How Much Longer Will This Last? 12-2 12:20 PM CT To me the Timberwolves are one of the most dysfunction franchises in sports today. I like to compare them to the Detroit Lions of the NFL, they just make horrible decisions over and over and yet the front office remains intact year after year(finally the Lions did fire Matt Millen earlier this year). The Timberwolves are winning 1 out of every 4 games this season. Things have certainly not gone according to plan. The T'Wolves were supposed to be a much improved team this season according to the front office after the offseason moves that were made. So far this year, we look like the same team from last year except with a few new faces. We are still losing games we should win, we are still outmatched in talent and size but most importantly we are still getting out coached. Honestly though, what did we expect from this team? I will admit that I bought into the hype this offseason that this team would be a lot closer to a .500 ball club. After 16 games, I feel like a fool for even thinking this team could win 30 games. We can't even beat teams like the Thunder, the Kings, or the Bobcats. Plain and simple we are on the same lowly level as those teams listed above. The thing that makes me laugh the most is, did Kevin McHale really think that by having a coach and a group of players that have never won in this league, that we would magically turn into a winning team? We have a head coach right now with a career winning percentage around .300! In any other franchise, a coach with that low of a winning percentage would not even be considered for a head coaching position. Yet for some reason even after seasons of 12-30, 22-60, and now a 4-12 start, Randy Wittman remains the head coach. Think about it people, Avery Johnson and Mike D"Antoni were fired for making the playoffs last season! Both Johnson and D'Atoni won over 50 games last year but our coach won 22 games and still has a job? What’s even more funny is we didn’t even think twice about hiring one of these solid coaches to replace Wittman this season. But back to the point of a losing coach trying to turn a group of losing players into winners. It really does not make much sense to me. I almost feel like the Timberwolves are praying it will somehow work out. This is too competitive of a league to get lucky and having a coach who has never had at least a .500 season in the NBA is not really the brightest idea in the book to turn a struggling franchise around. Why should these players even buy into Wittman's schemes? I sure wouldn't, if I knew my boss completed his job around .300. Who are you to tell me what to do when you can hardly even win 3 out of 10 games and this is your job. I mean this guy went 12-30 with Kevin Garnett in his prime! He couldn't even go .500 with Kevin Garnett and we expect him to go .500 with Al Jefferson and a bunch of 6th and 7th men in the league? Plain and simple how much longer are we going to put up this crap? I'll tell you one thing, having 4 draft picks next year is not going to solve anything. Oh boy, surely 4 more younger inexperienced players will be able to turn this team around. We have plenty of young guys on this team, how many more drafts do we have to go through in the lottery to be satisfied with our rebuilding? If the draft is not the way for us to rebuild a team, which it seems like it isn't the best way based on our past selections, then trade our picks for experienced players who are still in their 20's. This team does not need more young players right now especially 4 rookies next season! How much more time do we want to spend developing young talent? Another 5 years? I've seen teams like the Clippers, Hawks, Celtics and sit in the lottery for years praying that there young talent will come together somehow. Guess what it never did. Average coaches and young players with potential usually does not result in a winning ball club. Each team turned things around when they acquired some veteran players and right now we have the perfect opportunity to do make a trade with the amount of draft picks and expiring contracts that we have. (Note: the Clipper suck now but they turned things around in 05-06 when they added veteran players) Oh and then there is the good argument that we need to save cap room for 2010. Are you serious? Who is going to come to Minnesota in 2010...no one. We have one of the least attractive destinations for free agents to choose from with our team's reputation and of course the cold weather. Almost any free-agent would rather end up in a place like Orlando or Miami than in Minneapolis. The only way the Timberwolves will get an all-star player on this team is through a trade. We pretty much have to force players to come here as sad as that sounds. I'll wrap things up here with this thought. If we are still in rebuilding mode, which we say we are, then why aren't guys like Kevin Love, Rashad McCants and co. getting consistent minutes? Look at what the Grizzlies are doing. Guys like Jaric, Bucker and Walker have hardly even touched the court this season. They are letting their younger guys play. How many minutes did we give up to these 3 goof-balls last season? Look at what trying to win ball games did last season with these guys, it gave us 22 wins, yippie! Clearly the Grizzlies understand that these 3 guys are no where near deserving enough to take minutes away from their young players. The Timberwolves however thought these guys were solid veteran players that could help lead this young team. The Grizzlies have sent their fans a message by playing their younger guys and are letting them develop as basketball players. They understand that by trying to win basketball games right now by playing average veteran players it will only get them another 5-10 wins. So you can pretty much end up in the 20 win range by playing younger guys or win 30 games wins with some washed up veteran players. Either way your season is a failure, you might as well take the 20 wins and the chance to develop your young players. The issue of playing veteran players hasn't been as big of an issue this season as it was last season, but the big issue this year has been giving the younger guys consistent minutes. The Timberwolves have been sending us mixed signals all season long. Are we developing our young players or are we more focused on winning ball games? It seems like the game-plan changes from game to game. If we are trying to win ball games then we need to make a trade. This current ball club is not going to get into the playoffs with the current amount of talent we have. If we are trying to develop, then let's not hype up the fans like we are going to be much improved basketball team. We invested the #3 pick in Kevin Love and he is getting 20 minutes a game! That makes no sense to me. Then again nothing in this franchise makes sense to me.
