Timberwolves 91 - 81 Bulls

The Wolves played well tonight in a fun, fast paced game with a lot of ball movement by both sides. The Wolves started the 3rd quarter by holding the Bulls to 2 points and opening up a 20 point lead. With five minutes left in the quarter, it was critical point that the Bulls make up some ground to go into the 4th quarter looking at an achievable task. For the Wolves, it was critical to break the spirit of the Bulls and prevent a late rally. So of course the next five minutes were spent feeding the ball into the post and watching it bounce off of a confused Eddie Griffin's hands, as Luol Deng took over the game for the Bulls and started their comeback, taking the lead down to ten points, and closer in the 4th quarter. The Wolves did take back control in the 4th enough to keep the Bulls from making up any more ground.

They played a decent game against a .500 team, but it seems like both organizations need something to happen. The Wolves have a lot of mediocre players who don't consistently distinguish themselves even as role players. They also have no upside, as everybody's just getting older not better, they're too good to get a decent lottery pick (and draft poorly anyways), and have like $300m tied up in guaranteed contracts over the next few years. Unless one of the two big proposed trades goes through, the Wolves will lose the fans and be back to what they were for the first few years of their existence: the Washington Generals of the NBA, a team that provides a forum for basketball fans who want to see other NBA teams.

The Chicago sports media has been convinced since around 1995 that Kevin Garnett is a Chicagoan who desperately wants to return home to the embrace of a major media market. His repeated statements that he's from South Carolina and only lived one year in Chicago never seem to daunt the true believers, though, and for a decade they've reported first that he was going to sign as a free agent to replace Jordan, then that he would demand a trade and the Wolves would have to take whatever Chicago dangled for him. (When he bought a house in Malibu and not Villa Park, this did nothing to quell rumors of his heart being in Chicago.) The proposed trade is whoever the Bulls don't particularly need, they'll ship to Minnesota, and then with Garnett supplementing their existing talent they'll be a force in the Eastern Conference. The advantage to the Wolves would be some money in expiring contracts, and breaking the log-jam of having Garnett's salary tying up all their cap money. The only reason to do it is the Bulls can package New York's draft pick in the deal, which could give the Wolves a new franchise player. A lot of Wolves fans are rooting for this because we want to see a spectacular talent like Kevin Garnett play on a good team again in his career, and he can't do it here.

The other trade goes in the opposite direction, putting together a trade for Allen Iverson, who has been benched by the Philadelphia 76ers for basically just being Iverson and not showing up to practice. A combination of Garnett and Iverson could make the Timberwolves a serious playoff team again. It would certainly be nice to see KG with an actual second scorer again. It's now obvious Iverson is going somewhere as soon as possible since the 76ers won't play him, but Denver has a competing offer. This would be risky, but certainly interesting, and Iverson has been a treat to watch when I've seen him in Minnesota.

So in my opinion, either one of these trades has to go through, or the prospect of five more years of mediocrity will drive off the remaining fans, and Kevin Garnett will opt out of his contract in 2009 and sign with the Lakers or Clippers. Probably not the Bulls though, sorry.