Tag: Minnesota Timberwolves (Page 2 of 11)

      Kevin Love breaks record with 51st double-double

      February 17, 2011 /
      Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin Love backs into New York Knicks forward Ronny Turiaf during their NBA preseason game in Paris on October 6, 2010. The Timberwolves won the contest, part of the annual NBA Europe Live tour, by the score of 106-100. UPI/David Silpa

      Rotoworld has the details…

      Kevin Love, who suffered a shoulder injury on Wednesday, had 18 points, 18 rebounds and zero 3-pointers for his 42nd straight double-double, and 51st before the All-Star break, setting an NBA record.

      George Mikan had 50 double-doubles before the break in 1950, but Love snapped that record tonight.

      For those of you who have pretty much ignored the T-Wolves this year, Love is having an outstanding season, averaging 21.1 points and 15.5 rebounds, and is shooting 43% from long range. He was named to the All-Star Game as an alternate.

      The T-Wolves have their sidekick. Now they need to find a perimeter superstar who can shoot the lights out and/or create his own shot. They had two picks in the top 6 back in 2009, but passed on Stephen Curry, Brandon Jennings and DeMar DeRozan (who is averaging 16.4 ppg for the Raptors), and instead came out of the draft with Ricky Rubio and Jonny Flynn. Curry looks like a star, while Jennings and DeRozan have shown flashes of that kind of potential.

      Now it appears that the T-Wolves may trade a first-round pick for Anthony Randolph, who can’t get off the bench for the Knicks. A mid to late first-rounder would be fair, but if the T-Wolves end up trading away their first-rounder (which project to be in the upper lottery) it will be a steep price to pay for a guy who hasn’t made much progress in neither Golden State nor New York. Don’t forget, they owe a first-rounder to the Clippers to finish the dreadful Marko Jaric trade. That pick is top 10 protected in 2011 but is unprotected starting in 2012.

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      Ricky Rubio doesn’t want to play for the T-Wolves?

      January 24, 2011 /

      Barring some sort of language barrier or misquote, “a senior member of Rubio’s camp” seems to have confirmed to the New York Times what we all pretty much knew — Ricky Rubio does not want to play for the Minnesota Timberwolves.

      The Timberwolves continue to push him toward the N.B.A. as soon as possible, contending privately that they have a commitment from him for next season. But Rubio’s camp does not appear to be convinced.

      “The bottom line is, why would he want to play in Minnesota?” a senior member of Rubio’s camp said this month. “He’ll continue to say all the diplomatic things, and Minnesota needs to keep his value up for trade purposes, but the family’s preference is to be on the East Coast, specifically New York, Miami or Boston. He wouldn’t be troubled if he has to stay another year.”

      But the Timberwolves have leverage. They hold his exclusive draft rights, meaning they are the only N.B.A. team with whom he can negotiate. Their latest strategy in trying to persuade Rubio to sign may center on the possible N.B.A. lockout of players after the collective bargaining agreement expires June 30. The terms of the new agreement will probably be significantly less favorable for rookies.

      New York, Miami or Boston…hmmm. Well, Boston is probably out because Rajon Rondo is already there, and he’s one of the best point guards in the NBA. It’s not like Rubio’s recent play has been so awe-inspiring that the C’s would give up on a bird in the hand like Rondo. Some are even wondering if Rubio’s development has stalled.

      Miami would be an interesting landing spot from a how-are-they-going-to-make-this-work standpoint, but Rubio is not a good fit. LeBron and Dwyane Wade handle the ball so much that it would be a waste of Rubio’s playmaking talents. LeBron and Wade need to play with a point guard who can space the floor with good three-point shooting, and that’s not Rubio’s game. At all.

      The Knicks are a possibility, and Rubio’s freewheeling, pass-first style would be fun to watch in Mike D’Antoni’s up-tempo system, but Raymond Felton is averaging 17.5 points and 8.7 assists, and is a better scorer than Rubio at this point. Felton is only under contract for one more season, so if the Knicks see Rubio as a better point guard of the future, they have a few assets that might appeal to the Timberwolves.

      The article goes on to discuss how the new CBA might not be as favorable to rookies, and that might encourage Rubio to sign before June 30. But right now it looks like he’s willing to play in Spain for another season and try to force the T-Wolves to trade his rights to an East Coast team.

      It’s amazing — T-Wolves GM David Kahn took three point guards (Rubio, Jonny Flynn, Ty Lawson) in what was considered to be a great draft for that position and still doesn’t have his PG of the future. He passed on Brandon Jennings and Stephen Curry to take Rubio and Flynn, and ended up trading Lawson away (for a draft pick that turned into a trade for Martell Webster). Darren Collison was also available when the T-Wolves took Lawson.

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      Love not long for Minny?

      January 6, 2011 /

      In an SI.com article, Kevin Love didn’t shoot down the possibility that he would change teams in the near future.

      Love sees all of this, has absorbed it, processed it. Which is why he is complimentary of the Timberwolves’ progress — “I can see a light at the end of the tunnel,” he said. “I couldn’t see it last year” — but he stops short of saying he plans to be in Minnesota for the long term. Love is eligible to sign a contract extension this summer but admits he does think about free agency, about having some control over his future.

