I tend to think they’ll take Curry since they’ll be in desperate, desperate need of shooters after this deal takes place. Seriously who’s going to space the floor- Gomes??? So this is one positive.

As for the other pick- I tend to like Harden better than Evans since Harden’s shown he can be effective off-the ball. Although if you were to take Evans you would need to pair him with a shooter like Curry.

Lastly- Songalia can probably give us some quality minutes of backup 4- next year. Not that the Wolves have any real shortage here.

and hope that Thabeet or Evans falls to # 6

Trade Love to Memphis and draft Rubio.
Trade #6 and #18 (and 28 or Pekovic if necessary) to OKC for #3 and draft Thabeet
Draft Harden with #5.

PG: Rubio/Telfair
SG: Harden/Brewer
SF: Gomes/Brewer
PF: Big Al/Rhino/Songaila
C: Thabeet/Etan Thomas

Love, while very solid, will never be worth more than #2 pick in any draft and I just don’t think Kahn is going to devote serious cash down the road to two players that play the same position.

We have an outside shooter in Harden, a playmaker in Rubio, a center to protect the rim in Thabeet, a perimeter defender in Brewer, a glue guy in Gomes, a solid backup PG in Telfair, decent depth still at PF, and lots of expiring contracts.

Great breakdown of the trade, s-n-p – actually got me to register!

Anyway, my take is that it’s a financially conservative move that also offers us an opportunity to improve, so it’s well worthwhile. The Wiz are in a “win now” mentality, so it’s best to take advantage of that while we can (for the record, I’m definitely cheering for Flip next year).

I’ll admit I’m a Rubio fan, but I couldn’t bear to see us part with significant assets (more than one of Love, Al, #5, #6) to acquire him, though I think having “A” and “B” teams (like Portland) would be interesting, with Al anchoring the half-court team and Rubio on the fastbreak team.

As for the other options, I’m still not quite feeling Curry – he’s a scorer, yet Al is maybe the worst facilitator from the block I’ve seen, barring a few Zach Randolph “efforts”. He also hasn’t played pick and roll offense much, instead relying on screens to get free – I’ll admit he’s better than any other recent prospect at the catch-and-shoot.

Pair Rubio and Evans.

Rubio, Evans, Brewer… Maybe literally the WORST jumpshooting team ever in the NBA. If we make the play for Rubio, we need to keep 5 or 6 and take Harden or Curry. Give Rubio a good spot-up jumpshooter to pair with in the backcourt (Harden/Curry), a low-post presence (Al Jefferson), a pick-and-roll partner who can shoot mid-range jumpers (Kevin Love), and an athlete or two finish his sweet transition passes (Brewer, Carney), and that’s a pretty dynamic line-up, especially offensively.

Rubio, Harden, Brewer, and Carney are all average-to-good perimeter defenders, so if we could pick up somewhere a big man who could rotate with Al and Love and protect the rim (but not one who comes at as high a cost as Thabeet) we’re going in a very good direction.

I remember seeing a post by SNP that the new word in the dictionary is Khan-ed. If he pulls off all these trades and rebuilds a worthy team in less than a year then… that definition might need to be rewritten.

I say we stay away from Thabeet and we do a nice combination of Harden, DeRozan, Curry and if Rubio falls cool, but dont trade for him.

In terms of veterans in the locker room are we solely going to rely on Mark Maden and Cardinal? I’m sniffing we need at least someone in the backcourt that can help these young guys and show them how to win.

I love Rubio but I would seriously question passing on Curry for Evans. They need shooters! Badly!! Ryan Gomes is by far their best returning 3 Pt-Shooter. If they don’t end up with Curry now I’ll be quite disappointed.

This draft still has disaster potential.

are you joking?…we need thabeet….al needs thabeet….and thabeet needs al…we could have the "best" back court in the nba….put thabeet with holiday….or teague…or any of the other pgs that are littering this years first round and we will be fine…im seriously tired of us drafting pgs and sgs that cant get the job done…i remember when going into a divisiong with the nugs TBs and jazz was a good thing….what happend?…oh yeah…we traded one of the greatest players in history to the leperchauns

There is risk involved with this trade.

1. Was this the best way to maximize assests going forward. This is going to be hard to prove alot will depend on who we get at 5. The reality is though we perhaps could have maximized assests in a different direction.

2. We have nothing in the backcourt. We’re probably in for another year of Sub 30 Win Ball because of this. For the long-term this seems a win- the short-term might not be pretty.

