The most difficult thing is the teasing

As I sit here on a late Sunday afternoon, the Timberwolves are currently getting their collective asses kicked by the Boston Celtics. In many ways this doesn't really bother me. The C's, after all, are one of the three best teams in the Eastern Conference. They are two years away from winning the title. And they have a helluva lot more talented than the Baby Wolves.

But it caps a week that demonstrates to me just how tough it is to hang with a team through rebuilding.

The tough part isn't knowing there are games when your team doesn't have a shot and will need something close to a miracle to win. What's tougher is simply the teasing.

The teasing? Yep.

Let's look back at the past nine days or so. Last Saturday they get stomped at Sacramento, losing by 20. Monday night they respond by getting a very nice win at Utah. They come back Wednesday night and show not nearly enough effort in a bad loss to the Clippers. And then they lead tip-to-horn in the rematch against Sacramento and win. Tonight, the Wolves are simply overmatched and that could be the case again Tuesday against Atlanta.

Maybe I'm not patient enough for the reality of NBA rebuilding, but I'd like to see more consistent play. I know there are a large number of teams that are flat-out better than the Wolves, but I'd like to begin to see the elimination of the really bad performances.

The Wolves, as bad as they are, aren't 20 worse than Sacto. They shouldn't fail to show up for a winnable home game against the Clippers.

I get that 82 games is a lot of games. Maybe this doesn't have much of a point, but I'd like to see a few of the bad games vanish. I also know this isn't simply a Minnesota problem. Oklahoma City has run into a little of this. Sacramento has done the same as has Milwaukee. Even Portland -- albeit the injury-riddled Blazers -- have struggled with this.

I am happy that this team is getting better. Waiting for the the Wolves to make another small step is difficult.

I love eBay/what to expect tonight.

I just walked back to my desk from the printer. In my hand is the printout of two tickets for tonight's Wolves-Clippers game. I bought them off of eBay. $100 worth of tickets that I scored for $18.30. How good is that? For less than the price of going to a movie, I'll get to see a number of good young NBA players. Will I see a playoff team? Probably not, but it should at least be interesting.

What exactly will I see this evening? The team that got crushed at Sacramento? Or the one that made good plays (with Gomes out) down the stretch in Monday night's win at Utah?

While the Timberwolves still have but four victories this season and are last in the Western Conference, there are some good things out there. A look at them:

- The biggest thing is that the Wolves simply have a better clue as to what Rambis wants offensively. There looks to be less confusion and less standing around.

- JFlynn, in the process, seems to have a better sense of what he wants to do and is playing with more confidence. His play at the end of the Utah victory was strong. I didn't like the early-in-the-clock three with a couple of possessions remaining. But the way he beat Deron Williams off of the bounce on the winning basket was very good. That is especially the case considering that the screen to get him loose never really got Williams.

-I'll be interested in seeing Corey Brewer tonight. He played his best game of the season against Utah in that he played a bunch of minutes, scored 22 points, shot better than 50 percent from the floor, had two assists for every turnover and took a great charge in the final 45 seconds on Carlos Boozer. While I didn't see the Sacramento game, he shot better than 50 percent in that game as well. I hope that he has figured out the magic of good shot selection. If that is the case, that would be significant for the Wolves.

-Has Big Al finally returned? On the recent road trip, Big Al averaged 24.3 points and 12 rebounds per game. He scored 23 or more points in each game, marking the first time this season he has gotten 20 in three straight games. Maybe the knee is starting to feel good. It will be interesting to see what he can do against Chris Kaman tonight. Al only had 13 points against the Clippers earlier this season while turning the ball over eight times.

FLYNN FOURTH: If you have ESPN insider access, you can read David Thorpe's analysis of the rookie class at this point. Thorpe rankes Flynn fourth behind Tyreke Evans, Brandon Jennings and Omri Casspi. I totally get the first two. I'm not as sold on Casspi, but I can't totally argue either as the native of Israel is having a fine rookie season for the Kings. At the same time, he doesn't have nearly the responsibilities as Flynn either.

That's it for now. Looking forward to an evening at Target Center tonight.

Dead Freakin' Last

That is where Marc Stein has the Wolves now in his weekly power rankings. You can see it here.

I'm not sure the Wolves are last as they have played better since Love's return. That said, I only saw the first half of Saturday night's butt-kicking from Sacramento. It appears as if keeping the wife happy was a good move because that thing got UGLY.

Tonight at Utah? Would love to say that I'm optimistic.

I do have an eBay bid on some tickets for Wednesday night against the Clippers. Will know by the end of the night if I'll be in Target Center for the big game.

Also, make sure you check out the New York Times story on the Triangle offense. It is some good stuff.

That's it for now. I might be tweeting during tonight's game, so make sure you're following @the600project.

UPDATE: Timberwolves.com says Gomes isn't going to play tonight after tweaking his knee. He can walk and should be fine, but won't play tonight. Audio link here

Thoughts on Lakers and Kings

Well, let's get the most interesting item of last night out of the way. Here is the link to the Corey Brewer total facial of Derek Fisher from last night. It is nasty.

The game itself wasn't nearly as awful as I expected it to be. The Wolves actually played pretty well against a Lakers team that is, frankly, way better and way more talented. It was a one-point game at halftime and finished as a 12-point loss to the team that is clearly the best in the West.

I really thought this was probably Al Jefferson's most complete game this season, especially considering the level of competition. Big Al finished with 24 and 13 while shooting better than 50 percent from the floor. While everyone would like to see the pre-knee injury Al from last season, that hasn't always been the case. But against the Lakers, there were more glimpses of it.

In addition, Sessions was very effective, especially in the second quarter as the Wolves kept this from being a total ass kicking.

As I posted yesterday, that brings us to another challenging game tonight at Sacramento. I know what you might be thinking: Sacramento, they suck. Wolves will win for sure.

I'm not sure that I agree with that line of thinking. The Kings, in my estimation, have exceeded expectations as much as any team in the Association. Sacramento, after all, won only 17 games and current Wolves assistant Reggie Theus was fired just 24 games into the season.

This season, Sacramento has won nine games despite playing without its best player -- Kevin Martin -- for much of the year. I truly thought when Martin went down that the Kings were again going to be the worst team in the West.

Exactly what has happened under new coach Paul Westphal is difficult to completely explain. Rookie guard Tyreke Evans has been very good (20.2 ppg) and really might end up as the best rookie in the league (even despite Brandon Jennings going for 55 earlier this year). In addition, second year big Jason Thompson has shown significant improvement.

I have taken to watching the Kings a little bit at night on League Pass and one thing that has been fairly consistent is that Sacramento really plays hard. Effort is sometimes easier to see than it is to quantify, but here's one area where it shows -- the Kings are outrebounding opponents by 40 for the season in 21 games.

While the Kings are better, this is the most realistic opportunity for the Wolves to get a win on this road trip. It won't be easy, but it also isn't impossible. It will be interesting to see how the Wolves respond to the second night of a back-to-back.

On additional note: There was an interesting CBSSports.com story yesterday that discusses NBA attendance/revenue. This might not be a shock to anyone who has been to Target Center this season, but Ken Berger says that the Wolves revenue is down 24.4 percent over a year ago. That, my friends, is fairly scary.

If there is some good news it is that the Wolves are not in the bottom five in PAID attendance per game. Memphis is last in the league, averaging only 6,879. Sacramento, Milwaukee, Philly and Charlotte all also average less than 9,000 paying customers per game. The Wolves are 21st in announced attendance (generally tickets distributed) at 15,077 per game. It is very unclear what the paid number is.

One other tidbit from the story shows that the Wolves are among teams bringing in less than $500K in revenue/game.

"Compared to full-season figures for 2008-09, the number of teams netting less than $500,000 in gate receipts per home game has grown from five to eight, with the Sixers, Kings, and Bobcats joining the Grizzlies, Timberwolves, Bucks,Pacers, and Hawks in the under-$500K club."

Will Sessions be moved?

That's at least a possibility according to ESPN.com's Marc Stein.

He lists Sessions as one of the players most likely to be moved in this piece.

Does that make sense? It's not a crazy idea. With Jonny Flynn appearing to get more and more comfortable, it certainly looks like Sessions' minutes are going to go down as we get further into this season.

That, however, does create some issues. The biggest of which is who the hell would back up Flynn? Obviously they could get a backup PG in a deal or sign somebody from the D-League or something. Some of that could make sense if the hope is to get John Wall.

Anyway, food for thought. Just wanted to pass it along.

A couple of quick items

Semi short of time here this morning, but wanted to throw out a couple of things for my faithful readers (seriously, I love the comments).

In this morning's Star Tribune, it was pretty clear that Jerry Zgoda went to Lakers practice yesterday.

