MinnesotaSportsScene.com

After a hope-building win to start the season, the Minnesota Timberwolves have now lost eight straight games to get off to yet another disappointing start under third-year head coach Randy Wittman. Now standing at 1-8, their hopes for achieving at least a 5-5 record in the first 10 games is blown to smithereens.

While the Wolves have plenty of young talent, even with the addition of Mike Miller, they simply haven’t come into their own just yet, and their “W” column looks like a supermodel on cheap diet pills.

Still, there are signs of hope, right?

Not really. Not at this point. Sorry.

When Kevin Garnett was still a Timberwolf, he usually made in a single season what it will take Ryan Gomes five years to earn under the terms of his new contract with Minnesota. Gomes, arguably the second-most-important cog in the Kevin Garnett trade last summer, was an unrestricted free agent this off-season.

Although coming off another poor year for the Wolves in terms of wins and losses, Gomes is the kind of young, high-potential, high-character talent Minnesota was hoping to build around in the wake of the Garnett trade. Only 25 and still improving his skills each year, Gomes averaged 12.6 ppg and 5.8 apg, but is considered a locker room asset for the largely young and less experienced Wolves team McHale has assembled thus far. Gomes may be past his acne years, but he’s still a young player by NBA standards.

When I first heard that the Timberwolves were smart enough to take O.J. Mayo with their third pick in the NBA Draft last Thursday, I was thrilled. When I heard the next morning they’d traded him overnight to Memphis for a player they could have had anyway, I was not so thrilled.

Correction: I was pissed as hell.

But I’ve had time to calm down now and look at the team the Wolves are left with as a result of the trade, and surprise, it’s not looking quite so bad at the moment. In fact, it’s looking pretty good.

For those who aren’t in the know because they were away on European cruises, here’s the skinny on the deal:

The Wolves sent O.J. Mayo to Memphis, along with Greg Buckner, Marko Jaric and Antoine Walker. In that group, the only real loss is Mayo. But then there’s what we get in return.

First, we get PF/C Kevin Love, who Memphis drafted, and who the Wolves liked quite a bit, despite drafting Mayo. In addition, we get Mike Miller, Jason Collins and Brian Cardinal. Miller is the catch of the deal, while Jason Collins is an upgrade at center and will be paired with Love at that position, taking the pressure off Al Jefferson and allowing him to switch back to PF.

Going into the draft, Minnesota was weak in the front court and had a fair amount of dead weight on their roster, most especially Jaric with three years and $21 million left on his deal, wasting cap space, as well as one year and $9 million for Walker, who didn’t want to be a Wolf anyway.

Now, take a look at our starting and second-string lineup for the Wolves:

PG Randy Foye, Sebastian Telfair
SG Mike Miller, Rashad McCants
SF Ryan Gomes, Corey Brewer
PF Al Jefferson, Craig Smith
C Kevin Love, Jason Collins

That’s an improvement. Is it enough to get out of the lottery and into the playoffs? It all depends on how the pieces fit, but the Wolves have about $6 million in cap space for free agency this year, which may be spent on retaining Gomes and Telfair; they also have potentially three first-round and two second-round picks in next year’s draft, depending on if they must send the LA Clippers the pick they owe them or not, from the disastrous Jaric trade. And they expect to have about $18 million free under the cap for free agency in the summer of 2009.

Not bad.

The Minnesota Timberwolves are doing their homework on all the players who they might potentially choose later this week with the third overall pick in the NBA Draft; they’ve run them through their paces on and off the court and held everything but competitions in swimsuits. And that may be coming yet.

Although the team has been the subject of many trade-down rumors and at least one trade-up rumor (to snag Beasley and give Miami a shot at Mayo), indications are the the Wolves may be looking seriously at keeping the third pick and, barring changes in the draft above them, taking Mayo to give the Wolves a back-court combo of O.J. Mayo and Randy Foye, with Rashad McCants and Sebastian Telfair backing them up.

While that could set up the Wolves’ backcourt for the next decade, the question is whether it is what the Wolves need to turn the corner; the Wolves have no lack of young talent now, thanks to the Garnett trade and this is one of the rare cases where a trade-down (perhaps two spots or so) might make sense, if it brings in a veteran small forward or center, and still gives the Wolves a chance to draft someone they like, such as Brook Lopez or Kevin Love.

We’ll know soon which route they choose. The draft is scheduled for Thursday, June 26.

Minnesota alumni and hero Kevin Garnett will have to play a game six to bring home his first NBA championship to his new team, the Boston Celtics. Kobe Bryant, who the Celtics had shut down most of the series, scored 25 points, and Lamar Odom 20 points, in game five to create a 103-98, five-point road upset to keep the series alive on Sunday.

So now it is back to Boston, where the Celtics will enjoy a home-court advantage for Game Six and have the chance to win the NBA Title in front of a home crowd. The Celtics laid it out to attempt to close down the series, however, and only a CAT5e might be able to detect where things went wrong.

Paul Pierce led all scorers with 38 points, Ray Allen had 16, and Garnett scored 13 points along with 14 rebounds, but got into foul trouble against the Lakers’ Pau Gasol, limiting his effectiveness. Still, with the chance to end the series and win in front of their home crowd, Celtics fans must be excited at the prospect of a Game Six.

Well, the game ended and Garnett and company did the unlikely; they erased an 18-point half-time deficit and came back against the odds, on the road in Los Angeles, to win Game 4 and return to Boston up 3-1 against the Lakers, winning by a final margin of 97-91.

