Howlin' T-Wolf

Hope you have a happy Ricky Rubio's Judgment Day

Today marks the final day  in which Ricky Rubio can exercise his buyout with Regal Barcelona and join the Wolves for the ‘11-’12 season. Under the current rules of the CBA, May 31st is the final day for teams to sign a player to a contract under the rookie scale before the next season. But really, today shouldn’t be recognized as the last for anything; instead today could be viewed as the start of a countdown. For many of you who don’t understand, there are other ways the Wolves and Rubio can get around either signing or reporting he’s part of the team and not actually have to announce it today.

But with today being the most important in months, fans must realize this is all but a done deal. Some obstacles remain very present and could force Rubio’s fate away from the NBA for yet another season.

One of them being Rubio is still under contract with his current team in Europe right now. It’s playoff time, actually. And although Ricky’s not playing as big of a part as some would think (He’s coming off the bench) there’s a good chance he wouldn’t set sail from his squad in the heart of a playoff race. The Wolves, after a couple years of studying Spanish law, actually have figured out that they can sign Rubio to a “future contract.” That way he’d be able to finish the postseason in Spain and join the Wolves near the end of June when the postseason ends.

Another issue could be the international factor as well as the fact that Rubio doesn’t want to play here, as he subtly hinted at when he was drafted. Rubio’s been oh-so shy since receiving even minuscule amounts of NBA attention, making the likelihood of him making his decision via press conference or anything like that slim-to-none. So if later tonight he does indeed decide to be bought out, you won’t hear it unless you have Twitter or an up-to-date news source of that nature. And if you’re looking for this decision to reach the amount of production, limelight and sickening suspense like “Lebron’s Decision Day,” you’re in the wrong place. This news, if broken, will be a small but important bit of info fans can get excited about. Not like using some charity philanthropy to gain leverage on NBA fans around the world and then drop them on their heads in one man’s quest to be a part of an All-Star squad. But I digress.

And finally, the most serious threat to Rubio not signing at all: The expiring CBA. With a lockout looming and neither side, the players or the owners, budging on negotiations to fit a new CBA into place, Rubio may not want to deal with the unpredictability of the whole situation and rather stay in Europe altogether. But, under the current CBA, which expires on June 30th, players are able to sign a free agent on July 1st. So Rubio, if he doesn’t declare his future today and the Union and the owners can sign a deal before the CBA expires, has a new date, July 1st, to actually sign a contract with the team for next season.

Still, even with these issues present, there are “good things happening” behind the scenes, a source told me. The odds of us hearing it today may not be the highest by any means, but they’re more than zero. That’s a very good thing. That means Kahn and co. have done good work the past few months and made progress on getting their man overseas. I’ve even heard from others that the Wolves have already signed Rubio and are just waiting for another date to release the good news, which would be fantastic!

And that is why today should be a good day, rather being the final or last time we can get Rubio over here before next season. There are ways around it, as I already reviewed, that make it possible for today to be just as normal as any other. It’s just that today should be thought of as the start of something, not the end.

So if all ends well, something Timberwolves fans know absolutely nothing about, Rubio will be a Timberwolf at some point this summer and will join the team in their effort to turn this ship around, so there’s not reason to fret. It’s another piece to the puzzle but it’s the one you lost under the couch from three months, and you’re happier than hell to get it back and connect it to the board.

This comes from Chris Broussard via ESPN.com:

Already owners of the No. 1 pick in the draft, the Cleveland Cavaliers are trying to sweeten their position by securing the second pick as well, according to league sources.

The Cavaliers are in discussions with the Minnesota Timberwolves and Detroit Pistons about a three-team trade that would give Cleveland the top two picks of next month’s NBA draft.

Chad goes on to say that Cleveland would absorb Rip Hamilton’s deal with the trade exception from Lebron James. The Wolves would the receive the #4 and #8 pick in this Summer’s draft. And the Pistons? I have no idea.