A couple of the highlights:

- The last four Wolves losses have come by an average of 2.7 points. The previous 11 losses were by an average of 18.8 points.

- Phil Jackson on the Wolves: "They look like they started to get it about a week and a half ago. They're starting to play better. It's nice to see his team starting to play well and be competitive. They've gotten over the hump, so to speak, so I'm warning our guys not to take them lightly."

My thoughts:

1. I expect the Wolves to get their asses completely kicked tonight at Staples Center. If we have learned anything in the first six weeks of this NBA season, it is that the Lakers are in a different universe from the rest of the teams in the West. Eight of the Lakers 17 victories this season have been by 15 or more points. They beat Utah the other night by 24 points. They have a 19- and a 20-point win over Phoenix. They beat the Bulls by 15, Oklahoma City by 16, New Orleans by 16, Memphis by 16 and Golden State by a whopping 33. Basically I'm going with no expectations and if the Wolves make it somewhat competitive, I'll be thrilled.

2. If the Wolves can win one game on this three-game road trip, that would be a pretty good feat. I'm guessing, however, that it will be an 0-3 trip. Winning at Sacramento seems like the most obvious place to get a win, but the surprising Kings are 8-3 at Arco this season (losing only to Miami, Chicago and Atlanta). In addition, guess who doesn't play tonight? Yep, Sacto. And Monday night in Utah? I say no chance. The Jazz are going to want to give the Wolves a serious beatdown after losing here last Saturday.

3. Here are a few things I'll be watching for on this trip: How long can Rambis keep bringing Love off of the bench? How will the minute distribution between Flynn and Sessions evolve? How will Ellington adjust now that teams have some film of him playing legit minutes?

That's probably it from here today. Please chime in whenever in the comments. I am happy to hear from you, even if you disagree with me.

The perfect game?

The email was on my BlackBerry when I woke up this morning. The sender was a friend of mine who loves all things Minnesota sports. The Wolves aren't his favorite team, but he watches a good number of games and has a decent sense as to what is going on.

His take was simple: Last night's loss to New Orleans was the perfect game for the Timberwolves.

I'm not sure that I believe with that, but I do get his point. The Timberwolves played very well for 2 1/2 quarters and still had a chance to win the game in the final minutes. Jonny Flynn set a career high in assists, KLove was again solid and Big Al put up good numbers.

And they lost.

My buddy says he's now on the bandwagon for the Wolves to lose as many games as possible so they have the best chance at winning the lottery and landing John Wall. The way he puts it, "the difference between 15 and 22 victories is irrelevant, but if that means we can get just one more ping-pong ball, it's worth losing."

My take has been that the Wolves need to eliminate this culture of losing and at least establish a culture of improvement. I was disappointed that the Wolves had awful offensive execution in the second half that was littered with turnovers and predictable play. I was bummed that Flynn lost CP3 on that last inbounds play. Because while New Orleans isn't what it was a couple of years ago, it is still a decent team. I would like to see the Wolves win some games -- like the Saturday win over Utah -- against teams that are at least in the conversation for the playoffs. I'd also like to have them show some improvement so that they might be on the radar screen of more people in the Twin Cities. Because eventually this whole economic model of no one showing up will collapse.

What are your thoughts? Should people hope for loss after loss? Or should they try to squeeze out every possible victory?

The worst job in sports?

There are certainly bad jobs out there in the sports world. You could do the laundry of large NFL linemen. You could be one of those goofy guys with the flags at the Vikings. You could be Tiger Woods' PR guy right now.

But is there a tougher job in sports than to be someone trying to make a living by selling tickets for the Timberwolves?

These poor folks -- who can't be making all that much money -- have to try to find a way to get people to buy tickets from the team to see a team that is off the radar of way too many people in town.

Tonight the Wolves host New Orleans. I don't have corporate or vendor tickets for tonight's game. Now I realize I should probably go home after work, deal with the snow in my driveway and curl up in front of my TV to watch the game. But there is something about watching Chris Paul in person that has me at least considering another option.

It is amazing how little you can get into a game for now at the Target Center (can you really go more than about 48 hours without receiving some sort of ticket email from the team?). A quick glance at Craigslist/StubHub/eBay/Ticket King has pairs upstairs for less than $10. Downstairs tickets can be had for very little as well. I can only imagine what scalpers are getting outside. Can't be much.

This leads me to something of a moral question: Do you ever feel like you should buy from the team? That way the Wolves don't lose as much money, people might not lose jobs, the team can't use the 'we're losing money so we can't get better' card.

I am sometimes torn on that. I'm cool with buying from the team, but I need to look out for my own pocketbook as well. A cheap or free ticket that happens to end up in my lap is always a good thing and, obviously, I'm going to buy a beer or two and something to eat at the game.

Anyway, still considering ticket options. Maybe I'll see if somebody on Craigslist gets desperate by the end of the afternoon and I can grab some good seats for peanuts. Otherwise, I'm probably going blow snow and watch on TV.

And if you are someone trying to sell tickets in this market, I feel for you. I think the product isn't bad and is worth watching, but this is the biggest problem with the start of the seasons. The Wolves can no longer sell hope to the public and that is not a good thing.

Perhaps progress at the quarter pole

OK, I know that 82 games isn't divisible by four. But for the sake of this little blog post, I'm calling 20 games into the season to be the quarter mark.

For the Minnesota Timberwolves, the first fourth of the season hasn't been terribly pretty. There was a 15 game losing streak. There were lots of new faces. There was little Kevin Love. There was Al Jefferson, but not at 100 percent.

But on Saturday night, there were brief signs of life. A murmur. A little something. If the NBA season was a Grey's Anatomy episode, the Wolves would still be on the operating table and Christina would be bitching about something while Derek attempted another impossible surgery. On second thought, maybe I should quit the Grey's Anatomy reference since Seattle couldn't even keep its NBA team.

But as I sat in Target Center on Saturday night, I couldn't really believe what I was seeing. The Wolves played with confidence. They, largely, made good decisions down the stretch. They knocked down open shots. And they beat Utah for their first home victory since opening night.

While Utah is more middle-of-the-pack than great, the Jazz do still have some nice pieces. They have a great PG in Deron Williams, they have a system and they usually don't beat themselves.

At the end, I don't really care that the Wolves won on Saturday. I do, however, care about how they won. They won, in large part, by going young. Over the final 5-plus minutes, Rambis went with this lineup:

Big Al, KLove, Gomes, Flynn and Ellington.

Or 24 years old, 21, 27, 20, 22

Or sixth year, second year, fifth year, rookie, rookie

This, to me, is progress. I understand that making the Wolves competitive is going to be a process. I get that it is going to take time. And I'm cool with that. I'm cool with them losing if it means truly playing guys who have a chance moving forward.

What I'm not cool with is playing the guys who aren't part of the longer term future. I don't want to see Pecherov on the floor at the end of games. I don't want Jawai. I certainly don't want to see Brian Cardinal.

I say play the kids and see what happens. I'm cool with a little bit of Damien Wilkins, but not a ton. I don't think Ryan Hollins is really an answer, so I want only small doses. I am also not super excited to see Corey Brewer on the floor during the final minutes because he simply isn't good enough.

One more thing. Less Sasha Pavlovic would be nice.

To me the return of KLove and the improved play of Ellington helps greatly in this area. Against the Jazz, neither Pecherov or Jawai saw the floor and Hollins played less than 13 minutes. We all know that Kevin Love has a chance to be a very good player in the NBA. He may never be an All-Star, but he is very, very solid. He rebounds like crazy, he starts the team's transition game and he makes very few mistakes. After all, he has two double-doubles in two games. What's wrong with that?

But as important as Love's return is to the Wolves, the emergence of Ellington in the past week can't be overlooked. Part of the reason why I like Ellington is that he seems to have a good understanding of what he can't do and he tries to find ways to do what he is good at. He's a good outside shooter, he's a pretty good passer and he's kind of sneaky good as a rebounder.

Over the past three games, Ellington has averaged 26 minutes, 3 rebounds and 10 points per game while shooting .619 from the floor and averaging more assists than turnovers. Let's compare him with Corey Brewer. Over Brewer's past five games (easy stats on espn.com), he is averaging 25.8 minutes, 3.4 rebounds, 8 points per game while shooting .372 and turning the ball over more than getting assists.

Corey Brewer seems like a nice guy. He seems to be in good shape after missing almost all of last season with a kneed injury. And he's a good dunker. But Wayne Ellington is way more efficient offensively, doesn't make as many dumb plays and doesn't need as many shots to score.

The biggest difference to me is that he seems to know his limitations and avoids things he isn't good at while Brewer either doesn't know or doesn't care that his range is about four feet from the basket. He also tries for the impossible a little more than I'd like and that leads to turnovers.

