Minnesota Sports Forum

When the Thibs regime ends, as I believe it will by next summer, we'll be able to look back on a number of things that brought it to an end. One would be the failure of Wiggins to come anywhere close to reaching his potential. Another might be KAT failing to further develop defensively. Still another would likely be Jimmy Butler taking his talent to some other franchise as a free agent. And of course, ultimately Thibodeau has to be held accountable as a head coach for failing to get the most out of the talent on his roster as we saw his first season when he failed to do better that Sam Mitchell even those the same group of players had more experience and had finished strong the previous season. But I want to focus in this thread on what I consider to be Thibodeau's failure as PBO to take full advantage of opportunities. Here's my list of what I'd call missed opportunities:

1. Drafting Justin Patton at #16 instead of John Collins, Anunoby, Kyle Kuzma or Josh Hart. I had John Collins and Anunoby slotted for for us at #16 in that order of preference. So I'm not relying on hindsight with respect to those two guys. Although I didn't peg Kuzma or Hart for that pick, the Lakers obviously saw their talent and I'd like to believe we have a savvy enough front office to do better than a rube like me and as well as a rival Western Conference front office. I know it's early and that Patton could emerge as a great pick. But as of right now, it looks like a terrible pick relative to other alternatives that rubes like me and other organizations did or would have done. So in my view, Thibodeau missed an opportunity to significantly improve our roster by failing to draft John Collins, Anunoby, Kuzma or Josh Hart

2. Failing to get Jordan Bell for cash included in the Butler deal. Knowing that the Bulls sold that pick for cash, it would seem obvious that the Wolves could have held out for that same swap as part of the Butler deal. It's crystal clear that the Bulls had already made up their mind to move on from Jimmy and start their rebuilding process. It was equally clear at the time that there weren't any other takers seriously competing with the Wolves for Butler. I strongly suspect the Wolves never pressed for including the 2nd round pick in exchange for cash. In my view, this was a missed opportunity to draft a talented, high energy young PF.

3. Failing to trade up from #16 to get Donovan Mitchell. You might recall that the Jazz traded all the way up from #24 to #13 and all they had to give up was Trey Lyles. So there's no doubt a swap of #16 for #13 to take Mitchell was there for the Wolves if our front office had been savvy enough to recognize Mitchell's potential and work out a deal with the Nuggets to get him. I'd say this was the biggest missed opportunity of them all by far. Draft Mitchell instead of Patton and we wouldn't have to worry about whether Wiggins develops. I have to believe that Jimmy would have loved playing with Mitchell, so it's more likely he'd be inclined to stay.

4. Failing to do a sign-and-trade this summer with the Lakers for Randle -- Taj for Randle. Knowing what Randle agreed to with the Pelicans it's obvious that his agent would have pushed hard for the deal I'm suggesting if the Wolves had offered it. And knowing that the Lakers are trying to build a contender for season by adding veterans on 1-year deals to keep their flexibility for next summer, I think it's likely the Lakers would have been receptive to the deal. Obviously, it remains to be seen how Randle does this season and thereafter. But I'm willing to wager that he'll be really good and would have been a terrific addition to the Wolves with his strength, explosiveness and high energy next to KAT.

5. Failing to trade Jimmy Butler draft night for a top 5 pick, which I think was doable. I truly believe that the Grizzlies would have dealt their pick to us for Butler. Obviously, it's fair to say I can't know this for sure. I'm clearly speculating, but I think my conjecture is reasonable.

I'm not going to get into what I'd consider to be mistakes our front office made, such as overpaying Teague rather than signing Darren Collison for substantially less last summer -- also something that's not based on hindsight since I had this idea last summer. Instead, I'm limiting my post and this thread strictly to what I'd call missed opportunities. Obviously, we won't know if I'm right on most of my list until at least a year from now. So we can all comment on my list or offer different lists right now. But we'll have to come back to this thread in a year to discuss further.

Lip, the world outside is filled with pretty women waiting to be pursued! Unless of course you're married, in that case you have my sympathies... now get to work on that honey do list!

By the way, Momma is single again!

Lol. Well, I'm married with a long list of missed opportunities behind me -- probably for the better! :)

1. I agree. Anonuby was the guy. For all the reasons thibs liked Okogie and KDB, the whole package was there in Anonuby. But, I think KATs lack of interior defense pushed this pick and not BPA.

2. No guarantee that they would have taken Bell. And even less chance that the wolves would have developed him into the player he looks like now.

3. See 2.

4 and 5, I can agree with it.

I think there are were of alot opportunities, especially with regards to free agency, but I dont consider them missed because I dont think those players want to play for thibs unless well compensated.

Lip I'll add to your list that prioritizing Bazz last offseason instead of a more vet player was a missed short term opportunity. I think it was a defensible move but it was a missed opportunity since Bazz was such a failure last offseason.

monsterpile wrote:Lip I'll add to your list that prioritizing Bazz last offseason instead of a more vet player was a missed short term opportunity. I think it was a defensible move but it was a missed opportunity since Bazz was such a failure last offseason.

