I think this is probably the biggest issue. Penn's agent can talk about Penn having a home in Portland, being friends with people in the Blazers organization, etc, but my guess is that ultimately Penn decided the Minnesota position wasn't the best opportunity for him to succeed. I've read a couple of sought-after executives, in the past, talking about how people think that you should jump when offered a GM opportunity because there are so few of those jobs in existence. But, in fact, taking the first opportunity is a very bad idea if it's a bad situation because if you accept it and fail (and a bad situation makes that much more likely) you may never get another chance. As long as you don't accept that first GM position, you remain a "hot prospect" and will get more opportunities. You want to absolutely maximize your chances of success in your first GM position, because failure can mean it's also your last. Success gives you a chance to establish yourself.
Good news for Portland and, I would like to think, for Penn. What is Taylor thinking not giving the new GM the power to hire his own coach? It's madness... Ed O.
Nate is not KP's hire. It happens all the time, espacially if they are newly under contract or popular because of the shithead players that used to be on the team like Nate.
I don't think it's that common at all... if it were common, it wouldn't really be the focus of the articles, I don't think. There's a difference between having a coach in place and then the owner not allowing the GM to replace the coach. Further, KP was within the organization when Nate was hired, so he had some comfort level with McMillan. Given how many strikes MN already has against it, I think tying the hands of the guy who's going to have to save the franchise is stupid. Ed O.
MINNEAPOLIS (AP)—The Minnesota Timberwolves hired former Indiana Pacers executive David Kahn to run their basketball operations, four days after being rejected by Portland assistant general manager Tom Penn. The move was confirmed to The Associated Press on Thursday by a person with knowledge of the hire. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because an announcement wasn’t planned until Friday. http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news;_y...F?slug=ap-timberwolves-kahn&prov=ap&type=lgns