Anyway, this thing has gone in about 12 different directions, but I think the combination of KLove returning and Ellington seeing more late-game minutes is a step in the right direction.

Returning from injury. And what might have been.

When Wolves play tonight at New Orleans, much of the focus will be on Kevin Love. Jerry Zgoda just tweeted that Love will play tonight for the first time this season after breaking a bone in his hand during the preseason.

But I keep thinking back to last Feb. 8. That was the night that Al Jefferson went down in a heap near the end of a loss to the Hornets. You know the rest of the story: Torn ACL, out for the season, Wolves go into a total tailspin.

The Wolves had just gone 13-9 over the previous 22 games, but would go a brutal 7-25 the rest of the way.

Even now, I don't think Al is fully healthy. He's played, but hasn't looked like himself. He's been great at times and then vansished at other times. It might be another month until he's fully the Al we once knew.

But what happens if Al isn't on the floor in the final 30 seconds at New Orleans Arena? How many more games do they win? Another five? Another 10? What does that do to the team's draft position?

Do they make the move with the Wizards? Do they end up with Rubio and Flynn? Do they end up with someone like Tyreke Evans or Brandon Jennings?

Back to Love. I am interested to see how much he plays tonight and, as a result, how much he plays tomorrow night at Target Center against the Jazz.

As Phil Miller wrote in the Star Tribune this morning, the Wolves should be able to take advantage of Love's ability to outlet the ball quickly and play faster. There is reason to believe that one of the slowest offenses in the NBA will speed up and get more easy baskets.

I don't think this is going to be an immediate fix for the Wolves. Love needs to get in a little better game shape -- working out is not the same as playing in a NBA game. But I do think the Wolves are going to get better.

How much better is a question. Just as it is interesting to think about what could have happened if Big Al had had a better last trip to New Orleans.

Entering a cold winter

Thanks to some corporate seats, I was about 12 rows up on the side from Ramon Sessions when he missed the first of two free throws last night. All he had was an opportunity to last night's game in the closing seconds and potentially force overtime against the Memphis Grizzlies.

I watched the Wolves melt down, again, in the third quarter and give up control of a game that they owned in the first half. I watched defense -- especially on Rudy Gay and Zach Randolph -- become super soft.

A postgame beer later, I walked out into a brisk night and it hit me: This is all we've got. The Timberwolves are a bad team and even though Kevin Love could be back as soon as Friday night, I'm not sure things are going to really change.

Because let's be honest. If you can't beat a bad Memphis team that was playing the final game of a five game road trip at home, how good can you really be?

I tried to be optimistic even as the Wolves won game after game. I thought it was the schedule and that the home losses weren't really all that bad. But nobody is going to confuse Memphis with the Lakers or the Celtics. While the Grizzlies do have a few good players, there doesn't seem to be a big team concept going on there.

And if you can't beat a Griz team with an injured point guard, who are you going to beat?

It has been five weeks since the Wolves won their home opener. When are they going to win again at Target Center?

I truly thought this team would be improved over a year ago. Damn was I wrong. And it's going to be a long, cold winter.

KLove back by the weekend?

Jerry Zgoda blogs about it here. Love says he's hoping for Saturday against Utah. But Tuesday at Toronto could be the date as well.

The month ahead: December

The Wolves enter December on a win-a-month pace. They won once in October and then, 15 losses later, won the final game in November. Here's a look at where they are, how that compares with a year ago and what to expect over the next month.

Overall record: 2-15

November record: 1-14

Record through November last season: 4-11

December record last season: 2-14

What to expect: While the bar is admittedly quite low, it seems quite unlikely that the Timberwolves will be as bad in December as they were in November. The team should be gaining a greater understanding of the Kurt Rambis' offense and get a better sense of what the head coach wants. In addition, Kevin Love -- who hasn't played since breaking a bone in his non-shooting hand during a preseason game at Chicago -- should return by mid-month at the latest.

And there is the schedule. The December schedule is easier. Much easier.

After a November that saw the Wolves make three separate trips to the West Coast and have double games with Phoenix, Portland and Denver (along with the Clippers), things are much different.

The Wolves only have one West Coast trip in the month, they have eight home games instead of seven and the multiple games are against Utah, New Orleans and a surprising Sacramento team.

In addition, there are simply more games that you look at and say, "They might be able to win that." That starts Wednesday night with a home game against Memphis. In addition, there are two games against a banged up New Orleans team, two with the Kings, a home game against the Clippers, a game at awful New Jersey and a home game against Washington.

What's realistic: The Wolves should win at least four games this month and five or six isn't completely crazy. Five wins in December would put the Wolves ahead of their victory pace at that point a year ago. That, however, is a bit deceiving as the McHale led Wolves went 10-4 in January.

Game worth seeing: I am a big fan of two things. I like teams on the rise and I like catching teams from the East that only make one trip to MSP. Because of that, I'm calling the Dec. 22 game against Atlanta as the one to go to. The Hawks are an example of why NBA fans need to have patience. Five years ago, Atlanta went 13-69. Since then the Hawks have steadily increased their win total, going from 26 to 30 to 37 and 47 a year ago. They are currently 12-5 this season with two wins over Portland, a win at Boston and a win over Miami. Plus the game is a chance to see Joe Johnson in person. After the uber-elite of LeBron, DWade and Bosh, Johnson will be among the most interesting free agents available this summer.

Three Random Things

Maybe I'll make this a regular part of the blog. We'll see I guess. But here are Three Random Things going through my mind when it comes to the NBA.

1. My biggest weakness has become the Golden State Warriors.

Some people love chocolate. Other people can't stop smoking. I can't stop watching the Golden State Warriors.

I know that the Warriors are totally flawed and dysfunctional. I know that Monta Ellis said on the first day of training camp that there was no way that he and Steph Curry could play together. I know that they were dumb enough to sign S-Jax to a big deal and then trade him away for not a whole lot. I know that Don Nelson does crazy things like not play Anthony Randolph enough minutes.

But, man, are they fun to watch. The ball moves like crazy. Ellis attacks the rim like he's twice the size that he is. Anthony Morrow might be the best three-point shooter in the Association. And they can run it up on almost anybody. 

It has reached the point for me that if I'm flipping around the League Pass offerings and the Warriors are play, I'm probably watching. Hell, I'm considering trying to buy one of those sweet "City" T-shirts. Last night's game against Indiana was a perfect example of why. The Pacers had no clue as to slow down Ellis. He finished with 45 despite fouling out with about six minutes left on what I thought was a crap block/charge call. 

Tonight, the Warriors play Denver and I'll probably watch again. Nothing like a little late night up and down.

2. What doesn't get talked about regarding Brandon Jennings

Upon my return from Thanksgiving, I found Sports Illustrated sitting in my mailbox. In it was a nice piece on Brandon Jennings. While I've seen him mentioned a little bit in stories on Jennings, this piece quoted former Oklahoma and Indiana coach Kelvin Sampson at length.

I really think that Sampson's role on the Milwaukee staff has helped Jennings greatly. Sampson was one of those college coaches that forced his guys to work. He was a cheater, but he got his guys to work, play hard, defend and get after it. Sampson has worked hard with Jennings on his outside shooting -- what many people thought was his biggest weakness. He has repeatedly worked him out, put him through drills and given him confidence.

Plus almost all of Sampson's coaching career has been spent dealing with players around Jennings' age. He understands what a teenager is like, what a teenager wants and how to get through to them. That can only be a bonus. 

3. My new reading material

Over the weekend, I picked up the still pretty new Bill Simmons' The Book of Basketball. First, you have to love Costco. The list price for this massive 700-page epic is $30. I saw it at Target for $21. I bought it at Costco for $16 and change. 

I'm not super far into the book,  but it seems as if it is going to be a good read. Simmons is funny and I had no idea about his history of going to Celtics games at Boston Garden. The book seems cool so far and the footnotes are hilarious. 

I'm sure there will be more updates down the line.

That's three items. And I'm out. Look for a post later about the month ahead for the Wolves.

Yes, amazing does happen.

Yes, cue up the Kanye West. 

The Minnesota Timberwolves won a game. On the road. Against a good team. It is quite amazing.

I thought the Wolves were destined for an 0-for-November streak when they entered Sunday night's game at Denver. Minnesota, after all, was playing a Nuggets team that defeated it by 13 points at home just a few nights earlier. And that final score was closer than how the game really played out.

If you look at the Wolves 15-game losing streak, the numbers are pretty staggering. Only four of the losses were by single digits. There was a 41 point loss at Golden State, a 28 point loss to Portland and a 25 point loss to Phoenix. The average margin of defeat in this stretch was by 15.13 points. 

So how did they beat a Denver team that has been very solid so far this season? I know this sounds extremely lame and the stats geeks aren't going to like it, but the Wolves shot the ball well over the final three quarters, they played good defense and they never freaked out.

