KG Trade

[TheGrey08]

Abe, for me this isn't about ripping people who make negative posts. It's just tiring to see posters who are strongly negative probably 90% of the time. When you struggle to think of or find a non negative post from someone that's very telling.

From my perspective (I don't read EVERYTHING on here) you post plenty of non negative posts. You aren't someone who takes every single opportunity there is to be negative. Sure you may not be positive all the time, but you aren't negative a ton either. There's at least plenty of in between from a lot of us on here. We don't need to be strongly positive all the time, but the extreme negativity is very tiresome. That's why I tend to ignore some threads/posts all together.

Taking history, numbers, stats, etc into play to curb your enthusiasm/expectations is valid and makes sense. At the same time I don't see the need to throw all those numbers out there like you did a few posts ago b/c I don't see how that helps the discussion. We already know the team has been really bad for most of it's existence. That isn't what this is all about.

[kekgeek]

http://www.mangameslost.com/nba-games-missed-and-tmitt-metrics-april-6-2015/

We're the most injured team in the league by a decent chunk. 16 wins is terrible, but we haven't been healthy at all this year and we aren't even close to an acceptable level of injuries to fairly judge a team's performance. You don't win playing your 10-15 guys significant minutes which we have had to do most of the year. That is why your argument about our wins this year saying we are extremely far away is bullshit. We have no idea how far away we are because we are playing guys who don't play in a normal season this much.

To be fair won't this happen almost every year for the wolves Rubio, pek, kmart, shabazz and Bennett all are injury prone

You can't reasonably say those guys are so injury prone that they should miss 50+% of every season they play in the league. Pek is the only one on that list I expect to miss most of next year. The rest should play more than they sit. Also we have another year for our depth to develop so I don't expect as big a drop off as we had this year where the majority of minutes are being played by guys in their first or second year. Flip is tanking so I don't see how this last month is accurately representing our team moving forward. Most of our vets could play, but he's sitting them to get experience for the young guys and tank for ping pong balls.

I mean Rubio has only played in 61% of the games since being in the league. Pek has played in 63% of the games. Kmart consistently misses about 20 games a year. Shabazz hasnt even played a full 82 in his 2 seasons combined (I know some of it is Adelman but he was hurt last year also and he hasn't even played in half of the games this year). Also Bennett has only played in 65% of the games since his career has started.

I think we have a really injury prone team with a lot of our core players. I mean we have been saying this could be a playoff team (not me besides last year) if they stay healthy but guess what the wolves have been the most injury riddled team the last 4 years and that is not just luck

[Hicks123 [enjin:6700838]]

Well, I am with Abe on this, so I won't get too deep. I think that maybe watching this team for the past 26 years has certainly jaded any objective lens on the future.

That being said, looking at the current environment in the West, does anyone really think the following team competes for a playoff spot in the next couple years:

Pek
Towns
Shabazz
Wiggins
Rubio

I just don't see this team as a +.500 team....healthy or not. Are they better than they showed this season? Sure....if they stay healthy. But like many have commented, this "staying healthy" thing hasn't been a very successful endeavor the past 4 seasons.

Truthfully, and I said it in a post a couple weeks back, we not only need to hit on our top pick this year (either Towns or Okafor IMO), but we really need to hit on a "Gobert" type guy at some point later.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

I think Dieng will rebound next year and play a lot better. I'd like to see a closing lineup of Ricky/Lavine/Wiggins/Dieng/Okafor. I think Dieng would benefit greatly with a move to the 4. I think he'd play better as a secondary help defender and it would let him go after more boards with Okafor challenging the shots. Then have the bench be primarily Backup PG/Martin/Bazz/AP or AB/Pek and fit KG's minutes in there somewhere. Our starters would have a good offense/defense balance and our second unit can try to run up the score and take advantage of most second units not being able to keep up with them offensively. Try to kick the win total up to low 30's and let the player development improve the win total from year to year like the Thunder.

[Monster]

I've been one of the most optimistic posters here for years and generally I don't have a problem with people being negative because there is more than one way to look at things and we can experience the same things and take something different from it. Abe to me is very much a realist not a pessimist. He also has some amusing humor at times to go with his the past paints a bleak picture of what may come posts.

Like Hicks said this team as its constructed is gonna have a hard time getting to .500 much less the playoffs in the west. This franchise doesn't have anything significantly different going for it than it has since its inception so there is some reason to be worried about something coming together. Alex is really negative because he feels like Glenn is a HUGE part of the probl and the franchise won't succeed with him here. I get where he is coming from but I am not that down on Glenn.

The thing I wish we remembered more is we are all on the same team as Timberwolves and basketball fans. There is no need to attack each other we al want good things for this franchise. Maybe sometimes the realists shouldn't burst the bubble but man it's hard to hold back. Let's just hope we can finally get back to some good basketball again and enjoy watching games more instead of looking forward to what 10 day contract guy will be playing 30 mins in the next game. Which brings me to the next point

This team was constructed of injury prone players and still is and it has only gotten worse. Coming into the season the only guys on the roster that were supposed to play significant roles that didn't have a poor injury history was Young, brewer, Dieng and Wiggins. We have the well documented vets and we also had young guys like Bennet Rubio and Bazz that I had worries about. Not much has changed but it's gotten worse with Rubio adding KG and Pek there is basically little hope for him. Bazz got hurt again and so did Bennett. It's bad forks I don't even know what to say. The good news is Martin will get hurt but he is paid accordingly so might as well keep him for now because this team lacks shooting. Chase might be healthy so maybe we can deal him or he opts out. I wouldn't cpunt on him staying healthy. Once again Wiggins is basically the only guy you can count on plus Dieng as a rotation player being healthy. Brutal just brutal. Flip the GM has a lot of work to do.

