I am too angry, upset, depressed, etc. to write about the topic thoroughly, but I’ll give it a quick try.
Psychologists would tell you that you need to talk about things that upset you this much. Right now, this blog is my therapist.
Rumor has it that the Boston Celtics and Minnesota Timberwolves have agreed to a trade involving Kevin Garnett (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=2954127). Let me state that another way, the Wolves are apparently going to trade the only marketable face the franchise has known in its almost 20 years of existence.
A month ago I came to the realization that this might happen and it might be the only way the Wolves could get better as a team. I even tried to put myself in Glen Taylor’s shoes. If I owned the Wolves, would I trade KG and try to get some proven talent and some draft picks? I’m not sure. A team never gets fair value for trading away a superstar. I also still feel the Wolves are closer to a championship trying to find the pieces to play alongside Garnett than they would be dealing Garnett and trying to build with young players. There are a lot of teams with nice young players that are absolutely terrible teams (see Atlanta with Josh Smith, Josh Childress, Joe Johnson, Marvin & Shelden Williams and Charlotte with Sean May, Emeka Okafur, Raymond Felton and Gerald Wallace and now Jason Richardson). Having a group of young players might be fun to watch, but it doesn’t necessarily equate to a championship team.
So what are the parameters of this potential trade? From the sounds of it, the trade is EXACTLY the same thing Boston was offering one month ago, MINUS the #5 overall pick. How in the world does this make sense? If you were buying a car and the dealer said it was $40k and you turned it down, would you go back a month later and buy it for $50k? Unbelievable.
Rumor has it the actual specifics of the trade have Boston sending Al Jefferson (solid player who is 22 years old and averaged 16.0ppg and 10.9rpg last season in 69 games), Ryan Gomes (nice player, but not great), Gerald Green (an amazing athlete who knows as much about basketball as I know about space travel), Sebastian Telfair (a thug who likes to pack heat and would be a terrible influence for the young players the Wolves DO have) and Theo Ratliff (a washed up player included simply to make the contracts work).
If the Wolves decided to trade KG and get younger, I would not agree, but could understand that there was a direction for the franchise. Al Jefferson may turn into a franchise player, and that’s great. But again this is so upsetting because this is the same trade that was on the table a month ago MINUS the #5 overall pick (used for a very talented Jeff Green from Georgetown). There is no way to explain this current trade rumor to me that makes sense. We won’t want any of the Celtics draft picks because having Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and KG will earn a #30 overall pick or worse.
Glen Taylor, remember how the Vikings made the Dallas Cowboys a dynasty by trading for Hershel Walker?
I am absolutely convinced that I could perform my current job AND Kevin McHale’s job better than he is doing his job now. Is this a situation where McFale approached Danny Ainge and said, let’s make Boston a contender, I’ll quit my job (or get fired) with the Wolves, fly out to Boston and we’ll both smoke cigars in Red’s old office.
One more point.
Boston was able to get Ray Allen from the Sonics for Wally Szczerbiak (big contract), the #5 pick and a handful of scrubs. Did McFale even consider calling the Sonics and offering Ricky Davis (a 20ppg scorer who could go away at the end of the year if you wanted), Troy Hudson (who could be bought out) and the #7 pick (turned out to be Corey Brewer)? Would the Wolves be better with a lineup of Foye, Ray Allen and KG or Foye, Ricky Davis and Al Jefferson?
Again, if they made a decision to trade KG, that would be one thing. But, they are agreeing to a deal that was made a month ago only missing a possible future All-Star.
McFale gets paid to make horrible decisions like this. Amazing.
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