After an awful first quarter, the Wolves made 32 of 59 shots over the final three quarters. They shot better than 50 percent in the second and third and shot exactly 50 percent in the fourth quarter. We haven't seen that this season. Even after last night's victory, the Wolves still rank 29th in the NBA in offensive efficiency and effective FG% percentage according to Knickerblogger's stat page. 

On the other end of the floor, Denver shot poorly. While it's difficult to really know if this was crooked shooting by the Nuggs or great defense by Minnesota (maybe a little of each?), Denver shot 41.7 percent for the game and was only 4-19 as the Wolves got back in the game in the fourth quarter.

The Wolves also showed some poise for maybe the first time this season. They were below their season average for turnovers (which means Jonny Flynn played more under control than in the past), they never got rattled when Denver rallied down the stretch. They continued to defend and run their offense. There weren't a ton of forced shots or early in the clock shots in the fourth quarter. Those are good signs. 

One thing that I liked while watching the game and really liked when looking at the Popcorn Machine gameflow was how Rambis managed his bench. As I've blogged about in the past, I don't think the Wolves can just go and put in the second unit all at once. There is too much of a dropoff.

Last night, there wasn't a single time in which there wasn't at least one starter on the floor. After halftime, there were at least two starters on the floor at all times. That, to me, is important. The Wolves aren't good enough to just slide in five new guys, especially offensively. There were times in the losing streak in which Rambis would put a lineup of guys on the floor that simply couldn't score. That, for once, changed.

Now here's the big question: Can the Wolves win two in a row? With an average Memphis team coming in on Wednesday, I don't think it's impossible. While it may not happen, at least now that is a possibility. Sure beats saying that the losing streak was crawling toward 20. 

Negativity on Thanksgiving

A few things on this Turkey Day.

1. Many apologies for a recent lack of blogging. I haven't given up, I've just been a bit busier than I would like in my work life. I do so hate when work gets in the way of other things. I did have most of a post written after last week's loss to Houston, but it never quite got finished. My take was that I want to see more Ramon Sessions and less Jonny Flynn. 

2. I'm out of town this weekend so I didn't see a single second of last night's loss to Denver and, barring something really strange, won't see any of tomorrow night's game against Phoenix. From looking at the box score and seeing some video highlights on nba.com, it seemed like more of the same: missed shots, little defense and a fourth-quarter rally against the other team's reserves to make it look closer than it really was.

3. I do wonder exactly when the Timberwolves are going to win another game. I knew this season was going to be a challenge and that became an even greater challenge once KLove broke his hand in the preseason, but I didn't think it was going to be this bad. I thought we were looking at a 25-win season or something in that ballpark. So we're sitting here on Thanksgiving and the Wolves are 1-14 and they are really very close to being 0-15. Last night's loss makes it official that this is the worst start in Wolves history. 

Think about that for a second: Worst start in Wolves history. That really is saying something. We have seen a good amount of bad basketball here in the Twin Cities. Hell, the didn't get to 20 wins in either 92 or 93 before following that up with 20 wins in 94 and 21 wins in 95. But all of those teams recorded more than one win in the first 15 games of the season. 

I can't see the Wolves beating Phoenix tomorrow night or winning at Denver on Sunday. That will make them 0-for-November. That, friends, is brutal.

There is one thing I'm thankful for on this day, however.

1. I am thankful that we do have a NBA team to watch, despite the recent sucking of the Wolves. I recently saw a friend from Seattle who was in town for work. He talked about how once the Seahawks are through, there isn't all that much to get excited about until the Mariners start in April. Yes, there is college hoops, but it isn't the same.

So we do have that.

I'm talkin' about practice. Not a game. Practice

So as the Memphis Grizzlies and Allen Iverson parted ways for good, the Minnesota Timberwolves got back to work. Al Jefferson was supposed to be back in the Twin Cities and Kurt Rambis worked his team in the bowels of the Target Center.

On Tuesday, they'll do the same thing. And this is very good. 

Because since this season began, there has been very little time for the Timberwolves to actually practice and actually work to improve. 

Prior to the current stretch of three days between Saturday's loss at Memphis and Wednesday night's home game against Houston, the Wolves had not had consecutive days off this season. They'd had three back-to-backs and two trips to the Pacific time zone, but no consecutive days off.

So instead of having opportunities to really focus on themselves and work on the details of the triangle offense, Minnesota's options were pretty much play, prepare for the next game and play again.  For a team with as many new players and coaches and players (whoops, seen the commercial too many times), that isn't a good thing.

Now two practices aren't going to turn the Wolves into the MJ-Pippen Bulls or the Kobe Lakers, one would hope that there will be at least a little improvement. After all, the Wolves are about as bad as they could be offensively. According to John Hollinger's advanced stats on ESPN.com, Minnesota is 28th in the Association in offensive efficiency. The Wolves are scoring only 91.6 points per 100 offensive possessions. Only winless New Jersey and Charlotte are worse offensively. At the same time, they are giving up 106.3 points per 100 possessons (20th). And you wonder why they've lost 10 in a row. 

Because of a multitude of real world responsibilities, I probably won't blog again until Wednesday morning. But the time we get to that point, hopefully the Wolves will be looking a little better. 

And maybe they will have signed AI. (Kidding).

What is David Kahn thinking today?

Oh how I would love to get an honest answer of what's going through David Kahn's mind today.

After all, let's look at the past 48 hours or so.

- The Wolves lose to Dallas (not a surprise).

- Kahn sends out his 'I know we suck, but hang with us' letter.

- Wolves, without Big Al and KLove, lose the battle for last place in the West at Memphis. The Timberwolves have now lost 10 in a row and are in DFL in the West.

And if that wasn't enough, enter Brandon Jennings to rub a little salt in the wound.

If you haven't heard, Jennings dropped a smooth 55 on Golden State on Saturday night. And he did it after going scoreless in the first quarter. He made 12 of 13 shots in the third quarter, scoring 29 points in that 12 minute span. He broke the Bucks single-game scoring record for a rookie, which might be that big of a deal except for the fact that it was previously held by a dude we all know as Kareem. It was the most points by a NBA rookie since Earl the Pearl dropped 56 in 1968.

The result is a whole ton of second-guessing of Kahn. After all, Kahn is the guy who passed on Jennings not once, but twice in June's NBA Draft when he took Ricky Rubio and Jonny Flynn. Was he a fool? Will Rubio/Flynn over Jennings become to Kahn what Ebi over Josh Howard or Brandon Roy for Randy Foye became for Kevin McHale?

I was in Target Center a couple of weeks ago when the Bucks were in town. What we saw that night was Jennings worst performance of the season. He went 4 for 16 and finished with only 9 points. Flynn outscored him that night and things looked just fine for the Wolves.

But in his other six games this season, Jennings has scored 17 points twice, 24, 25, 32 and, now, 55.

What does all of this mean? It's far to early to know. But early returns aren't great. Brandon Jennings certainly looks like he has the potential to be very special.

What do you think Kahn is thinking today?

UPDATE: Very nice Brandon Jennings story from Yahoo! writer Adrian Wojnarowski here. Worth the read.

Note from Kahn

Jerry Zgoda just posted this note on his blog from GM David Kahn.

There isn't anything too earth-shattering in it. But it is probably good to try to have some direct conversation with fans.

I, like the GM, was happy to see some fight against Dallas. And I'm cool with Hollins getting tossed out. It shows that the players at least care.

Can they beat Memphis tonight? I guess it's possible, but the combo of no Big Al and the second half of a back-to-back seems difficult to overcome.

Forgot one thing

Meant to add this to the post below, but there is some good news for Wolves fans. 

This morning's Star Tribune featured a piece by Phil Miller, who has been hired part time to help Zgoda on Wolves coverage. This is really good news on several fronts. Miller, who was most recently the Twins beat writer at the Pioneer Press before being laid off, is very good and experienced in covering the NBA. Before his time in St. Paul, he was the Jazz beat writer for the Salt Lake Tribune.

But, to me, it also means that the Timberwolves has some value to editors at the paper. Last season, the Pioneer Press quit sending a reporter to road games and began hiring freelancers in road cities who may or may not have known a whole helluva lot about the Wolves. 

For the Star Tribune to ensure that Zgoda gets help (important with all the travel and the back-to-backs) is a good things for those of us who are interested in the team.

A few thoughts entering a two-loss weekend

I guess I might as well get the Wolves-related item out of the way: I can't see the Timberwolves winning anything this weekend, with Big Al at home for personal reasons. The only question is how bad they'll get beat.

