Wolvescast Digest: Get Your Game On, Go Play

Welcome to the first edition of our weekly Wolvescast Digest, a roundup of NBA odds and ends related to your favorite hometown team. With so much fun NBA content on the web, it can be easy to miss things. We’re here to make it harder for things to fall through the cracks of your overtaxed attention spans. Feel free to leave a comment with anything that you feel deserves inclusion.

Local heartthrob Jon Krawczynski gets to the heart of what makes our father, Jimmy Buckets, special.

“My thing is I’m not the most talented guy,” Butler told The Athletic. “I won’t sit here and tell you that I’m the most athletic, I’m the best shooter, I’m the highest flyer. But what I pride myself on is being extremely tough and just playing hard. That’s a talent within itself.”

Glasses model and Star Tribune reporter Jerry Zgoda’s wide-ranging Q&A with the new four-time All-Star dares to ask what it would take for Jimmy to stay in Minnesota after his contract expires.

Q: A question from Twitter: What will get you to sign an extension here with your contract set to expire in 2019?

A: Got to win. We have to win. We’re doing a great job of that now, but if I’m winning, I’m happy. I’m not worried that it’s negative 50 degrees outside. I just want to win. I want to be happy. I want to be around good people. I think we have that right now.

Remember when Karl-Anthony Towns said he didn’t care about making the All-Star team and nobody believed him for a second? This is what caring looks like:

I’m so happy for him and his family. KAT looks happier than I’ve seen him in a long time.

Meanwhile, Jimmy had a slightly different reaction on Instagram:

CBS Sports’ Jack Maloney checks in with beloved former wolf Wayne Ellington who is “making it Wayne” in Miami this season.

“He’s a walking … trigger -- what do they call that in a video game? A cheat code? He’s a walking cheat code,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said before the Heat’s 106-101 victory. “He’s our version of this generation of the Miami Heat of Ray Allen.”

We should all react to Tom Thibodeau inscrutable media relations like ESPN’s Nick Friedell:

Must Read Story of the Week: Don’t miss this interview between The Undefeated’s Jemele Hill and Maya Moore of the Lynx, First of Her Name, the MVP, Queen of the Court, Champion at Every Level, Breaker of Records, and Mother of Buckets.

Q: Not just her, but Sue Bird, Breanna Stewart. There seems to be a different sense of solidarity between white and black athletes in the WNBA. We know you guys don’t make as much as male athletes, so in some respects you have even more to lose because you don’t have as much. So why do you think that level of fearlessness seems to exist among you?

A: I think there’s a pioneering, fighting kind of a spirit in the female athlete because, you know, we haven’t been raised on “All I have to do is play my sport and I’m going to have everything I want.” We’ve had to do extra and go above and beyond. And I think that builds a certain character in female athletes that gets shown in the best way when it comes to these social justice issues. It’s a natural extension of our experience, fighting for those eyeballs, for views, for attention. It’s the same thing; we’ve seen that cycle. We’ve seen the rhythm of the fight. I think the heart of the female athlete is so huge.

Steve Kerr continues to lead the league in dad jokes:

The Timberwolves have announced their plans for Flip Saunders Night. Do you think KG will be in attendance?

The Minnesota Timberwolves have announced plans for “Flip Saunders Night” at Target Center on Thursday, February 15. The Wolves will host the Los Angeles Lakers, with tip slated for 8 pm Central.

The centerpiece of the evening will be the unveiling of a permanent banner in Target Center to honor the memory of Flip. Other elements will include a donation by the Timberwolves Fast Break Foundation to the Flip Saunders Legacy Fund. Additionally, all fans in attendance will receive a Flip Saunders commemorative coin. One of Flip’s trademarks during his tenure with the Wolves was to create a new team coin each season for players and front office staff, then randomly give them to people he would encounter as a way to include fans on that season’s journey.

On last week’s Wolvescast, Neil and I expressed our disappointment with this year’s All-Star jerseys. Naturally, we decided to rank the 11 best All-Star jerseys in league history.

And the award for worst jersey goes to these monstrosities from 2008:

And finally, we leave you with this week’s compilation of tasty beats and basketball feats: Jams of the Week!

Let us know what we missed in the comments below!