The skepticism on what’s actually being discussed and who goes where leaves this trade as murky at best. But if the Wolves head into the draft with, yet again, three picks in the first round, they could very well leave the draft with two great lottery picks and a newfound first-rounder for 2012, the summer of Clippergeddon. You really can’t argue with that, and would have to give Kahn some serious credit for wheeling and dealing there. But of course, that was all just formulated in my head. The chance it blooms into reality are slim-to-none, as usual. If only…

Being no stranger to the NBA Draft, the Minnesota Timberwolves should be pros at this. And, as a fan of one of the lottery’s likely contestants every year, so should Howlin’ T-Wolf. With that said, from now up until the actual NBA Draft, Tom and I will tackle the task of role-playing every GM for each team in the league by alternating picks throughout the first round. Shouldn’t be too hard, right? But with the “David Kahns” of the NBA world today, believe me, it’s much more difficult to predict one’s fate than it seems.

We will release three total mock drafts: This one, one in two weeks and one the night before the draft. As always, feel free to criticize accordingly. Just please be kind.

Without further adieu, here we go! Read more…

We don't need the dude from Lie to Me to tell us what Rubio is thinking.

When I was about 10, I was still convinced that I could play basketball in the NBA. I learned to dunk on my Nerf basketball hoop just like Vince Carter. I spent hours in my drive way, pretending to hit buzzer beaters. Suffice to say…if an NBA team had ever tried to lure me away from, well, just about anything, I would have dropped it like it was hot and moved to Minnesota, Charlotte, Alaska, Russia, or pretty much wherever they told me to be.

So maybe a part of me is just jealous of Ricky Rubio. Maybe.

But honestly, I can’t be the only one getting sick of the Rubio drama, right? The never-ending speculation? The waiting game? At this point, I feel like we are getting expertly led on by a girl who knows the game much better than we do, leaving us just interested enough to keep hope alive, but deep down, of course, fully aware that we have no chance in hell.

I started writing this piece several days ago, actually. The original title was Ricky Rubio: A Refresher. Included within the article were glowing reviews of Rubio’s court vision, defense, and addiction to no-look passes; all the reasons why Wolves fans should be excited. See, things were starting to look optimistic. Kahn had just visited Spain. NBA writers were speculating on how Rubio coming over would change up the draft. I caught myself frequently refreshing my Google news with the key word “Ricky Rubio” typed into the search bar. I’m guessing I wasn’t the only one.

Then, somewhere along the line, my Ricky positivity faded. I’m pretty sure it was around the time the draft lotto happened, and reminded us all that the Timberwolves are still the Timberwolves, and they still never catch a break. And Kahn stopped sounding optimistic, and started saying things like “I’ll talk about it when there’s news.” And Rubio decided that he didn’t want to ditch his Spanish League team during their playoff run, which sounds all well and good, until you consider that Rubio’s next series doesn’t end until June, and nobody really has any idea when David Kahn’s mystery timeline runs out on signing Rubio…including David Kahn. Not only that, but Rubio is a bench contributor at best on his Spanish League team. In their clinching game of the last series, Rubio played 19 minutes off the bench. Ricky! You are getting the same kind of playing time as Eric Maynor! They would survive without you!

Tangent: Is Rubio aware that the only way he doesn’t start on the Timberwolves is if he’s a European flop of Darko proportions? Or, as a matter of fact, that Darko actually started for the Wolves this year? (Insert the sound of Wolves fans weeping.)

Anyway, at this point, thanks to a badly worded clause in the CBA (see the fantastic Canis Hoopus link above), we don’t actually know when the Wolves have lost their opportunity to bring Rubio to the States, or when they could sign him if he was even interested. Speculation is running rampant that Kahn has to be considering trading Rubio, especially if Derrick Williams succeeds in his campaign to have Cleveland draft him second.

So which would be more frustrating: suffering through even more Rubio drama or seeing Kahn trade away the player we’ve been hoping and waiting to see in a Timberwolves uniform for the past two years?

You tell me. I’m tired of thinking about it. If you are looking for me, my Nerf basketball hoop is calling.

You only get one shot/Do not miss your chance to blow/Cause opportunity comes once in a life time.
-Eminem

It’s not often in life that a person gets a real shot at redemption.