First of all, I hope things turn out all right for Al and his family. Certainly that's more important than a couple of games. But I'm guessing anybody who has Dirk, Dampier or Marc Gasol on their fantasy team is looking forward to big games. I'm guessing that Nate Jawai and Ryan Hollins aren't exactly going to scare anybody.

Now onto a few other items:

1. I think Mark Cuban is a cool dude (at least sometimes)

Yes, he's loud, brash and kind of a jerk at times, but there is something kind of endearing about Cuban. While I totally disagree with the stuff he said about Kenyon Martin last year during the playoffs, the dude scored some points with me last night.

Not a shock here, but Cuban is big into the interwebs. He blogs like crazy and he's a Twitter fool. But he also gets the social part of social media. What do I mean?

Last night, a Twin Cities Twitter group had a tweet-up at the Bulldog N.E. in (duh) Northeast Minneapolis. So what happens after the Mavericks got to town for tonight's game? Yep, Cuban showed up. That, in my book, is totally cool. There were pictures of Cuban with normal folks all over Twitter last night. Apparently he was great.

Could you see Glen Taylor just showing up at a bar and talking to 20- and 30-something Wolves fans (I'm talking age, not numbers)? He just doesn't seem like a normal guy in the way that Cuban does. On the list of NBA owners who I would like to have a beer or eight with, Cuban is certainly near the top.

Imagine the loyalty Cuban builds with Mavs fans by being a fan? Imagine how excited people would be if Cuban, for example, showed up in a bar with 30 Mavs t-shirts and handed them out? Those people would have a great experience and very well could become big-time brand loyalists.

2. I hate Thursday nights

I know Howlin' T-Wolf tweeted yesterday how he thought last night's TNT games were going to be great. Maybe I'm a bit too cynical, but the last thing I really need to see is more Cavs and Lakers.

There is nothing that irritates me more than watching the same teams over and over and over on national TV. Clearly teams like Boston, Cleveland, Orlando, the Lakers and San Antonio are good, but the league does have 30 teams. That is pretty much the entire reason why I bought the NBA League Pass. I like watching teams try to get better, I like team basketball rather than superstar basketball and I get board with the overhyped.

Aside from the Wolves, I enjoy watching Portland and Oklahoma City more than any other teams. I'm cool with Denver and Atlanta and the Sixers. I'll even watch Charlotte by choice. And there is nothing better than getting in bed and watching those crazy Golden State Warriors for a quarter or so before crashing for the night.

That's why Thursday's are so brutal. Last night, there wasn't another game on the schedule so the options were the overhyped or Grey's Anatomy with the lady. Clearly I watched Meredith and Derek and the rest of those Crazy Kids at Seattle Grace.

3. My biggest surprise

This kind of fits in with the last post, but how about giving it up a little bit for the Sacramento Kings? They lose Kevin Martin and get better? I would not have thought that. I watched much of the second half the other night of Kings-OKC and was very impressed. Jason Thompson was very solid. Beno Udrih has been good as has Tyreke Evans. The Kings are destined for the lotter again, but there might be a little more talent there than I originally thought

That's it for now. No regular TV on the Wolves the next couple of games. Not sure if I'll get them on my League Pass. I hope so, but if not, at least I won't miss anything of great note.

We aren't alone

Nice column this morning in the New York Post by Mike Vacarro on the sorry Knicks.

The Wolves are certainly not alone in feeling helpless in Novemeber.

My favorite part of the column:

"They are simply an awful basketball team. They are outmanned. They are outgunned. They are a beaten-down eight-track player in an iPod world, an analog throwback in an NBA that went digital years ago. You want to be angry. You want to be appalled. You want to be disgusted.

And then you take another look at the team on the floor.

And it all makes sense."

You can read the rest of it here.

More later with some random thoughts for a Friday.

Game 9: Do I need to revise my expectations?

I don't think my initial expectations were unreasonable for this Timberwolves team. I was quite certain this team had no chance at making the playoffs. I didn't even think they would get to 30 wins. But I did think they would be improved over a year ago.

I know that KLove is going to be coming back and that Al still has work to do. But I guess I didn't expect a team that really wasn't going to be competitive on many nights.

I thought 25 wins was very realistic. I thought something close to 30 was possible if things went well.

I didn't watch as much of last night's loss to Portland as I wanted to. I watched the first half at home, but then went out for a little while last night and the bar didn't have the game on. By the time I got to the bar, I saw on Twitter that the Blazers were pulling away and it didn't really matter.

So as the Wolves prepare for Friday night's game against Dallas, they sit here at 1-8. They are tied for the fewest victories in the West. And if it wasn't for the the hella comeback on opening night against New Jersey, these would be your winless Wolves.

While that is certainly bad, it is even worse when you play the what-if game. Let's just say, for fun, that the Wolves would have gotten a couple of fourth-quarter breaks in the early part of this season. They would have beat Boston. And they might have won either at Phoenix or the Clipp Joint. So there's two more wins. That's the sad thing, if you look back, the best you can say they deserve to be is 3-6.

Other than that, it has been disaster after disaster. Five of their losses have been by 15 points or more and only two have been by less than five points.

The Wolves have 10 more games this month: Dallas, at Memphis, Houston, at Portland, at Clippers, Nuggets, Phoenix, Memphis, at New Orleans and Utah.

How many of these are really winnable?

Dallas? Nope, not even at home.

The game at Memphis seems like a possibility, but the problem is that it is the second half of a back-to-back for the Wolves and the Griz have two days off before that.

Houston at home? I guess maybe if they play well.

at Portland? Considering what we've seen this month, no chance.

at Clippers? Not unrealistic at all.

Denver? Nope.

Phoenix? Not against the biggest surprise so far in the West.

Memphis? Probably the best chance for a win the rest of the month.

at New Orleans? Big Al's first return to where he got hurt. I don't love the Hornets, but they are better than the Wolves.

Utah? Surprised the Jazz have struggled the way they have. This, I suppose, is possible.

So where does that leave us? Is this team going to struggle to win 20 games? Are they going to win fewer games than the Gophers men's team?

If you haven't read Jerry Zgoda's game story from this morning in the Star Tribune, you should. It was pretty good. Loved the honest from Big Al.

What will adjustments look like?

Let's be honest about Kurt Rambis' life as a NBA assistant coach: He's led a pretty charmed life. 

He's coached in four NBA Finals as a Lakers assistants. He was on the staff of two teams that won championships. He is used to winning. 

That winning part means that, at least most of the time, the guys on his bench were better than the guys on the other bench. That means that getting better results means needing the Lakers to execute better on the floor. Maybe it meant changing up some defensive assignments. 

We're talking little things. Not big things.

That's part of what I'm most interested about with tonight's Wolves-Blazers game. Tonight is the first time in the Rambis era in Minnesota in which the Wolves will play a team for the second time. How will the Wolves mix things up against a team that mopped the floor with them on Sunday night.

I can't imagine that Rambis is simply going to roll out the same guys and attack the Blazers the same way. Because the last way didn't work. 

Here's what I'd like to see: More Big Al and Ryan Hollins together against the Blazers. Portland is a very difficult matchup for the Timberwolves because of Greg Oden and Lamarcus Aldridge. Oden is a monster, a total load inside while Aldridge is long, lean and athletic. Oden posts up like crazy, Aldridge runs the floor like crazy.

If we learned anything in Sunday's loss, it is that Pecherov can't keep up with Aldridge. Just can't happen. I don't think the Wolves can go small because the 6-11 Aldridge seems like he would simply post up, say, the 6-7 Gomes. 

I expect the Wolves to get mopped up again, but I am interested to see how Rambis adjusts.

The wheels have fallen off....

Do you remember the good ol' days? You know all the way back to last Wednesday?

Remember when Al Jefferson made that shot with 9:50 to go in the third quarter against the Celtics? The Timberwolves led Boston, 56-45. Target Center was jumping. That smug punk Kevin Garnett was, hopefully, going to take himself to Boston with a loss. Things were great.

It seems so long ago now doesn't it?

Because what we've seen since then has been beyond awful. 

Over the final 21:50 of what would be a one-point loss to the Celtics, the Wolves were outscored 47-35. They followed that up with a no-rebounding 87-72 loss to Milwaukee. Next up was a 116-93 loss at Portland and last night's 146-105 embarrassment at Golden State.

Add that up and the math is really ugly. Over those 3-plus games, the Wolves have been outscored 396-305. Yes, they have been outscored by 91 points over a little less than 166 minutes. 

How is that even possible?

In the losses to Milwaukee, Portland and Golden State, opponents shot 49.8 percent from the floor and 44.8 percent on 3s. That, my friends, is defense that can be best described as close to zero. Or less than zero. 

While I can accept the loss at Portland, I have a far harder time with the Milwaukee and Golden State losses. These are not playoff teams. These are not rosters filled with talent. These are peers of the Timberwolves. And if this is how the Wolves measure up with teams like them, it is going to be a long winter in the Twin Cities.