I may be a little biased because I am so high on curry, but I feel if we can get curry and put him at point and get harden we will have a great team. We can then we can use are 18th pick to maybe get a guy like Terrence Williams. The reason why I’m not sold on Rubio is because everyone says he can’t shoot, but he’s a terrific passer. But correct me if I’m wrong can anyone on our team shoot? We just traded our 2 best shooters who is he going to pass to? and Rubio plays an upbeat style. Look at our team right now we don’t have anyone who can run the floor. I think we get curry. Maybe get lucky with Harden and if not take Evens. Because that leaves us with someone who can attack the basket and someone who can shoot. Then with the 18th pick we get a SF or a back-up big man. Then with our 28th pick I think we take Chase Budinger or Wayne Ellington.

I starting 5 of
Curry
Evens
Ellington
Love
Jefferson

If this happens we have 2 great shooters in curry and Ellington, a great passer, driver, and defender in Evens and 2 pretty good big guys. Granted we may be undersized it’s still a great offensive team that is extremely young and over the years can gel and become great.

Keep the picks!!!

Thin backcourt or not…lets remember how terrible this team has been for the past two seasons and how young it will soon become. I don’t think we need to force the issue by drafting two backcourt players that fit together, rather we need to focus on talent and upside with all of these picks. Stockpile the best assets that other teams leave behind because they are drafting on need and sort out the roster down the road when we actually approach an NBA talent worthy roster (we’re a long ways away).

We are going to be a pretty crappy team this season and probably next too, but I can get excited about a roster full of good young players.

I posted this yesterday when we discussed the possibility of this trade but now that it’s official I figured I would post it again. I think we stay with #5 & #6 and let Memphis pick before doing anything else. Look at Memphis’ options:

1. Take Thabeet: Doesn’t necessarily fit but would be a BPA situation. Then OKC probably takes Harden and Sacramento decides our fate. Either way we get Evans or Rubio (according to DX we get both).

2. Take Evans or Hill: The two guys who make the most sense for them to take. Hill b/c he fills their biggest need and Evans b/c he played at Memphis and would be well received by the fans. This means that they simply couldn’t get equal value in trade and knew that Rubio & Thabeet just wouldn’t fit as well. OKC then takes Thabeet and we still have a great chance at Rubio.

3. Take Rubio: This automatically signals a trade from them. Almost certainly for Rubio but there is a small (2%) chance it could be Conley on the way out (like I said small). I don’t see any other team having the assets and flexibility that the Wolves do. Unless the Kings want to give up Jason Thompson (unlikely) or the Knicks can work out a S&T with David Lee (unlikely), we seem to be in the drivers seat. OKC takes Thabeet, Sac takes Evans and we walk away with Rubio/Harden.

My money would be that Memphis goes for option #3. Jordan Hill is IMO the best option for them. I think they draft Rubio #2 and we take Jordan Hill #6 (b/c his salary would then be lower than #5, an incentive for the Grizz). I think the deal has something to do with them getting #18 and shedding a small amount of salary (Darko & Haddadi for Madsen & Smith & Pecherov)

This could happen, but is it the most probable outcome?

Would Memphis prefer Hill/#18/ some salary relief over Thabeet? You’re banking that they either dislike Thabeet and/or love Hill….not sure if I see that.

If Rubio is the player people think he is SAC is not passing on him.

which concerns me is the roster. As i said in another thread, we have 11 guaranteed contracts, 3 1st rounders, and just did a 2 for 3 players with another pick. That nets us 16 potential guaranteed contracts. 1 too many. 2 to many if Kahn wants to resign Carney.

So now, all 2nd round picks and at least 1st round pick become “stash” players. Or is Taylor going to let Kahn buy some guys out to clear roster? If he does, I think we will be in luxury tax range. Can’t see Taylor doing that.

So, while there is euphoria in the fact that we finally have a GM do something, I am really hoping this is a 1st step to at least a few more. Because if it stops here, I think we wasted more valuable assets (expiring contracts) to get less desirable assets (an over abundance of picks for which we do not have roster space for in a weak draft)

Eli Whitney is famous for good reason. I’ve always been an advocate of interchangeable parts in a rebuilding program, which is one of a number of things that makes me hope like hell we don’t draft Tyreke Evans. Something in me says Kahn is done before he starts with the idea of drafting someone without a clear-cut position for this backcourt, much less someone who may, in fact, not be able to create for a roster full of backcourt scrubs who need him to create for them. We absolutely cannot have someone whose self-confessed alter ego is Tracy McGrady trying to run a backcourt. But my bigger point is that players without clear backcourt positions present a sort of paralysis masquerading as “flexibility”— because Foye had promise at the 1, we hesitated to bring on a true point; because he had promise at the 2, we hesitated to bring on a true shooting guard. And so forth. Get a true point in this draft. Get a true shooting guard. If one or both of them do not pan out, trade one or the other for a true point guard or a true shooting guard. Just please do not lock us into combo hell for another four years putting bit-playing guards around someone who is built like a shooting guard, shoots like a power forward, and is asked to play point guard while channeling T-Mac.

I agree that they essentially have to make another move for roster space reasons, so this thing is far from done.