After all, a redemption story requires a life-altering disappointment and then a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make up for that disappointment. And if you can throw in a little revenge to sweeten the deal…well. It just doesn’t get much better than that, does it? Ask 8 Mile; it wasn’t enough for Rabbit to win the rap battle. He needed to destroy Papa Doc and his entire crew in the process.

But if we were to believe Mr. Mathers on the issue of opportunities, 2006 would have been the end of the road for Dirk Nowitzki.

I’m sure you remember, but I feel the need to remind you: in ‘06, Dallas faced Miami in the Finals. Dirk led the Mavs to a 2-0 lead, before Miami came storming back and took the next 4 straight games to rip the championship away from Dallas. Dallas fans (including Mark Cuban) were incensed at the superstar foul calls Dwyane Wade had been getting all series as he drove to the basket. The rest of the NBA began to call the Mavericks soft. This description picked up steam as the Mavs lost in the first round three times in the next 4 years, and failed to make it back to the Conference Finals.

But the story on Nowitzki and the Mavs has been getting an upgrade this postseason.

For starters, Dirk has been going nuts. Averaging 28.5 points per game, Dirk has been performing at an efficiency level rarely before seen in the NBA. Bill Simmons likes talking about the 50-40-90 club, a rare NBA achievement in which a player shoots 50% from the field, 40% from three, and 90% from the free throw line. This postseason? Dirk is shooting 52% from the field, 60% from three, and 92% from the line.

Whoa.

But more than that: Dallas has been proving themselves tough. Not only did Dallas sweep the defending champion Lakers, they did it after two come from behind victories in games at the Staples Center. They were more talented, more composed, and mentally tougher than Los Angeles, who embarrassed themselves in game 4, committing petty and dangerous flagrant fouls in a blowout, sending their Hall-of-Fame coach off in shameful fashion. (It was awesome.)

The NBA blogosphere has been flooded with writers clamoring to be the first to say “Dirk isn’t soft, I’ve been saying it all along!” Which, of course, is utterly bogus; everyone has been calling Dirk and the Mavericks soft since ‘06, there’s no doubt about that. Many of these same writers said that Portland would upset Dallas in the first round, and very few, if any, of these writers picked Dallas to beat Los Angeles in round 2. For the record, I include myself in this, I picked the Lakers in 5. Fool me once, shame on me.

Possibly the most fascinating storyline left in the playoffs is this: if Dallas advanced to the Finals, their opponent could be none other than the Heatles, who enter Sunday’s game with Chicago tied 1-1 as well. Obviously, the Heat are a very different team. But the sight of those red and black uniforms, as well as Dwyane Wade, the player who completely eviscerated them last time, would be enough to make even the most confident Mavs’ fan shake a little bit.

At which point, it will be up to Dirk to change the narrative. This postseason has people talking about him in an incredibly positive way, but the internet is a fickle beast. With Kevin Durant and the Thunder already giving the Mavericks just about all they can handle, it’s not implausible to say that this could be Dallas’ last real chance to win a title. Failing to grab the Larry O’Brien trophy could close the book on Dirk’s legacy, as his years begin to climb up there, and it would be a very bitter taste with which to leave Dallas’ fans, especially if they lose again to the Heat.

But if he succeeds, and Dallas wins it all? Well, take it from Rabbit. That would be redeeming indeed.

From left to right: Kahn, smug white dude, bastard child (I'm kidding, of course, in the same sense Kahn was...)

It just seems like they never catch a break. Inconceivably, even with the greatest odds of walking out with the winning card and an enormous grin on his face, while possibly saving the franchise and his legacy with one combination of ping-pong balls, David Kahn was caught in the middle between a Hall-of-Fame-coach-firing GM and a chronically ill 14-old good luck charm for a team that was demoralized harder than any other before.

“This league has a habit, and I am just going to say habit, of producing some pretty incredible story lines,” Kahn said. “Last year it was Abe Pollin’s widow and this year it was a 14-year-old boy and the only thing we have in common is we have both been bar mitzvahed. We were done. I told Kevin: ‘We’re toast.’ This is not happening for us and I was right.”