A couple of other things:

1. Remember that Oleksiy Pecherov dude? He played six minutes against Golden State. Yes, six. I understand that the way that the Warriors spread the floor doesn't really fit Pecherov's ability. But this is the same guy who really dominated KG less than a week earlier.

2. ESPN.com's John Hollinger and Chad Ford wrote an interesting piece today in which they did power rankings for where the 30 NBA franchises are based on the next three years. They looked at player, management, money, market and upcoming draft picks. The good news is that the Wolves weren't last. The bad news is that they are in the bottom third, ranking 22nd. The team was dinged for management (26th), the market (28th, and weather was used against us) and current players (21st). The good news is money (8th) and draft (7th). The overall ranking was 10th in the Western Conference. 

I thought a couple of the results were interesting: Portland was first, Oklahoma City was 4th and Phoenix was 27th. Certainly worth a read. And the franchises the Wolves were ranked ahead of: New Orleans, Washington, Memphis, Golden State, Phoenix, Sacto, Milwaukee and (drumroll, please) Charlotte.

Quick update

Yes, I watched last night. No, I haven't given up on the blog.

Call it late night, early morning, day full of meetings. Will blog more later. 

Until then, feast your eyes on this New York Times story. Read it and each time you see the word Knicks, replace it with Wolves. Basically it is about how even when the eyes are on the future, there is still this pesky 2009-10 season that has to be played.

Will blog a bit more later.

Mr. True Hoop checks out the Wolves

Henry Abbott, the genius behind the True Hoop blog (now on espn.com), checked out the Wolves-Blazers game last night. He had five quick thoughts.

You can read about them here

Just wanted to share.

Game 7: The rotation riddle

After sitting in the Target Center stands on Friday night and watching last night's mess at Portland, I find myself curious about the Rambis Rotation.

As I look at this Timberwolves team, the one thing I don't see is an overabundance of talent, a long list of guys who are swimming in awesomeness. I see one star in Big Al, a couple of guys who have a chance to be very good in Flynn and KLove and then a collection of role players of varying degrees. Corey Brewer and Ryan Gomes are decent players, but would they start on a really good team? 

After that, the roster is littered with guys who either are young and unproven or old and get by on their grit.

What does this mean? It means I wonder why then have there been times when Rambis has a team on the floor without a single starter?

I'm not sure the Wolves could have beaten Portland the way the Blazers played last night, but when Rambis went to the bench at the end of the first quarter and beginning of the second, all hope of victory was lost. Late in the first quarter and early in the second, the Wolves were outscored by 8 points when they had the group of Ryan Hollins, Wayne Ellington, Nate Jawai, Ramon Sessions and Sasha Pavlovic on the floor.

I wonder why. Maybe it is because none of those guys are go-to scorers and are all supporting scorers? You think.

On Friday night's loss to Milwaukee, the Wolves lost significant ground in the second half when they had Brewer, Hollins, Sessions, Sasha and Wilkins on the floor.  

I get the cat-and-mouse game that is played between coaching staffs and that it might be smart to sit Al when Nate McMillin takes Greg Oden out of the game. But I'd like to see a way for Rambis to rotate his roster so that there is always a scorer on the floor. 

How do you do that? I realize it is a challenge. But if there's one thing that the Wolves have going for them, it is the fact that the roster is filled with young guys. You don't want to run them into the ground, but its possible for the younger guys to play a few more minutes in spurts. 

Don't know what to say

A friend of mine and long-time Wolves season ticket holder summed up last night's loss to Milwaukee simply: "That was the worst game I've every seen"

He might not have been to far off. 

As we walked out of Target Center and to a First Avenue watering hole, he was livid. 

I realize that there are going to plenty of nights when the Wolves get thrashed. That's the reality of a young, rebuilding team. I get that and can accept that.

What I can't really accept is the Wolves getting their asses kicked by an average at best Bucks team that no longer has Richard Jefferson or Charlie V and one that doesn't have a healthy Michael Redd. I also can't accept the Wolves apparent fear of rebounding. And the ball movement was crap.

How bad were the Wolves last night? The easiest way to sum it up is that Luke Ridnour was the best guard on the court. For real.

When this week started, I thought the Wolves could win two games. I thought winning at the Clippers was very possible and I was certain they would beat Milwaukee at home. Neither happened and the Wolves are now 1-5 and play at a Portland team tomorrow night that looked pretty good in a win over San Antonio last night. I can't see a win there, but maybe Monday night's game at Golden State is a possibility.

I'm cool with the reality that progress will be slow. But I would like to see some effort. 

That's all.

Update: The Target Center looked like the TC of last year. Lots and lots of empty seats. The good news was that I got two $50 tickets for a total of $39. Still I feel a bit ripped off.

The point guard situation

In the wake of Wednesday night's come-from-ahead loss to Boston, I had two people separately say that they were disappointed that Jonny Flynn was on the floor at the end of the game. Maybe I should rephrase that, they were disappointed that Ramon Sessions wasn't on the floor.

There certainly is room to make that argument. And until Kevin Love returns and Kurt Rambis has to figure out how he wants to carve up frontcourt minutes, point guard may be the most interesting position to watch.

In Flynn and Sessions, the Wolves have two very different point guards. Flynn brings more energy and has a greater potential to do things that make you say wow. But he also has a far greater potential to do something stupid or make a mistake. Sessions is far more steady. He seems to run at the same temperature regardless of what is happening. He's less flashy but more experienced and steady. He's very solid and makes way more good decisions than bad.

Frankly both of them could learn a little bit from the other.

I understand why Rambis doesn't play them together. To do that makes the Wolves very small -- especially defensively. It also means that CBrewer moves to the 3 and Gomes plays the 4 (assuming they are both on the floor). I think Brewer can play either the 2 or the 3, but the early parts of this season have shown that Gomes is far more comfortable at the 3 than playing power forward.

All of this leaves Rambis in a little bit of a bind at point guard. Let's look a little closer to minutes/rotations/productivity in the second half.

With the Wolves leading by 8 at halftime, Rambis went for his original starters to begin the second half. The PG breakdown goes like this:

Third quarter

- Flynn plays the first 9:02. The Wolves as a team are -7 in this stretch. At the same time, Boston PG Rajon Rondo is in the midst of scoring 14 points over the first 10:36 of the third quarter.

- Sessions enters the game with 2:58 to go in the third quarter and plays the rest of the way. The Wolves are -1 in this stretch and the game is tied at 72 after three quarters.

Fourth quarter

- Rambis sticks with Sessions to start the fourth. He scores four points, grabs two rebounds and dishes out an assist over the 4:58 of the quarter. He goes to the bench and doesn't play again. The Timberwolves lead by 1 when Sessions leaves the game. However, Rondo is not in the game at this point.

- That means Flynn enters the game with 7:02 left and plays the rest of the way. He enters the game at virtually the same time that Rondo checks in. Flynn doesn't take a shot over the final 7:02 and dishes out one assist. During this time, the Wolves are -3. In addition, they have their most difficult stretch of getting good looks at the basket. Down the stretch, Minnesota gets about two easy looks. Everything else is tightly contested.

In terms of plus-minus, Flynn is -10 after halftime while Sessions is even. Flynn doesn't score a point and takes only one shot in 16:02 of action while Sessions scores four points in just under eight minutes. Some of this is apples and oranges as Flynn and Rondo were on the court together almost the entire time while Sessions and Rondo guarded each other for only about a minute. Is that a factor? I think it is. Rondo, for the record, scored 16 points after halftime.

I love Jonny Flynn. I love how hard he plays, love his smile and energy and love that he wants to be in Minneapolis. But taking only one shot and getting only one assist after halftime doesn't cut it for me. That said, the only way Flynn is going to get experience and get comfortable is to get minutes and play when the game is on the line. I'm guessing that Flynn learned something from Wednesday night's loss. At the same time, if one of the goals is to establish a culture of winning and show improvement, maybe Sessions needs to play more and play at more important junctures of the game.

That, in a roundabout way, brings me to tonight's game against Milwaukee. This is a game that I think the Wolves can win and maybe should win, especially with Michael Redd being out because of a strained tendon in his left knee. My question is how the Wolves two point guards are going to react. I fear that Flynn is going to try to do too much in his first regular season matchup against Brandon Jennings. I fear the same thing about Sessions as he plays his old team for the first time. The Bucks didn't match the Wolves offer for him over the summer and basically drafted over him by taking Jennings.

Watching point guard play and minutes at that position develop will be interesting. There is certainly a case to be made that Flynn get the ball as much as possible and make Sessions a backup. But it can also be argued that Sessions needs to play more. We'll see what happens moving forward.