Trading up to 2 only makes sense if they don’t have to give up much more than 6 and 18. Maybe they throw in Smith because of the insane number of PF on the roster. If so, then we draft our new back court of Rubio/Harden. If we stay put, then it’ll either be Curry/Harden or Evans/Harden.

I would argue that we’ll need to package together some of the later picks to move up in the draft or get ourselves an established player for both talent and roster space reasons. You can’t stash away that many Euros, otherwise you might just as well start a Euro-farm team.

This is a question out of my own ignorance.

The beat writer from NY who broke the story just rehashed and said that it is not a done deal yet.

http://twitter.com/alanhahn

The price to move up to the second is the five and six? Why would we do that? I hope to God we dont! How about we end up with 2 and 9 or 10? Why hasn’t that been thrown around as an alternative? A third team like Toronto or New York are definitely interested in moving up and would give up some nice assets for 4 or 5 spots. Memphis would receive the 5 or 6 with the other team taking the other… we get the 2 and 9 or 10 and New York sends someone to Memphis for Marko.
MN: Picks 2 and 9 or 10
Mem: Pick 6 and David Lee???
NY: Pick 5 and Marko
Memphis might even settle for Nate Robinson instead of Lee just to get rid of Marko. We can still get DeRozan at 9 or 10 I am sure while netting Rubio. If not, draft someone like Flynn and trade him later for Henderson or Clark as a big 2/3.

With 18 we get in this order: Mullens, whoever is left from Louisville, Lawson, Hansborough, or Daye
With 28 we nab anyone who is left over from 18, Calathes, or a Euro prospect
In the second round try for Jodie Meeks for a great shooter/scorer and/or Demar Carrol, Taj Gibson or Greivis Vasquez for some high energy guys (like Vujacic, House, Posey, Varejao).
We will be able to get rid of a couple rookies into the D League right away until some contracts expire, not like we really need energy guys until we are close to making the playoffs anyways and thats not gonna happen for a couple years…unless our Kahn Man has some more tricks up his sleeve.

All I know is that I would NOT trade 5 and 6 for two without getting another pick in the top 10 as well. Then we at least get the 1 and 2 spots covered while possibly trading our second PG if DeRozan is gone for a SG in the middle of the first round.

Mostly because if you draft Rubio or Thabeet- the rest of the roster is in desperate need of shooters and wings.

One, I’m a huge fan of this deal. This team needs to be bold. Every NBA championship in the last 30 years has had two All-Star caliber players on it and with the exception of the 2004 Pistons had one Hall of Famer. I’m not saying the guys we get at 5/6 or even if we move-up to 2 or 3 will be All-Stars, but we can say with certainty that Foye and Miller will never be.

Two, this trade forces us to take another look at the Mayo/Love trade b/c it doesn’t happen (I think…more below) without Miller.

Three, is one benefit of Kahn’s boldness the ability to attract a higher caliber coach? I would imagine JVG, Avery, Mark Jackson etc would find our post draft roster to be loaded with potential.

Four, I wonder if Kahn tried to get Wizards’ to throw-in Nick Young (preferred) or DeShawn Stevenson instead of all the bigs to better replenish our depleted backcourt. I would have loved to have gotten Young instead of 3 PFs, but probably wouldn’t have happened.

Five, I wonder if we needed to include both Foye and Miller. I ask not b/c I think they had any long term future with team, but b/c they may have been decent trade assets in trying to move-up to 2 or 3. Apparently, Wiz asked for our #18 and Kahn rightly denied them so it may have required both Foye and Miller. Brings up another interesting point…what was more valuable trade asset: Miller, Foye or #18?

Finally, my initial instinct was to package 5 or 6 and #18 to move up to2 or 3 and I think I still fall there, but what about sitting tight at 5/6. At the very least we’ll have some combo of Curry/Evans/Harden and I’d love to see Rubio or Thabeet fall to us. We’ll still have options at #18. If we don’t have PG with 5/6 than we can maybe get Lawson, Maynor or Teague. If we draft two guards at 5/6 we can grab Mullens at 18 (or throw-in 28 to move up a bit to get him).

I can say this is the most excited I’ve been about the T-Wolves in some time. And by the way, when was the last time the T-Wolves were the headline story on front page of ESPN? KG trade focused on Celtics.

Should be fun watching the draft tomorrow night.

Maybe the Wolves should trade up for Harden? There are a half-dozen PG’s that look good to me, but damned few SG’s.

Not sure if it’s been pointed out here before, but Hollinger’s rankings reflect very poorly on Rubio. He has real questions as to whether or not Rubio is going to be able to score at all in NBA.

Love is a perfect trigger man for a transition offense. Rubio, Carney, Brewer, Evans are runners. Al, not so much. Al could do the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar thing and trot down for the half-court offense if needed.