btw how come theres no talks about ak47?, im surprised teams are going after him hard

ATL got Milsap. It seems PEK is no longer a fit there. DAL has ~$12mil left after signing Calderon. CLE might be saving their money for next season to take a run at Lebron. Its looking good for us signing PEK.

No takers for AK yet. We need someone to take some salary (Barea, Ridnour or D Williams) from us!

Would have thought AK to CLE made a ton of sense. They're holding out for Bron imo.

Could you imagine both AK and Pek coming cheap enough that we could get them both back??



Still really unlikely but a boy can dream!

yea i mean spurs used up all their $ already, dallas wont go after ak47 due to marion + dirk being there

hawks signed korver + millsap so i assume they wont want ak47 either

i guess pistons or bucks only other teams that have space??

btw i just realized ak47 is gonna be 33 in a short time, do we really want to give the guy 3-4years??

i wouldnt give andrei more than 2years 14-16 at this point tbh, could if we can get rid of one of our pg's & pick him & pek up

AK really does like it in MN and if he had his choice of teams he'd likely pick the Wolves. However, he has been pretty steadfast that he's looking for a multi-year deal that will be his last payday of his career so the long-term security of his family trumps his desire to run w/ the Wolves.

I think Flip and the FO view him as a nice to have piece that they won't overpay for in terms of contract length; especially since a 30-year old (K-Mart) is already getting four years and they are going to have to shell out big time $$$ to Pek. The circumstances of the team got us to this point in that:

1) - We are going to rightfully owe Pek a ****-ton of money to keep him so signing AK to a 3+ year deal wasn't prudent as it would really restrict our short-term cap flexibility.

2) - When Rubio's rookie deal expires, he's going to want close to max money and should get it. If we balance the roster and get pieces in place and pay AK an escalating 3+ year deal, I'm thinking there might not be enough space to retain the core pieces and give Rubio enough to keep him here.

3) - AK is not an outside threat and we needed to sign a scoring wing who can shoot the trey stat which we did.

All those add up to the fact that giving AK a deal for more than two years or even one year guaranteed and one with a team option is probably not in Flip's plans simply given where our cap is at. It would be ideal obv to do a S&T for K-Mart which would allow us more flexibility to bring back AK but I'm thinking that's not going to happen.

The most likely scenario is that Flip believes AK is a 'nice to have' piece that he's not going to overpay for in terms of either contract length or amount so he is letting AK test the FA market to see if he can get his long-term deal. If not, he knows that AK likes Adelman and Minnesota so we can lock him up then. Argue the merits of that all you want but given where it seems Flip wants to take the team, good call.

Our lineup SUCKS defensively right now. Only Rubio is clearly a plus defender and we're clearly at a negative at the 2. PEK is aight and maybe Love is improving but it's gonna be rough.

I'm excited in general but it's worth pointing out.

we have a good backup center who will be a + as well

& im not counting out shabazz or even d.williams yet.... i really want to see them get better & be a positive either off the bench or insert themselves in the starting lineup

Kirilenko is a championship caliber role player. I think hes being under rated in this thread and I really hope he somehow comes back

I mean we have a bunch of guys who can shoot threes. We don't have any who can do the things he does

Wat

Everyone itt loves AK.

Calling Dieng a + defender already is silly, rookies rarely are. BROW wasn't even a plus defender last year. Plus he's only gonna play 8 mpg or something anyway.

I don't think Bud is a starter. Martin would probably be best served coming off the bench too, but we don't have any better options right now.

Dieng has like an 85% chance of being a total stiff. And I like Dieng but centers drafted in the 20s hit ~10%. Don't think you can really count on him to be a game changer as a rookie.

strongly disagree x2

To be fair, vjl has Dieng as 62% bust, 24% bench player with a 14% chance of becoming a starter. But yeah, you're basically right Jay.

Bud can start, but he's a significant downgrade from AK.

Sam is right - we need some more quality defenders.

AK would be a perfect fit on this team. Dumping Luke or JJ + DW for nothing and signing AK would make this a very good team right away.

someone said in the reg season thread that dallas trying to trade for jjbarrea

cant we just dump d.williams + jj contract for marrion??

or if dallas would take both in exchange for picks n sign ak47??.... either way i think its a win win for dallas no?

Its a possibility that Dallas might take Barea, but its less likely than before they signed Calderon. I think DW's contract is only guaranteed this season, so they could dump him next season if they wanted to. I'm pretty sure they'll be trying to clear cap space next season.

idk that we want Marion (one year $9.3 mil). That might be ok for us this season, as I think he can still play a little, but AK > Marion, and $9.3m is a lot. I'd rather receive nothing in return for JJ & DW and then sign AK.

Williams isn't nearly bad enough to not have his option picked up. Not even close.

But yeah, I'd ship JJ to Dallas for free 100%.

$6.7 mil in 2014/15? Do you really think he's worth that much? I dont. And it escalates to $8.7m the following season.

http://hoopshype.com/salaries/minnesota.htm

http://www.awolfamongwolves.com/2013...on-the-wolves/

http://www.basketball-reference.com/...youngth01.html

I'd do it, but Philly probably wouldnt.

question for you guys... would you be willing to trade d.williams or some random on our bench or a pick for austin rivers?

rivers was playing hurt last year & had a horrible season, peliticans looks like they wont have him playing much with all the guards they have signed

would you guys do it or no?

That's gotta be a troll.

am i the only one who can see the positives in that trade?

we dont lose anything & can only gain

Yes.

Rivers is a very bad player. He was expected to be bad by the crew at Canis and he fulfilled those expectations. I would not even trade Shabust for him because Rivers' contract is worse.

All that being said, Rivers is paid a lot less than DW, so it would net us some salary cap space at least. I'd far rather trade DW for nothing than to take on Rivers though.

He might not be but it's still way too early to give up on him. He was a borderline NBA starter last year and is still very young at 21. He still has value and upside. He's been a young player somewhat overwhelmed by Adelman's rather complex cutting/spacing offense.

The only guys that get their rookie scale options decline are Thabeet-type total stiffs.

yes. We can't gain anything and can only lose. Sub-zero is far worse than a replacement player like Gelabale.

Sub-zero: 5.9 PER, -0.038 WS/48 (negative! or sub-zero)
Gelabale: 10.5 PER, 0.62 WS/48
Wes Johnson: 9.5 PER, 0.21 WS/48

He's a historically terrible player.

let me throw another trade out there

lets say hypothetically dallas offers pek 13mill a year & we dont match

d.williams + ridnour/barrea/shved for asik a possbility at all??