Minnesota Sports Forum

KG4Ever wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 8:49 pm Is there a team that would take Randle for a second round pick? If so, do it!

Randle needs to be moved before deadline. Cannot risk him taking up his player option next season. Or even worse TC extending him. He is a terrible fit with Ant and Gobert.

I think he holds some value, more likely with an Eastern Conference team.

Need to start Naz at the 4 to see if he’s worth extending at likely high price he’ll demand.

Would Brooklyn do a Randle + couple of 2RPs for Cam Johnson and Day’Ron Sharpe deal?

Cam Johnson would be a great fit on this team as a 6th man.

Phenom wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:24 pm I was going to go to this game but my wife said I had to go back to AZ to see my in-laws . Was Ant too selfish tonight?

He took some heat checks for sure, but I will grant him a few of those considering how damn hot he was from outside. He also fumbled the ball a couple times with unforced turnovers.

Otherwise, I thought he got off the ball pretty well when doubled and he really opened up the floor for his team mates, who mostly failed to capitalize.

But as brilliant as Ant was, Cade Cunningham was the best player on the floor tonight, as he was a true floor general tonight, scoring and making all the right plays and passes. Sort of took us apart like Doncic does - slow and methodical, but really clinical.

Coolbreeze44 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:24 pm

Q-is-here wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:15 pm

Crazysauce wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:00 pm Yeah q. That's great and all but had he not lucked into Jokic none if that happens. None of it.

I'd argue that him picking Jokic and then trading a redundant (and more senior) Nurkic to make way for him a season later was a brilliant move. He obviously saw something in Jokic before he became the juggernaut he is today.

Then he picked Jamal Murray at #7 a couple years later. Reminder: The Wolves picked Kris Dunn #5 that year.

Then he made a super smart trade to bring Aaron Gordon into the fold and soon after that drafted Michael Porter Jr. at #14.

He methodically found the right pieces to surround Jokic with and they won a title. No one player is good enough to win a title on their own these days. They need the right pieces around them and Connelly did exactly that with Denver.

Let's not forget he was able to find a taker for DLO and brought Conley, Nickeil, and multiple 2nds back.

One good move doesn't erase the epically bad Gobert and KAT trades. Kahnelly has been a disaster in Minnesota and I don't give a fukk what he did in Denver.

Not to hard to build around the best player in the league. If he thought he was so good then he wouldn't have waited so long to draft him. Not that he doesn't get credit for ultimately doing it, but lucking out on a 2nd round selection is the main thing to hang his hat on. Murray pick is who we should have picked but he lucked into him. It wasn't like he picked someone every other gm wouldn't have selected. Porter Jr isn't all that great. Clearly everything he has touched here has went to sh!t. Give him the dlo trade as a positive but there has been much more negative than positive. This team was young with a ton of assets when he took over. Now we suck and has put together the clunkiest team in the league with no picks to trade, no cap room to spare. Ant will be gone here in a few years. We will have no way to put talent around him is the worst part.

KG4Ever wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:07 pm

Phenom wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:05 pm

KG4Ever wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 8:30 pm

Good thing we aren't paying Kahnelly much. No worries, if we miss playoffs we will have a good draft pick in a loaded draft. Oops, scratch that.

Losing to Pistons will help the Wolves get a pick this year. This is some serious chess the team is playing right now.

Ha, Wolves better pray Pistons make playoffs. Wolves only have one of their own first round picks left.

One left? You have to have a pick every other year. If you mean we have one to trade then that might be correct, but then we did trade that 12 year old for Dilly, so I'm not sure we have one to trade.

I don't care really about more draft picks to be honest. We got a boatload of young dudes already who can't see the floor or minimally - Dilly, Minott, TSJ, Clark, Miller, throw Garza in there, etc... Unless you like the Iowa team. The sure draft some more. I guess they are like lotto tickets. But how can you tell if they are any good if they never see meaningful game time?

Crazysauce wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 9:45 pm Not to hard to build around the best player in the league. If he thought he was so good then he wouldn't have waited so long to draft him. Not that he doesn't get credit for ultimately doing it, but lucking out on a 2nd round selection is the main thing to hang his hat on. Murray pick is who we should have picked but he lucked into him. It wasn't like he picked someone every other gm wouldn't have selected. Porter Jr isn't all that great. Clearly everything he has touched here has went to sh!t. Give him the dlo trade as a positive but there has been much more negative than positive. This team was young with a ton of assets when he took over. Now we suck and has put together the clunkiest team in the league with no picks to trade, no cap room to spare. Ant will be gone here in a few years. We will have no way to put talent around him is the worst part.

