Minnesota Sports Forum

Where can they get off ranking us so high? Decrepit arena because of cheapness, refusing to give a top 5 player a max contract, Joe Smith, insulting KG on his way out. Taylor should be dead last.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10710924/2014-nba-front-office-rankings-owners?ex_cid=espnapi_public

thedoper wrote:Where can they get off ranking us so high? Decrepit arena because of cheapness, refusing to give a top 5 player a max contract, Joe Smith, insulting KG on his way out. Taylor should be dead last.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10710924/2014-nba-front-office-rankings-owners?ex_cid=espnapi_public

Taylor's a weird guy, but I actually go the other way on this one and rank him at least in the middle. The most important things an owner needs to do are be willing to spend money and not meddle. I don't think Glen was unwilling to give Love a 5th year...I think Kahn convinced him to save the max contract for Rubio. Glen cannot be considered a cheap owner. In fact, his biggest mistake (Smith) was because he wanted to spend too much, and outside the rules.

longstrangetrip wrote:

thedoper wrote:Where can they get off ranking us so high? Decrepit arena because of cheapness, refusing to give a top 5 player a max contract, Joe Smith, insulting KG on his way out. Taylor should be dead last.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10710924/2014-nba-front-office-rankings-owners?ex_cid=espnapi_public

Taylor's a weird guy, but I actually go the other way on this one and rank him at least in the middle. The most important things an owner needs to do are be willing to spend money and not meddle. I don't think Glen was unwilling to give Love a 5th year...I think Kahn convinced him to save the max contract for Rubio. Glen cannot be considered a cheap owner. In fact, his biggest mistake (Smith) was because he wanted to spend too much, and outside the rules.

I disagree man. I think he has felt burnt since the one time he did spend money (KG) because it was his only choice and you will never see us near the luxury tax again with him as an owner. He was one of the biggest advocates and leader of limiting players share of the revenue in the CBA. If he had nothing to do with not giving Love the 5th year than he is an equally bad owner for not stopping a bad business decision. The Love issue has to fall on Taylor as the owner.

thedoper wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

thedoper wrote:Where can they get off ranking us so high? Decrepit arena because of cheapness, refusing to give a top 5 player a max contract, Joe Smith, insulting KG on his way out. Taylor should be dead last.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10710924/2014-nba-front-office-rankings-owners?ex_cid=espnapi_public

Taylor's a weird guy, but I actually go the other way on this one and rank him at least in the middle. The most important things an owner needs to do are be willing to spend money and not meddle. I don't think Glen was unwilling to give Love a 5th year...I think Kahn convinced him to save the max contract for Rubio. Glen cannot be considered a cheap owner. In fact, his biggest mistake (Smith) was because he wanted to spend too much, and outside the rules.

I disagree man. I think he has felt burnt since the one time he did spend money (KG) because it was his only choice and you will never see us near the luxury tax again with him as an owner. He was one of the biggest advocates and leader of limiting players share of the revenue in the CBA. If he had nothing to do with not giving Love the 5th year than he is an equally bad owner for not stopping a bad business decision. The Love issue has to fall on Taylor as the owner.

I agree that it was a poor business decision, but it was based on an overspending logic rather than an underspending logic...that the Wolves could have a max contact with Rubio and a near max contract with Love. And the Wolves are pushing up against the cap now and rank 13th on total payroll. I actually think Glen is an owner that will allow Flip to go over the cap if he thinks it's necessary to win. He's a fan, unlike the Pohlads, and wants a winner in Minnesota. Heck, when you're worth $1.8 billion, going over the luxury tax threshold for him is like us deciding to buy a slightly better car.

longstrangetrip wrote:

thedoper wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

thedoper wrote:Where can they get off ranking us so high? Decrepit arena because of cheapness, refusing to give a top 5 player a max contract, Joe Smith, insulting KG on his way out. Taylor should be dead last.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10710924/2014-nba-front-office-rankings-owners?ex_cid=espnapi_public

Taylor's a weird guy, but I actually go the other way on this one and rank him at least in the middle. The most important things an owner needs to do are be willing to spend money and not meddle. I don't think Glen was unwilling to give Love a 5th year...I think Kahn convinced him to save the max contract for Rubio. Glen cannot be considered a cheap owner. In fact, his biggest mistake (Smith) was because he wanted to spend too much, and outside the rules.

I disagree man. I think he has felt burnt since the one time he did spend money (KG) because it was his only choice and you will never see us near the luxury tax again with him as an owner. He was one of the biggest advocates and leader of limiting players share of the revenue in the CBA. If he had nothing to do with not giving Love the 5th year than he is an equally bad owner for not stopping a bad business decision. The Love issue has to fall on Taylor as the owner.

I agree that it was a poor business decision, but it was based on an overspending logic rather than an underspending logic...that the Wolves could have a max contact with Rubio and a near max contract with Love. And the Wolves are pushing up against the cap now and rank 13th on total payroll. I actually think Glen is an owner that will allow Flip to go over the cap if he thinks it's necessary to win. He's a fan, unlike the Pohlads, and wants a winner in Minnesota. Heck, when you're worth $1.8 billion, going over the luxury tax threshold for him is like us deciding to buy a slightly better car.

You are assuming that Taylor wanted to pay out the 5 year max at all (ie to Rubio)? No way do we know that is true for certain. Small markets have it bad enough, but eventually any team has to bite the bullet and pay the tax to win. I hope your interpretation of his current approach is right though. I question it is. I remember a lot of negative quotes from Taylor about what a bad experience all the extra spending ended up being.

The arena isn't Taylor's fault. Almost all arenas are publicly financed in large part and there has been no appetite to spend public money on a new arena to replace Target Center. In fact, Glen had a hard enough time just getting some public money diverted to the upcoming renovations and even then Most of the renovation money is coming from Glen. Taylor relied solely on his own money for the last round of TC renovations about 10 years ago.

As for paying players, Glen has shown no reluctance to open up his wallet. He gave KG what was, at the time the biggest contract in NBA history. He paid Adelman a lot of money to coach here. Opening his pocketbook has never been an issue with Glen.

Glen's problem is his terrible judgment hiring front office executives. Hiring McHale wasn't a bad move at the time. But he stayed with him too long. There was no basis for hiring Kahn. And the Flip hiring was amateurish -- done with no effort to go after a proven front office exec. The Wolves CEO is Glen's son-in-law, not a top flight proven executive.

So I would put Glen in the bottom half, but not because of pocketbook issues. And there are certainly worse owners. Just ask Knick fans.

I think Taylor was liberal in KG era up to the point where Spreewell went haywire. I believe that soured Glen and changed his philosophy of spending moving forward. Most owners don't want to pay the tax either, but I am mostly going from Taylors comments about the spending in the KG era and his stringent stance in the CBA which really ended up doing very little for competitive balance in the league. I just think that Taylor has not made a good business decision in a while, including financial ones. The arena comment is really me just piling on, you are ultimately right lip but there are still examples of privately funded arenas (ie the Warriors new arena in SF).

I think Taylor would be a great owner if he could ever find a good gm, my fingers are still crossed Flip turns out alright. As lip pointed out Taylor's had a tough time hiring people in the front office and that's hurt the team. I think an owners role is to simply ok moves from a financial standpoint and for good or bad Taylor always seems to ok them.

Taylor also threw KG under the bus after he traded him for no reason at all.

Also instead of looking for a new GM by looking into good organizations and actually doing a job search, hires his old buddy Flip with no GM experience, and gives him ownership stake for whatever reason, insuring that he can never be fired. So if Flip turns out to be another Khan or Mchale, they'll be no hope for change because Flip will be here for a llooooonnggg time