      “We’ll see what happens with what David Kahn and the front office want to do,” Love said. “If it’s right, it’s right. If it’s not, it’s not. I could end up somewhere else. I just want to play for a team that wants to win at this point. At this point, I just want to win now.”

      Wherever Love goes, he won’t come cheap. The five-year, $60 million extensions signed by Joakim Noah and Al Horford last year will likely be Love’s starting point in negotiations. And his deal could be bigger. When asked what kind of contract Love could be in line for this summer, one league executive’s answer was succinct: Max.

      Some internet outlets have jumped on these quotes and started talking trade, but it sounds to me like Love is talking about his extension and keeping his options open before he signs his next contract. He’ll be with the T-Wolves for at least two more seasons, and by then he should have a good idea whether or not the Ricky Rubio dream will ever pan out for GM David Kahn.

      Love is averaging 21.0 points and 15.6 rebounds on 46% shooting, which is just so-so accuracy for a power forward. But when you consider his range (43% from 3PT, 1.3 made threes per game), it’s more than acceptable. He’s #2 in PER (24.04) amongst power forwards, second only to Dirk Nowitzki, and has the third-highest rebound rate in the league after Reggie Evans and Marcus Camby, who aren’t asked to do much else other than clean the glass.

      Love is putting up gaudy numbers on a bad team, so is he really worth a max contract? Yeah, probably. When you have a guy who can score 20-plus a game and dominate the glass, and stretch the defense with his three-point range, you have to lock him up. I don’t know that Love will ever be the best player on a championship-caliber team — his defense is adequate at best (opponent’s eFG% is a healthy 49.7%, and the T-Wolves give up 4.5 more points per 100 possessions when he’s on the court) — but he’s certainly capable of being one of the best sidekicks in the league. The trick for Minnesota will be to find another star or two before Love has to make a decision about his future.

      Ken Berger wrote a piece about the state of the T-Wolves that focuses on Kahn and his plan for the remainder of the season. (In short, he’s evaluating the roster.)

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      LeBron in favor of a less watered-down NBA, not contraction

      December 28, 2010 /

      LeBron is in some fairly hot water (…again…) after he spoke without thinking (…again). Here’s what he said about the idea of a less watered-down NBA.

      “Hopefully the league can figure out one way where it can go back to the ’80s where you had three or four All-Stars, three or four superstars, three or four Hall of Famers on the same team,” James said. “The league was great. It wasn’t as watered down as it is [now].”

      “[Contraction] is not my job; I’m a player but that is why it, the league, was so great,” James said.

      “Imagine if you could take Kevin Love off Minnesota and add him to another team and you shrink the [league]. Looking at some of the teams that aren’t that great, you take Brook Lopez or you take Devin Harris off these teams that aren’t that good right now and you add him to a team that could be really good. Not saying let’s take New Jersey and let’s take Minnesota out of the league. But hey, you guys are not stupid, I’m not stupid, it would be great for the league.”

      Anyone who knows the definition of ‘contraction’ knows that’s what LeBron is talking about here. Some people believe that it would be good for the NBA if there weren’t so many teams because there would be more stars on each team and the quality of play would go up. The downside with this strategy is teams (like Minnesota and New Jersey in LeBron’s example) would no longer exist.

      So LeBron is in favor of contraction. Wait — no he’s not:

      “That’s crazy, because I had no idea what the word ‘contraction’ meant before I saw it on the Internet,” James said after the Miami Heat’s practice Monday. “I never even mentioned that. That word never even came out of my mouth. I was just saying how the league was back in the ’80s and how it could be good again. I never said, ‘Let’s take some of the teams out.’ ”

      “I’m with the players, and the players know that,” James said Monday. “I’ve been with the players. It’s not about getting guys out of the league or knocking teams out. I didn’t mean to upset nobody. I didn’t tell Avery Johnson to leave either. I didn’t say let’s abandon the Nets, and not let them move to Brooklyn or let’s tear down the Target Center in Minnesota. I never said that.”

      Welcome to Semantics 101, with Professor LeBron. No, he didn’t say that we should be “knocking teams out,” but he did say how great it would be if the league weren’t so watered down, which would absolutely require fewer teams. He didn’t say the T-Wolves shouldn’t exist, but he did say it would be great if Minnesota’s star player were arbitrarily moved to another team. What happens to the T-Wolves in his world?

      Just because he didn’t say the word contraction doesn’t mean that he didn’t come out in favor of contraction.

      I like the Sportress of Blogitude‘s take on this:

      Aha! That is sound, logical reasoning right there. How can LeBron be in favor of something if he has never even heard of the word until he saw it on the internet? Allow me to illustrate: let’s say – simply for the sake of argument only – that some misguided pundit argued that killing some of the babies born into the world every day would be an effective means of population control. Obviously, such a deplorable opinion would generate a lot of controversy. But if someone later asked said pundit how they possibly could be in favor of infanticide, that person could potentially argue that if they have never heard of the word “infanticide” before, how could they be in favor of it? Unless a person can identify the exact word which perfectly describes some particular act, they cannot in any way support said act, even if that person previously stated they were in favor of exactly what that particular word means. It’s all about semantics, you see.

      Well played, LeBron. Well played. Your keen mastery of logic mystifies us all.

      That about sums it up.

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