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Timberwolves Notes: Wiggins Impresses, Thad Young Back, Martin's Surgery

Just some notes for your Tuesday

By Eric in Madison
Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports

Andrew Wiggins impressed DeMarcus Cousins on Saturday night:

Of course it was his biggest night as a pro so far. Hopefully he builds on it.

Thad Young will be back with the team in advance of Wednesday's tilt with the Bucks, which should be a fun game. We get to see the top two picks from this summer's draft face off against each other, plus the Greek Freak will be there.

I'll have more on the Wolves stats over the first 12 games, but they are now getting outscored by 9 points a game and are 29th in defensive rating. Despite being 6th in pace, they are dead last in 3PA, but also 7th in 3P%. That seems...inefficient. Of course now that Kevin Martin is missing...

They are also last in opponent's 3P%; teams are making an ungodly 43% against them. Not much of a surprise if you have been watching, as the Wolves seem either disinterested or unable to guard the corner three. Open look after open look.

Still, if you are feeling bad about the Wolves, go look at the 76ers Basketball-Reference page. Ouch. So much grim there.

Meanwhile, get ready for a lot of this:

It's going to be another long year. But at least we have vjl110 on the case.

Kevin Martin is undergoing surgery on his wrist; the optimistic take is that he will be back in six weeks or so. Without him, Corey Brewer has been starting at the two guard spot, and the offense has been running more through Andrew Wiggins. Punch Drunk Wolves has some thoughts on what Martin's absence portends.

Elsewhere...in an untterly non-shocking bit of news, prosecutor/apparent defense attorney Bob McCullough announces that the Grand Jury chose not to indict Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Mike Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

The announcement came in prime time, and was, in my opinion, handled about as poorly as possible. It seems clear that there was no indictment because he didn't want one; that's how these things work. Allowing the people responsible for choosing not to pursue justice to hide behind the skirt of the "grand jury," then blaming the media for things getting out of hand...as Nate in St. Paul put it last night, the justification was Bull Connoresque.

Of course the tear gas scenes in Ferguson last night were horrible. President Obama encouraging protesters to avoid violence on a split screen with police in riot gear and gas masks in the streets of Ferguson were an indictment of their own. An indictment of the racism that pervades this country. A reminder that we blame the victim. A visual aid that we insist that those suffering have more responsibility for their behavior than those who inflict that suffering.

And we still don't get it.

Today in History

1783: British abandon New York City, their last American military position. 
1792: Farmer's Almanac first published
1841: Survivors of the mutiny on the Amistad return to Africa
1864: Confederate plot to burn New York City fails
1867: Alfred Nobel patents dynamite
1897: Puerto Rico gains autonomy from Spain
1961: Bob Cousy becomes 2nd player to reach 15,000 points
1963: JFK interred at Arlington National Cemetery
1973: Speed limit cut to 55 mph to save fuel
1979: Pat Summerall and John Madden broadcast first game together
1986: Ronald Reagan reveals secret arms deal at the center of the Iran-Contra scandal

Today's musical birthday is Franz Xavier Gruber, most famous as the composer of Silent Night, which strikes me as particularly ironic and appropriate today.

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