That wasn't what I expected (both in terms of outcome and who was making jumpers)

As I posted yesterday, my expectations for the Wolves last night against Boston were low. OK, they were barely off the floor low. I had some things that I needed to get done after work last night, so I got home about 8:30 and started watching the game on my DVR.

I expected to watch until it got out of hand and I was willing to just shut it off at some point. Well, that never really happened. I totally get that the Celtics were in the second half of a back-to-back and that the Wolves were a little rested. But I still didn't expect Minnesota to lead by double digits at a couple of points and give Boston all they wanted.

There's much that can be talked about from this one -- Pecherov finishing with a career high, the Brewer "jump ball" at the end of the game, the fact that KG is still a loud-mouthed punk, that Rajon Rondo was the best player on the floor when Boston closed the gap in the third quarter and more -- but I have one major takeaway from this game.

That is that Big Al was ventured outside of what Jim Petersen likes to call "the painted area." I'm not sure if he needed some sort of visa or needed to renew his passport, but we saw Big Al in some very different spots on the floor. He made three jumpers in the 19-20 foot range, one in each of the first three quarters. He took three more in that same range (excluding the shot at the buzzer). 

This to me was clearly the biggest positive moving forward. Because while the loss seemed inevitable (which it was), I am interested to see if Al continues to take and make shots from outside of 15 feet. If it happens, he is going to have an easier time getting to the basket. There was one play when Al caught the ball on the wing about 12-14 feet from the basket. He pump faked, Kendrick Perkins bit and cruised past him for a layup or dunk. If Al hadn't made a couple of longer jumpers, there is no way that Perkins falls for the pump fake. He holds his position and the ball quite possibly gets rotated out. 

While Al has struggled with his health, we're starting to see (at least I think) more of what will be the real Al. He has averaged 35 mpg over the past three games and averaged 21 ppg in that span. He has also shot the ball a little better from the floor.

What will happen from here? That's difficult to tell. Friday night's home game against Milwaukee is very winnable and pretty crucial in my mind. But if Al can continue to make a few jumpers per game, both he and the Timberwolves are going to be better. 

Two road losses and a game that doesn't matter to me

So we are about two hours away from a Timberwolves game that doesn't matter to me one bit. 

There are people -- especially those in the Wolves marketing department -- who think that the Boston Celtics' only appearance of the season at Target Center is a big deal. I am not one of those people.

Why? First, I don't heart KG. Second, I truly don't care what happens tonight. And I don't think anyone should. The Celtics are in a far different stratosphere than the Timberwolves right now. They are shooting for 60 wins and a title. Aspirations here are quite different. I'd take 25 victories from the Wolves and run. I'd jump for joy for a 30-win season. The Wolves are young and inexperienced. The Celtics, well, aren't.

I expect that the Wolves will get dominated tonight. I think it will be much like last Friday night's game against Cleveland. I don't think it will be close. I don't think there will be a miracle. And I don't expect there to be anything of the sort. Now would I be thrilled if the Wolves made a game of this like OKC did last night against the Lakers? Certainly.

But I am more concerned about seeing improvement and seeing the Wolves win games that they could and/or should win. That's part of why the Phoenix-Clippers back-to-back was kind of disappointing. While I know that the Wolves best player still isn't 100 percent and their second-best player has a broken hand, I think they should have been able to win one of those two games. 

Phoenix has been one of the biggest surprises of the first week of the season to me. They are doing a nice job spreading the court and Channing Frye is a difficult matchup because of his ability to play on the perimeter. When he's out of the paint, that means teams either have to play off of him or Amare is left with more room to move inside. That is called damned if do, damned if don't. And then Nash is a total pick-and-roll freak with great vision. Like usual, Phoenix will struggle to defend teams that are bigger and stronger inside, but the boys in orange can run and score almost at will.

The best part of the loss to the Suns was the biggest letdown against the Clippers. Big Al was great -- especially early -- against Phoenix. He played big in the post, he wanted the ball, he looked like the Al of January 2009. He did almost anything he wanted.

While he scored 24 points a night later against the Clippers, he only grabbed four rebounds and Chris Kaman got 25 and 11. I know Kaman is better than most people know, but if Big Al is truly an elite big guy, he can't get outplayed by that guy. It just shouldn't happen.

Also, the Wolves shouldn't be outscored in three of four quarters by the Clippers. 

What does all of this mean? It means the Wolves will be 1-4 by the end of the night and Friday night's game against the Bucks is big. More about that later, but right now, I'm going to go watch a game that I don't really care about.  Because the Wolves have zero chance to win.

The Wolves Week: Can they win two?

As I type this, the Wolves are about 15 minutes away from tipping off Game 3 of the season at Phoenix. Most of the time, a NBA week is considered to be a Monday-Sunday proposition. Tonight, I'm going to cheat a little bit and have this be a Sunday-Sunday proposition.

That means the Wolves will play five times between tonight and next Sunday night at Portland. There is tonight's game at Phoenix, tomorrow night at the Clip Joint, Wednesday night at home against KG and the team in Green, Friday against Milwaukee and next Sunday at Portland.

Here is what I would like to see: Two victories. And I don't think that is unrealistic, despite the fact that three games are on the road and one of the home games is basically unwinnable.

This is a very different season than a year ago. I acknowledge that. New GM. New Coach. A ton of new players. An actual point guard. And on and on.

That said, I want this team to prove early in the season that things are different. A year ago, the Wolves beat Sacto in the season opener. And then lost eight in a row. It was the beginning of a 4-24 start to the season. It got Randy Wittman fired, but it also made the team largely irrelevant in the Twin Cities. Yes, there was a nice run in January, but the hole was very deep.

Hence, a two-win week would go a long way toward washing away the fear of another brutal start. I don't have outrageous expectations of this team. I know the Wolves won't be going to the playoffs. I know 25 victories would be a good season and 30 wins would be amazing.

Can they get two? I don't think it's impossible.

Tonight at Phoenix: The Suns aren't what they are were. They aren't an elite team and they aren't an automatic playoff team. But they aren't bad. Jason Richardson is back from suspension and Channing Frye has been an interesting addition. When the Wolves won in Phoenix last January, I thought it was one of their best outings of the season. This Suns team is better, but so are the Wolves.

Monday at Clippers: If the Wolves lose at Phoenix, this becomes a very important game. The Clippers are the Clippers (as seen by the fact that Blake Griffin couldn't even make it to the season opener before getting hurt), but they are better. They still have Baron Davis, Eric Gordon and Marcus Camby. Those are three pretty good players. They no longer have knucklehead Zach Randolph and I think that's a good thing. And I'm guessing the Rhino is going to want to play well against his former teammates. I'd like to think the Wolves can win this game, but it does scare me a little bit.

Wednesday vs. Celtics: Not much to say here. I expect this to be a lot like Friday against the Cavs. The Wolves might play hard. They might do some good things. But I expect them to get their asses kicked.

Friday vs. Bucks: This might be the most important game of the week for the Wolves. The Bucks are not significantly better than the Wolves, especially now that Charlie V and Richard Jefferson are gone. Hakim Warrick was a nice pickup and I think that Brandon Jennings will be good, but I do think the Wolves can win this game. This game is also important to me because I would like to see the Wolves make a step this year. To me, that is being able to beat most teams that are equal or a little better at home. A win here would go a long way toward showing that.

Sunday at Portland: There is no non-Wolves team in the NBA that I enjoy watching more than Portland. I love the depth and potential there. I am in the camp that says Greg Oden is going to be a great player. I still hate the Roy-for-Foye trade and think the Wolves would be a very different franchise if that move isn't made. LaMarcus Aldridge is wonderful. I can't believe Steve Blake is as effective as he is. There's the Fake Thug. I could keep going. I do wonder how they are going to keep everybody happy -- especially with Andre Miller there now. While this team might not make as big of a leap forward as some think, this is still a playoff team that plays well at home. I'll be very surprised if the Wolves can win here. If they do, it will be because they played very well.

Summary: Two wins -- including a home win against the Bucks -- would be a big step. I think it can happen. Worst case scenario is that the Wolves win one and hang very close in a couple others. A winless week? That would be a disaster.

Back at it

New season and a new resolution to blog. I'm hopeful that I can gain some good momentum and keep it through 80 more games.

As this Timberwolves season is in its infant stages, I am intrigued. I wasn't initially thrilled with the hiring of David Kahn as Wolves GM, but as he got to work -- and reworked the lineup in the process -- I became more excited.

The good:

- I love Jonny Flynn. I think he is going to be very, very good. I like that he plays his ass off. I like that he is cool with being in Minneapolis. I like the big smile.