Good addition, Monster. I agree.

crazy-canuck wrote:1. I agree. Anonuby was the guy. For all the reasons thibs liked Okogie and KDB, the whole package was there in Anonuby. But, I think KATs lack of interior defense pushed this pick and not BPA.

2. No guarantee that they would have taken Bell. And even less chance that the wolves would have developed him into the player he looks like now.

3. See 2.

4 and 5, I can agree with it.

I think there are were of alot opportunities, especially with regards to free agency, but I dont consider them missed because I dont think those players want to play for thibs unless well compensated.

It's not whether they would have taken Bell or Mitchell. It's whether the COULD have. That's what I mean by missed opportunity. But I do agree that we can't assume our coaching staff would have developed those guys.

I think you're right that a number of free agents were missed because they didn't want to play for Thibs. But I still consider those missed opportunities -- either because Thibs didn't pursue them or because they wouldn't play for him. Either way, I see them as missed opportunities. I'm thinking specifically of Belinelli and Ilyasova. But Monster made a good point that signing Rose may turn out to be a good signing that perhaps only Thibs could have accomplished.

If you want to go missed opportunities and the draft that legit could have changed the franchise to a legit contender for years you have to blame Flip on the Bazz draft.

Could of legit had Greek Freak/Gobert/Roberson instead of Bazz/ Gorgui/cash considerations.

We still would have K Love. Don't know how much those rookies would have played under adleman because Bazz and gorgui didn't see much time. So i'm guessing Lavine would of still been the pick the next year based on where I would assume we would be drafting.

A team of
Rubio
Lavine
Greek Freak
Love
Gobert
With Roberson off the bench

Now that is the year of realistic missed opportunities.

kekgeek1 wrote:If you want to go missed opportunities and the draft that legit could have changed the franchise to a legit contender for years you have to blame Flip on the Bazz draft.

Could of legit had Greek Freak/Gobert/Roberson instead of Bazz/ Gorgui/cash considerations.

We still would have K Love. Don't know how much those rookies would have played under adleman because Bazz and gorgui didn't see much time. So i'm guessing Lavine would of still been the pick the next year based on where I would assume we would be drafting.

A team of
Rubio
Lavine
Greek Freak
Love
Gobert
With Roberson off the bench

Now that is the year of realistic missed opportunities.

I agree that Flip really missed big opportunities that year. I've complained about those decisions by Flip a number of times, dating back to the time they were made. I remember posting my outrage back then over Flip's decision to sell the 1st round pick we could have used to take Gobert. That's not just a missed opportunity, that's malfeasance in my view. You don't see 1st round picks for cash!! My only quibble with your analysis is that I still think Love would have been traded. So substitute Wiggins for Love. Given the fact that neither the Greek freak nor Gobert was particularly good their first couple seasons, we might have still ended up with KAT or at least Porzingis in the 2016 draft. Assuming we ended up with Wiggins, the Greek Freak's development would have probably resulted in Wiggins being traded back when his value was still high. So who knows what would have happened.

The overall point is that you make your own luck as a franchise by making good decisions. That's what Golden State did to build their championship team and that's what the Spurs have done for many years. It's what the Celtics have done and more recently the Sixers. It's what the Lakers did drafting Ingram, Kuzma and Hart. The Wolves franchise has had ample opportunities over the past 5 years to put this franchise on a path to championship contention, but the record shows those opportunities were blown. It's sad when even a rube like me had better judgment than the Wolves' highly paid front office staff over the years.

Kris Dunn over Jamal Murray is really my biggest gripe with the Wolves FO when it comes to the draft. Say what you will, but that one never made sense to me and the early results are overwhelming. Personally, I'm not going to penalize them for not plucking Donovan Mitchell, Kyle Kuzma, or Jordan Bell out of thin air because overall team fit and opportunity played a lot into those guys getting to where they're at. Not to mention, Mitchell did not look like he'd be anything near the player he was for Utah last season when he played at Louisville. Skill-wise, I thought he improved more in the summer before his rookie campaign than he did in two years in the NCAA. Couldn't have seen that coming.

Prematurely giving Gorgui Dieng his lucrative extension and giving Andrew Wiggins the mini-max contract, and signing journeyman Cole Aldrich were all mistakes that were vocalized at the time by myself and some others. None of those are my biggest issue with how this FO managed the cap situation. The summer of 2016 was the time to strike in free agency due to our core players being on rookie contracts and this franchise was timid and scared. It was our only real opportunity to make a splash via free agency and it was squandered away. The Wolves went thrift shopping and came away with Cole Aldrich, Jordan Hill, and Brandon Rush. That was disappointing. No real efforts were made to get a legitimate game-changer for fear of future luxury tax implications.

Imagine having gone all in on Al Horford and convincing him that Minnesota was the up-and-coming situation to be a part of (not THAT hard of a sell at the time, honestly), and then making the Jimmy Butler trade while retaining Jamal Murray. That's a potential championship recipe.