[TheGrey08]

I don't think there was any intent nor do I think anyone actually attacked anyone. There is bound to be negativity during a season like this especially when a team has lost for so long. Shit I've been negative a bit myself. Most people's negativity is within reason though, and I get that sometimes it boils over a bit, but there's been some extreme & exaggerated negativity lately and it simply gets old.

We have plenty to look forward to as fans of this team, but we are going to have growing pains. We have a lot of young talented players and they are bound to play poorly b/c they are young and inexperienced. Lavine is a prime example. He makes boneheaded mistakes as he learns not only to play in the NBA, but to play a new position which happens to also be the hardest. He's very talented and shows flashes that show he has the potential to be great. We just have to temper our expectations as well as keeping the pessimism in check.

We've been crazy unlucky with injuries (as well as the draft & lotto generally speaking). Pek's is the only injury that is very concerning b/c as someone mentioned before, it's the only one we never actually see and it's been chronic for 2 years. Every other significant injury has been a freak accident. Rubios ankle & knee, Bazz's finger getting stuck in a jersey, Martin breaking his wrist while falling to the floor. Those are injuries nobody would have guessed. Pek's is the only one we could have guessed happening b/c he's had the same or similar foot/ankle issues.

Luckily we have 5 young pieces with talent potential ranging from solid rotation player to superstar potential (Dieng, Bazz, Rubio, Lavine, Wiggins - none of which I see busting) as well as the unknown wild cards in Bennett & Payne. We're very likely to be adding another very good talent in the draft and who knows what will happen with trades & FA. We may even wrangle a top coaching candidate this summer. We have an owner & PBO who don't always make the best decisions, but they aren't all bad either and love their team, the game and our city. Like I said, there is PLENTY to look forward to. ANYYYYTHINGSSS POSSIBLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLE!

[AbeVigodaLive]

If there's one thing I'll take from the season...

Wiggins has shown flashes of awesome potential. And other times, he blends into the wallpaper, as he did at Kansas. Either way... he was out there. Every night. Playing heavy, heavy minutes.

It's one thing to have a young talented player on the roster. It's quite another to have him out on the court. He could blow out his knee or tear his achilles or anything else tomorrow, but at least it seems like he won't be the type to sit out games with hangnails and bilateral leg weakness.

So, that's something promising. I think. I hope.

[Monster]

If there's one thing I'll take from the season...

Wiggins has shown flashes of awesome potential. And other times, he blends into the wallpaper, as he did at Kansas. Either way... he was out there. Every night. Playing heavy, heavy minutes.

It's one thing to have a young talented player on the roster. It's quite another to have him out on the court. He could blow out his knee or tear his achilles or anything else tomorrow, but at least it seems like he won't be the type to sit out games with hangnails and bilateral leg weakness.

So, that's something promising. I think. I hope.

He hasn't made it through his 2nd season yet without missing a chunk of games which D-Will is the only lottery pick rookie to do so for the Wolves since um let me check Google...Wally. That's superstitious history but good grief it's freaking weird. You are right though Wiggins has looked up to the task.

[alexftbl8181 [enjin:6648741]]

Well, I am with Abe on this, so I won't get too deep. I think that maybe watching this team for the past 26 years has certainly jaded any objective lens on the future.

That being said, looking at the current environment in the West, does anyone really think the following team competes for a playoff spot in the next couple years:

Pek
Towns
Shabazz
Wiggins
Rubio

I just don't see this team as a +.500 team....healthy or not. Are they better than they showed this season? Sure....if they stay healthy. But like many have commented, this "staying healthy" thing hasn't been a very successful endeavor the past 4 seasons.

Truthfully, and I said it in a post a couple weeks back, we not only need to hit on our top pick this year (either Towns or Okafor IMO), but we really need to hit on a "Gobert" type guy at some point later.

I'll going past this point. Even if this core is pretty good, in today's game you have to have depth because of injuries and how good teams are. The Wolves are just never going to be players in the free agent market unless they overspend. So they need to not only hit on draft picks, but acquire more and develop them. Unfortunately, the Wolves have never seen the value in the draft as other teams have and it shows.

Also the coaching sucks and doubtful it can develop anybody

[TheGrey08]

I'll going past this point. Even if this core is pretty good, in today's game you have to have depth because of injuries and how good teams are. The Wolves are just never going to be players in the free agent market unless they overspend. So they need to not only hit on draft picks, but acquire more and develop them. Unfortunately, the Wolves have never seen the value in the draft as other teams have and it shows.

Also the coaching sucks and doubtful it can develop anybody

I wouldn't say never. Certainly early on, but once you form a good team players will be more interested in coming without overpaying drastically. We just have to get there first and until then it's all about the young talent.

I don't see the point in throwing that in there at the end. Have you not seen signs of development from Wiggins, Bazz & Lavine? We have seen this team develop guys before. Yes I agree it's not as good at is as we would like, but we have seen some development this year.