Believe me, if Boston wins the next game and takes home the trophy in five games, there will be plenty of small business opportunitites in celebrating the Celtics’ return to glory. From a Minnesota perspective, it’s the second-best possible news for the former home state of Kevin Garnett.

The best-possible news, of course, would be if he’d been doing all this as a Timberwolf.

As a long-time Timberwolves fan, it’s hard not to be happy for Kevin Garnett as he goes through his first NBA Finals appearance as a player; after trying to win a gold bangle or two during a dozen years in Minnesota, the Big Ticket is finally realizing his dream.

As I write this, Boston’s making a hard second-half push to win Game Four and take the series back home to Boston with a 3-1 advantage over the Lakers. Strangely, the big stars on both teams are relatively quiet; Garnett has only 14 points for Boston and Kobe Bryant has a mere 13 ponits for the Lakers.

The score is 83-82 as I write this, with the Lakers up by one. Here’s hoping and praying that Garnett can pull out the road win with the help of Paul Pierce and Ray Allen. It’d be a great feather in Garnett’s cap after too many years surrounded by not enough talent to get the job done in Minnesota.

Former Timberwolves coach Flip Saunders has been fired by the Detroit Pistons. His crime? Only that he took the team to the Eastern Division championship series in all three of his seasons in Detroit. I guess that’s not good enough for some folks; it’s an NBA title or you’re gone.

Of course, with all the blinds on management’s eyes in Detroit, I suppose it’s hard to blame them; all they want to see is championship gold or nothing. Never mind that Flip’s teams have been among the top four every year in the last three years.

I wouldn’t worry too much about Saunder, though. He’ll be well-paid for the year left on his contract, and he’ll have his pick of NBA jobs once he’s ready to jump back into the fray.

There’s only one thing I wish the local sports press would shut up about, already: Stop wishing Tubby Smith would move away from Minnesota so that Flip can coach the Gophers.

I guarantee you, Tubby’s a better college coach than Flip will ever be, because Tubby’s been a college coach all his career! For the long-term good of the Gophs, now’s not the time to start pushing Tubby out the door. Personally, I hope he coaches the Gophs for at least the next decade, and retires at Minnesota.

Then, perhaps, Flip can have the job. In the meantime, Flip should continue coaching in the NBA. Unless the Wolves rehire him, he’ll be able to go through another couple NBA jobs and still be available 10 years down the line, when Tubby retires from college basketball after taking the Gophers to at least seven Sweet 16s, four Final Fours, and at least one NCAA championship.

After a dozen years in Minnesota and a trade to Boston, Kevin Garnett has finally made it to the Big Dance. While most Timberwolves fans would have loved to see The Big Ticket reach this goal in a Wolves uniform, I can’t imagine anyone begrudging him this long-awaited career accomplishment.

He’ll be cashing in a lot of flight deals during his series against the LA Lakers, which recalls all the classic Lakers-Celtics matchups of the 1980s, when Wolves GM Kevin McHale was in a Celtics uniform, rather than rebuilding Minnesota’s franchise, as he is these days. Ironically, it was McHale’s trade of Garnett to Boston that reignited the Boston franchise enough to re-fuel this decades-old Finals rivalry.

I’ll be enjoying every minute of it; I long to see Garnett finally prove, on the biggest stage on the NBA, that he and his Celtics are far better than Kobe Bryant and the Lakers.

It may not be happening as quickly as some might like, but it appears Fred Hoiberg, the former Minnesota Timberwolf forced into retirement by a heart condition, who has become involved in the front office of the Wolves, is still being groomed to take over Kevin McHale’s role when he finally decides to step away from the team. When that will be, no one is sure, but Hoiberg is the heir apparant.

“We’re getting him involved in all parts, and this coming year, we’ll get him some more responsibilities,” owner Glen Taylor told TwinCities.com columnist Charley Walters recently.

Let me be your travel guide to at least one degree, Fred: despite the tendencies of your predecessor, there are a lot of other teams to make deals with other than the Boston Celtics.

On a related note, if the Celtics win it all this year, I nominate the man most responsible for Boston’s return to glory, Minnesota GM/team VP Kevin McHale, as the NBA GM of the year.

Former Minnesota Timberwolf Kevin Garnett is showing Boston Celtics fans just how underrated he was when he was in Minnesota, leading the Beantown team to an easy win in playoff-opening action against the Atlanta Hawks.

Garnett and the Celtics have the best record in the NBA and home-court advantage through the Eastern Conference finals. Their 104-81 win over Atlanta - in a game that didn’t even look that close - seems to indicate a four-game series and easy advancement to the second round; Garnett only made it past the first round once with the Timberwolves, when he led the team to the Western Conference finals before falling to the Los Angeles Lakers.

Look for Garnett to get at least that far with Boston this season; seems Garnett will make frequent use of the Dymo labels to add to his award shelf this season. And here at MinnesotaSportsScene, we’re happy for him. No one worked longer or harder to finally be rewarded with post-season bliss.

The Minnesota Timberwolves improved their chances, however slightly, in the NBA Draft after winning a tie-breaker with the Memphis Grizzlies this weekend. Both the Wolves and the Grizzlies finished with 22-60 records, but the Timberwolves had rare draft-related good fortune and won the tie-breaker, placing them in the third spot in the NBA Draft, which gives them a slightly better chance in the NBA Lottery to determine draft position.

If the Wolves’ lottery chances continue to fall on the rosy side, they could advance even higher in the draft. In the worst-case scenario, they would pick no later than sixth. The Wolves’ chances of winning the top pick in the lottery is 13.8; Memphis’ chances are 13.7 after the tie-breaker. Someone with a reliable Patek needs to keep an eye on the clock on this one.