But who can you blame? Kahn, obviously pissed at the outcome of tonight’s suspenseful events, nailed it right on the head. No one wants to wake up in the morning and see that the lonely Wolves ended up with the #1 pick. Rather the feel-good story — Americans love those — of the son of Cavailers’ owner, Dan Gilbert, is a real headline-catching type of way to sum up the night.

It’s just unfortunate things had to play out as they did. The tens of hundreds of Wolves fans, anxiously anticipating who may be in that second-to-last envelope as it was disclosed, were gunned down and their hope, perhaps, shattered, including my own to a certain extent. Wolves Nation desperately needed the top pick tonight. Not to fulfill their quest in the Irving Sweepstakes but rather to inject some life, some sort of passion, back into a fandom that once thrived rabidly thanks to the smallest sense of competition and, of course, a little lottery luck.

But things aren’t all that bad. Because, really, if it weren’t for bad luck, the Wolves would have no luck at all. Now the Wolves have to wander into unchartered waters a bit. Without a clear-cut choice with the second pick, the Wolves have tons of options to play with. The only thing with that is that our GM is somewhat of an ape: He decides on instinct, not upon reason, but that’s an entirely different story. Like I said, the Wolves really have some ways of turning this fortune into just that, a fortune. It all just comes down to careful and calculative decision-making. They could begin with trading the pick outright and moving down, hopefully picking up some veteran leadership in the process (Chad Ford already noted that Kahn immediately made this adamant upon learning our fate.) They could go with Williams, the projected #2 coming into the lottery, but then Kahn would face an imminent obstacle of choosing between seemingly redundant spitting images of each other in Williams and Beasley (Do you choose the clinically insane scoring machine or a similar type player with a better, smarter head on his shoulders?) Or they keep the pick and make a reach for a more pressing need, perhaps an upgrade at center with Kanter or improving the interior defense, which is a must, and take Biyombo. Both would be highly criticized as reaches but they’d fill needs. Simply put. (But are the Wolves really in a position to draft by need, though?)

It’ll be an interesting month coming up. Kahn now has the alarming task of signing Ricky Rubio before the CBA expires on May 31st, as well as gain some insight into what to do with this upcoming draft. But one thing is clear: They need help and they need it fast. A little luck and fortune wouldn’t hurt either.

Let the soothing tones or Mr. Stewart’s voice flow over you.

Ahh…Much better.

Believe me, a certain level of tranquility must be reached before I can allow you all to sit down and witness what may happen to the franchise tonight because, odds are, it won’t be pretty.

Tonight does indeed mark the night where all things could very well change as we know it; a new path shall be revealed as loyal fans scheme up millions of ways to fix the squad only to see Kahn steer the ship in a different and puzzling direction. How ever the ping-pong balls fall, the Wolves will come out of this one with a new asset, hopefully one with some real value behind it rather than some long-gone afterthought of a basketball magician from Spain. An asset that could turn into a #1 pick. An asset that could turn into a #4 or worse prospect. An asset that could turn into a wrinkly but wise veteran.

We just have no idea how it will end up. That calm silence everyone’s had since the end of the season hasn’t given any clues into what’s ahead for the Wolves. But tonight that changes. We’ll finally get a gauge on what’s next, you know, the “what’s next” we’ve been asking for nearly five years now.

Tonight’s the night. Or let’s pray that it is. And may God have mercy on our souls.

According to some statheads who are much smarter than me, Love may have saved Minnesota from the worst season of all time

So here’s an interesting little stat that could make you want to hit your head on the wall several hundred times.

According to The Wages of Wins blog, Kevin Love lead the NBA in Wins Produced this season. According to their analysis, Love produced 23 team wins. This is mildly confusing, since the T-Wolves only won 17 games this season.

The blog bases their numbers off a team’s efficiency differential, which is the numerical gap between a team’s offensive and defensive efficiency.

