I've been walking around with the feeling for a while now. Are our rookies getting enough burn in their first year into the league? We've heard McHale say he didn't expect our nr3 pick to take over... Why not McHale? We've seen it happen before. No, not just Lebron, there was this kid way back, he was the first in over 20 years to get drafted straight out of high school...

So when I read the post on Corey I started wondering again if he had gotten enough burn. Decided to check out the numbers and here's what I found out.

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Ed: Thanks to Pliny for getting a discussion going!

The matchups are as follows:

• Spain-Croatia
• Lithuania-China
• USA-Australia
• Argentina-Greece

Australia's the only team that's given the US any trouble so far (in an exhibition), but I still don't think it will be close - the Aussies will win easily ;) seriously though, Americans by 30 or so.  Lithuania could have a tricky time - China obviously has home-court, and the Lithuanians, very strangely, were just hammered by the Australians.  I still think Lithuania wins, I even think it will be by a fairly comfortable margin.  Finally, I think Argentina wins big - I could be wrong about the Greeks, but I think their reputation is still inflated from the win over the US 2 years ago.

Spain-Croatia, to me, is the most intriguing matchup.  José Calderón says this at his website (for which he needs to hire a new translator):

Sincerely, I see Croatia as a difficult rival. They beat us last year in the Eurobasket Championships and we had a very complicated game against them in the previous one, when we were close to losing against them. They are a team very similar to us: They have good players in all of the positions, a very broad rotation and players with international experience. They have height, technical and physical. The proof is that in the last competitions the games against Croatia have been very equal. We have to be aware that it is going to be a very complicated and hard game against a great team.

The Croatians also know the Spaniards extremely well, as many of their players have experience in the Spanish league.  Could be a very interesting game, the Croatians have looked good in every game except the one against Argentina, and pulled off an upset against Russia.  Spain, on the other hand, seem shaky to me, even though they only have one loss - this might sound hokey but I wonder if the infamous team photo hasn't given them some bad karma.  I hate to pick against Spain, given their talent level and how long they've been playing together, but I think I'm going to go with Croatia in an upset.

I know the value of Rashad McCants in the eyes of T Wolves fans is really varied, but I had a trade idea that I wanted input on.

What about Josh Boone and Marcus Williams for Shaddy. You get your backup point, and a center who plays pretty good d and thrives off of junk points. They get a killer scorer.  Oh and the salaries match up perfectly.  This would also make it easier for the Nets to trade Vince Carter and get ready to try for Lebron. Thoughts?

This is from Chris Mannix's summer league review at si.com, thought I'd post it if only because he seems to be bucking the trend here - I think a lot of people are coming around to Love after the summer league, but definitely not Mannix.  (ps Bryant Reeves?  ouch!)

If you read this space regularly -- and I know there are at least three of you -- you know that I am not a member of the Kevin Love Fan Club. It's not that I don't see him having a long NBA career; in fact, I think Love can be a serviceable forward for the next 10-12 years. But when you are taken with the fifth pick in the draft (and traded for a potential star like O.J. Mayo), you are expected to be more than a more skilled Bryant Reeves.

Statistically speaking, Love acquitted himself well in Las Vegas: In four games, he averaged 18 points and a league-best 13.5 rebounds. He was unquestionably one of the most skilled players on the floor and at times showcased a well-placed mean streak. But dominating Lorenzo Mata-Real is a lot different than picking apart Tim Duncan.

"You see all those pump fakes?" an Eastern Conference coach said. "He can do that against this competition. But he tries that [stuff] against Duncan or [Kevin] Garnett and it's going nowhere. At the end of the day, you have to remember he's a 6-8 guy who plays below the rim."

Here's something more disconcerting: Love is considered by some to be a major injury waiting to happen. An NBA front-office source with a team who worked out Love described him as a "train wreck" physically, pointing to his surgically repaired knee as the biggest point of concern.

Then there is the question of Love's weight. Several league sources I talked to expressed concern that Love, who dropped 15 pounds and reduced his body fat from 15-16 percent to 11-12 percent in the months leading up to the NBA draft, will put that weight back on once the regular season starts.

Stay tuned.

No topic yet on the game versus Milwaukee so I guess I'll start a Fanpost again.

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When reports came out that Love was McHale's man, I was surprised. He's an unathletic, undersized, power forward, I really didn't see that as a good compliment to Al Jefferson (another power forward). I mean if anything it's a little redundant, they aren't radically different in their skilset. Jefferson is the better back to the basket player and Love is by far the better passer, but he (Love) still operates most effectively in the post.  Exacerbating this issue is that both players are below average defensively. I thought logically the Wolves would want to pair Jefferson with an athletic defensive minded center to help anchor the defense, a player like Dalembert, or even Brenden Haywood. I do really like a lot of the things Love brings to the offensive end,  but I'm not sure both he and Jefferson can realize all of their potential paired together.

If Love proves to be the more well rounded player (and I think he is) does this mean that Jefferson will be traded?

