anywhere for the time being. So the roster we have now, is essentially the roster we're going to have when the season starts. Let's hope the guys pull together and not apart. Let's hope Jimmy, KAT and Wiggins stay healthy. Let's hope Wiggins surprises us by taking a big leap forward. Let's hope KAT's defense improves. Let's hope Teague's defense improves. Let's hope Tyus continues his trajectory of improvement. And let's hope at least one of our two rookies puts himself in the conversation for rookie of the year. We don't need all of the above, but it should would be nice to hit on at least 4.

This is a really interesting fan base. We have been the worst franchise in the league for the last 20 years. Now we have one year in the playoffs and people are dissatisfied that we're not competing for a championship. Every team that is built to last has taken their time in getting there and none of them traded away an all NBA player to do it. Trading Jimmy at this point screams panic and would not bring the value that anyone here assumes. Yes we would be left with 2 potential stars, but they'd have one foot out the door when we didn't make the playoffs. Our trade options at this point should be our big salary players who are movable (teague, Taj, and Gorgui +draft picks).