Without Love, Minnesota would be expected to have the lowest differential in league history.  Would that actually happen?  Well, there are diminishing returns in the NBA.  So some of Love’s teammates would get a bit better.  But the diminishing returns effect is not so large that Minnesota — without Love — couldn’t challenge the 1972-73 76ers for the worst record in the NBA.

But even this isn’t the aforementioned depressing stat. The depressing stat is this: if their analysis is correct, and Love was replaced with a player of average production, the T-Wolves would have won 2.9 games this season.

Woof.

Of course, as the writers themselves point out, these statistics aren’t able to measure how much, say, Anthony Randolph would have produced if Love hadn’t been playing, giving Randolph more minutes. And considering Randolph’s performance per 36 minutes (21 points, 9 rebounds, 50% FG) was actually quite efficient, I think it’s safe to say that Minnesota would have won a very few more games than 3.

But the writers weren’t done trying to drive Timberwolves’ fans off the edge of a cliff.

First, Minnesota has done an amazing job of finding the least productive lottery picks in the NBA.  And secondly (a point related to the first observation), Kevin Love should probably try to get out of Minnesota as soon as possible.

Guys. GUYS! You’re killing the committee (of one). Ok, so Jonny Flynn hasn’t exactly panned out. And Wes Johnson is…streaky. (To put it very nicely.) And we all know Love is a threat to leave, even though it’s been rumored he wants to stay. We all know that Minnesota will probably have to overpay him to keep him around. But Rubio is coming! Seriously! It’s for real this time! (We hope. More on this later.) And Love and Beasley get along really well, by all reports! And…well, Minneapolis has a lot of corporations who could sponsor Love! Leave us some hope here. Jeez.

Anyway, despite the Minnesota Haterade these dudes are chugging (seriously, listen to the podcast, it gets worse), it’s definitely an interesting (if Prozac-inducing) stat, and I encourage you to go check out the full list.

Are we about to witness the final NBA game of the greatest Timberwolf of all time?

I feel a little under-qualified to be writing this article. See, I’m the mirror image of most Timberwolves fans; I cheer for the Celtics, but I adopted Minnesota as my Western Conference team thanks to my close(ish) proximity to the Target Center after Kevin Garnett had already been traded away. I witnessed from a distance his maturation as a young player coming from high school to the pros, his gigantic contract, his All-NBA teams, his first round playoff frustrations, and his MVP and ‘04 playoff run. I never connected with him during his formative years; I cheered for him mainly because I wanted to see him knock off the Lakers. (Speaking of which, here’s an unprovoked shot at the defending-champs-who-are-defending-no-longer that made me feel great for a couple minutes.)

But as you watch the Celtics/Heat game tonight (and I encourage you to do so; chances are good that it will be incredibly competitive, and oddly meaningful) keep in mind that Garnett is considering retiring instead of returning for a strike-shortened season next year, which would mean that tonight could conceivably be the final game of his wonderful career.

So as a fan of both Boston and Minnesota, allow me the liberty to remind you to remember Kevin Garnett.

Remember how he gave a crap every single night of his career, how he played with an unmatchable ferocity and passion, how he bashed his head against the basket frame to psych himself up before games, how he undoubtedly worked his ass off on both ends of the court.

Remember how desperately he wanted to win, and how he was selfless (to a fault), a defensive minded player who played the game the way it should be played, and in the process helped destroy the rather ridiculous stereotype that all NBA stars care about is padding their own offensive stats within the larger scope.

Remember how he never forgot where he came from, even when he was on top of the world. (”This is for everybody in ‘Sota…“)

Remember how he helped young players develop, stood up for his teammates, and created a culture in which a teammate knocked over had to be helped up by every teammate on the court. Remember how he cheered on teammates from the bench during blowouts like the 12th man on a 15 seed squad during March Madness.

Tonight might be Kevin Garnett’s last game in the NBA. Obviously, I’m hoping it isn’t. But if it is, it’s been an amazing run and a Hall of Fame career.

Don’t forget.

The plans to renovate the Target Center moved one step closer to reality today when Minneapolis City officials discussed how both a Target Center renovation and a new Vikings Stadium could work out. Read the details here.