Why did every other team wait so long to draft Jokic too!? It's not like Denver was the only team drafting players that year, sheesh! Denver had the 11th pick that year and he wasn't going to draft him way higher than the rest of the league had him valued. Obviously he didn't think he was going to become one of the greatest players ever, but he still made the pick.

And not everything he touched here went to shit, what are you talking about!? The trades that brought Rudy, Conley, and NAW here and jettisoned DLO were critical to us becoming a contender last season and making the WCF with a real shot at going to the Finals.

Now I think it's legitimate to question "what could have been" if we had stuck it out with KAT and Ant pre-Rudy and kept building around them. We'll never know. But don't make me go back and look up any old posts you may have made about KAT!

The sooner TC realizes Ant isn't him, the better off we will be in the long run. It's the same old problem for the Wolves. Hang on to your best player and be somewhat competitive, or take the OKC/Boston approach, accumulate a bevy of assets, and try it again. It sucks for us that KAT was never a #1 and I'm telling you Ant won't be either. The last thing I want to see is us bang our head against the wall for the next 6-7 years like we did with KAT before realizing Ant can't get us to the top. The worst feeling for me as a Wolves fan was putting my hopes behind Ant this year, and then seeing what he really is without KAT. He's a really good player who needs a great player for a running mate. I know this isn't a popular stance, but this isn't my first rodeo and I know what I'm talking about.

Right now the only starter anyone wants to see in the 4th is Ant. That's a big problem.

They have a roster where Finch doesn't trust any young guy. He's Mike Malone without a ring.

They've talked so much a bout flexibility but that's crap. They've committed to a center who honestly requires so much to be built around him perfectly that it doesn't feel worth having him. Let's have fun and assume Randle is out. Now the team's gonna commit to a big man they legitimately believe is 80-90% of what looks like is gonna be an All-NBA C in Towns. Now we have a bunch of wings and damn near nothing at PG and C.

This franchise and the fanbase have to concede this season is a massive failure that can only have lessons learned if they actually play these young guys

You simply don't empty out the draft pick chest and put us in cap hell for a 30 year old one way player who needs to be sat during certain situations due to his limitations and who most of the league and team dislikes. It was stupid. It changed the trajectory of the team. He screwed this team over with one trade. We will now be paying for it for years. Nothing like one good year of basketball so we can go back to another 10 years of ineptitude. You won't change my mind on Connelly and I won't change yours. I hate him. He has been beyond awful in my opinion.

Coolbreeze44 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 04, 2025 10:17 pm The sooner TC realizes Ant isn't him, the better off we will be in the long run. It's the same old problem for the Wolves. Hang on to your best player and be somewhat competitive, or take the OKC/Boston approach, accumulate a bevy of assets, and try it again. It sucks for us that KAT was never a #1 and I'm telling you Ant won't be either. The last thing I want to see is us bang our head against the wall for the next 6-7 years like we did with KAT before realizing Ant can't get us to the top. The worst feeling for me as a Wolves fan was putting my hopes behind Ant this year, and then seeing what he really is without KAT. He's a really good player who needs a great player for a running mate. I know this isn't a popular stance, but this isn't my first rodeo and I know what I'm talking about.

I'm gonna say this and I wanna be clear.

It ain't Naz Reid yet everyone wants him back at $20-$25 mil a year.

It ain't NAW yet everyone wants him back at $15-$20 mil a year.

It ain't DDV yet everyone thinks he's the great prize for an all-NBA center.

If you wanna trade Ant, cool. but seek another hobby because the next great Wolves player might not come for another 2 decades and that's not fear mongering. That's Wolves for you. You want all these picks back yet Finch ain't gonna play them, Connelly ain't gonna draft him since he'll be gone, and Lord help you if arbitration sides with Glen. I can't think of a Wolves fan who has no real problem sucking balls for the next 10-15 years because they feel unnerved about the main guy. As far as I'm concerned and maybe others agree, but I've seen my last rebuild and if everything falls apart, it won't be because they made a bad bet on Ant. It'll be because everyone from the top down to the fans made bad bets everywhere else.