I really did like the trade that McHale pulled off though. You managed to get rid of most of a lot of terrible contracts (Antoine Walker?) got Mike Miller (who will really help your outside shooting). I still think Mayo will end up a better player than Love or Miller, but I expect you guys will get another good draft pick this year, maybe get Jennings or Ricky Rubio.

Since the comments about the game were already a bit scattered by the time I got out of the hospital (all four of my wisdom teeth had to be removed) I'm gonna go ahead and scatter 'em some more. Here's my toughts after watching the archive stream.

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The 1st Summer League game is in the books and while we're all aware that it's just a practice game, there are a few things to take note of:

• Kevin Love is going to be able to rebound in the league.  No matter what happens with the rest of his game, he's going to grab a lot of rebounds on the basis of his strength, positioning, and grit.  He had 13 (5 offensive) in his debut.
  
• The Wolves may have assembled one of the worst Summer League teams in league history.  The Mavs were bringing players like Shan Foster and Derrick Low off the bench.  The Wolves had a few former Gophers and...well, it was ugly and the Mavs won on the strength of their bench. 
  
• Pooh Jeter, Blake Ahern, and Drew Neitzel are not the droids the Wolves are looking for at the backup point.  Here's hoping there's a Plan B to backup Foye. 
  
• It was very nice to see Kevin Love make in-game adjustments.  He had a terrible 1st quarter where he didn't seem capable of shuffling his feet side to side and he picked up 4 quick fouls.  After the 1st, he settled down, moved a ton without the ball, hit the boards hard, and was quite effective.  You could see by the end of the game that the points knew they could get the ball at 1/2 court anytime Love got a rebound or threw the outlet pass.  He also is going to make his living on the pick and roll with real players like Foye, Miller, and McCants around him.  It's too bad the other players on the team didn't seem capable of moving without the ball so that he could highlight his interior passing ability.  Seriously, there was a lot of standing around going on outside of Love.  It's pretty obvious when you watch someone who knows how to play surrounded by those who don't. 
  
• Corey Brewer made a number of fantastic moves to get open last night.  Of course, he followed up on these moves with equally un-fantastic moves right back into the teeth of the defense.  Brewer seemed hell bent on taking the path of most resistance to the hoop.  There were several drives where he found himself in space and instead of elevating for the shot, he kept on spinning and driving towards the backboard.   It was nice to see him aggressive and I doubt that we'll ever see him create a bunch of his own shots, but...well, here's hoping that he was having the same issues with the surrounding talent level as was Love. 
  
• Getting back to the awfulness of the Wolves' team, I don't think they have a single scorer or backcourt playmaker on their entire squad. 
  
• Did I mention that the Wolves have assembled a terrible SL squad? 
  
• It was nice to see Dwayne Casey at the head of a bench again. 
  
• Cupcake didn't get to play.
  
• Things to look for in the next game:
  • Will Love pick up early fouls?
  • Will Brewer play more under control?
    
  • Will Love look for his shot a bit more with zero talent around him?
    
  • Will Carney play?
    
  • Which over-matched guard will figure out that running the pick and roll/pop with Love is probably the best way to make the team?  

That's about it.  What were your final thoughts on the meaningless game? 

First off, a question: has the authenticity of this letter been verified?  I just read it all the way through (a serious undertaking) for the first time, and if it's really him, I really have to question his judgment on 2 points: his comment about Walker/Big Al, and his comments about Telfair.  Re: Walker: Stack says he was a locker room disturbance, and that they needed to get him out of there because he was "using Al to push for playing time for himself."  Re: Telfair: Stack says he "still needs to upgrade his shooting before we can consider him to be a bonifide [sic] part of our core moving forward."  Are these really things a GM says about his team?  Maybe they are verifiably true, especially in Telfair's case.  Still, this seems dangerously close to "calling out" Jefferson and Telfair - on the one hand, he is questioning Jefferson's locker-room judgment (and hence his ability to be a team leader); on the other, he's questioning Telfair's playing ability, and more broadly his place as a viable member of the team.

Anyways I do like his comments on Chalmers.  I'm not totally convinced he'll be a good pro - he's a very good shooter, and looks like he'll be a good defender, but at this point in time he's simply not a pg, and, to echo Stack, that's a difficult position to learn on the fly, especially as a 6'1 rookie.  Lucky for him he's in a perfect situation in Miami, as he would be in Cleveland or LA, since most of the ballhandling is done by another perimeter player, and his primary focus on offense will be to make open shots.  (This is why Derek Fisher is such a good fit for LA.)  I also like his comments on McCants and CDR, and on the Wolves' inside game with Jefferson, Love and Collins.

Am I the only guy who really wants the Wolves to sign Chris Richard?  I know we're suddenly deep at that position but hey, he's a very good rebounder and defender, shoots a good percentage, is smart, doesn't make mistakes, is young, has some potential.  Oh and according to Wikipedia his wingspan is like 7'5?!  I may be thinking more with my heart than my head since I like his game so much, but I would hate for the Wolves to lose this guy.