- I like getting rid of Randy Foye. I did like Randy Foye when he was a Wolf, but I never saw him really fitting in here. He can't play the point. He has a hard time guarding the better 2s in the league. He's a much better fit in DC where he can come off of the bench and not have the responsibilities of playing 30-plus minutes. I hope he plays well for Flip -- and he has so far -- but he wasn't going to help the Wolves in the long term.

- Rambis. I like the hire. I like a guy who was worked for a winner. I like that he's not a screamer who guys will turn out. I like that he's pretty chill, but with a mean streak. And somewhere deep inside of me, I like that he knocked McHale on his ass back in the day.

The bad:

- Loved the Rubio pick at the beginning, but I don't think he will ever play for the Wolves. Obviously he could be a nice piece to deal, but he was the one guy I was most excited about in this draft class. This certainly isn't the biggest deal breaker, but kind of a bummer.

- This team needs some luck in the health department. Love is out for at least a month. Al is limited now. It would be wonderful for things to get better from here. The Wolves clearly need a season of better-than-average health if for no other reason than to see what they've got. Can Corey Brewer be a player in this league? How will Al and KLove play together?

- The biggest bummer is that this team is still going to lose a lot of games. And I mean A LOT of games. If the loss total is less than 55, it will be a really good season for the Wolves.

Am I a glutton for punishment?/Do I really want season tickets

I just returned to my desk after a trip to the printer. In my hand are two printed out tickets for tonight's Wolves-Memphis game. The seats are crappy, but the two tickets cost me all of $4.95 on eBay. Yes, that was the total for the both tickets. That's $2.47 each to see a NBA game.

Now, I realize there are many people in the Twin Cities who might say that seeing a March game between the Timberwolves and Grizzlies isn't really a NBA game. After all, the two teams combined 34 victories are less than the win total of 10 individual NBA teams. Throw in that it doesn't look like either Foye or Hot Rod Carney are going to play and there isn't a ton of reason to expect anything other than the Wolves' 12th straight home loss.

While I would expect that I'm going to see far more Kevin Ollie than I would like to tonight, I'm all right with going to see a game in which the home team seemingly has little chance. I'll be in the house for Saturday's game against the improving Bobcats as well. 

This brings me to the topic of the never-ending Glen Taylor commercials. You know, the ones where he says he never thought he'd own a NBA franchise, etc.

When the announcement on season ticket prices was made last week, I was initially very excited about the possibility. $5 per game gets you in the door, $15 per game gets you a seat downstairs. It is a very good value, there's no question about that. You can get two seats for every game for less than $500 total. Two seats for every game downstairs is less than $1,300 and the team will let you pay for it in nine interest-free payments. 

But is that really enough for the Wolves to turn me into a season ticket holder for the first time ever? Probably not. 

The more I think about it, the more I think I'm going to just keep doing what I'm doing. Go to two or three games a month and watch a bunch on TV. My reasons are pretty simple.

Even though going to games is very easy for me. I already have parking downtown and I live within 15 minutes of Target Center, I'm not sure that I want to commit 41 nights of my winter. There are other commitments, there are work things and there are times when I'd just rather not go. 

Then there is the whole where to buy seats thing. I wouldn't say that I'm cheap, but I'd be inclined to buy upstairs tickets. I don't mind the seats up there and it is super easy to move downstairs to a better locale for the second half. I often go to games with my girlfriend. She'll play along, but it is clear that she doesn't enjoy the chase of the free upgrade nearly as much as I do (for the record, I may never see my upper deck Row V seats tonight). If I was to buy season tickets, she kind of indicated that she would prefer me to get downstairs seats.

I get her point and it is nice to not worry about getting bounced from your seats or getting stopped by an usher. But then you move into a price point where if the tickets don't get used, you'll feel like you're throwing away cash. If you toss away a pair of $5 tickets, that's one thing, but throwing away $30 a pop is another story. And it's pretty clear that some tickets just won't get used.

It does appear on timberwolves.com that there is going to be a super saver 10 pack where you can get downstairs seats for $175. I realize the opponents won't be terribly sexy and the nights of the week might not be awesome, but I think that is what we'll do. We'll end up with reserved seats downstairs for a good number of games and I actually like seeing the non-marquee teams. I see enough of the Lakers, Celtics, Cavs, Magic, Suns, Spurs and Mavs on TV. (An aside, I'm twisted enough that I'm bummed that I'm going to be out of town when the Wolves host Oklahoma City down the stretch because I would totally go see the Thunder). 

So I think that's what I will do. I'll get a 10-game pack and then catch probably another 5-10 in other ways. Sometimes I get expensive work tickets. And there are always tickets available on eBay. I got a pair for the recent Portland game that were downstairs for $29 with shipping. I saw New Orleans earlier this season for $8 for two seats upstairs. 

As much as I enjoy watching the NBA -- there are amazing players and amazing plays at almost every game -- I still don't think there is enough demand to warrant buying season tickets. Tonight, I'm afraid, will prove that. I expect to see acres of empty seats.

Fairly amazing to be honest

What in the name of Bill Blair is happening? 

As futile as the Timberwolves have been during certain parts of their 20 years in these Twin Cities, they had never lost 11 consecutive home games before last night's loss to a horrible Washington (or as the mother of a childhood friend of mine would say, Warshington).

The last time the Wolves won at home was the Jan. 25 overtime victory over the Bulls. That was back when the Wolves were among the hottest teams in the NBA and back when this Minnesota team had both a healthy Al Jefferson and a lot of promise.

I do still think this team has promise and some good young parts. Al is tremendous, Randy Foye is a nice player, I like Kevin Love, Ryan Gomes has shown promise of late and the team has a boat-load of draft picks.

But last night was bad. Because if you can't guard the Washington Wizards -- a team that has very few true NBA players, has been horrible on the road and was finishing up a four-game road trip -- who can you guard?

That's it for now. Must do my real job. Will have more of a take later.

A few items.....

1. Still very undecided of what to think about Jim Souhan's column last week in which he says McHale needs to go. There is part of me that agrees that a fresh start is probably needed, but I also wonder what that will really accomplish. There will be new plays to learn, a new system to install, new roles to be defined. I still think my preference would be for McHale to actually start a season and go from there. In neither appearance on the bench has McHale gotten a training camp and the ability to start from scratch. 

I'd like to see him take a healthy Corey Brewer and, hopefully, a healthy Big Al and see what happens. I say that because the Wolves have been better under his watch despite the horrible run of late. They've been more entertaining (for sure), they've played harder (most of the time) and there are players who have improved (Bassy, Gomes).

2. This week is a big one for me. I think everyone understands that the Wolves are going to have a difficult time competing with the top teams right now because of their injury issues. That's much of the reason why this team has won only two of its last 19 games. That said, how many truly bad losses were there in that stretch? The loss at Washington was bad. And how the team lost to Golden State last week was discouraging. Should they have beaten Indiana at home or won one of the games against Toronto? Perhaps. But other than that, the Wolves have had a high-protein diet of playoff teams.

That's why I would like to see something change this week. There is Washington tonight, Memphis on Wednesday, the Knicks on Friday at the Bobcats on Saturday. All at home. None of those teams are playoff teams right now, but the Bobcats are still in the mix in the East. What's realistic? I'd like to see two wins this week. Will it happen? I don't know.

3. A little reading material. Britt Robson, who knows a whole lot about this team and is at virtually ever home game, penned a very good piece for his blog here. It's certainly worth a few minutes of your time.

4. Trying to decide if I should go see the team early this week. I have tickets to the Charlotte game on Saturday. Tonight is probably out, but am considering either Wednesday against Memphis or the Knicks on Friday. There are certainly plenty of good seats available.

A little morning after exercise

So what do you on the morning after a brutal 24-point loss to a below-average Golden State Warriors team?

Well, after catching up on a bit of NBA news this morning on espn.com, I made my way to the Lottery and Mock Draft simulator there. Because what else is there after as poor of a performance/effort as I have seen this season. 

How many tries would it take for me to get the Wolves their first-ever No. 1 selection? Who would be the most likely selection according to the ESPN lotto gods? 

I spun the wheel (OK, hit the refresh button) 20 times and this is what I came up with:

- It took until the eighth try for the Wolves to win the thing and get the No. 1 overall pick.

- The average of the 20 pulls was a draft position of 5.95.

- I got the top pick once and the second pick twice.

- Wake Forest point guard Jeff Teague and UConn center Hasheem Thabeet were the "winners" in terms who the Wolves will select. Teague was the selection on eight occasions and Thabeet was selected seven times. The other five picks broke down like this: Oklahoma combo guard Willie Warren (2), Spanish PG Ricky Rubio (2) and Blake Griffin once. Not sure if Rubio is actually going to enter the draft.

Will any of it happen? Who knows. But it is better than thinking about that nonsense at Target Center last night.

Yuck

Went to the gym after work. Figured I'd get home in time to watch 2 1/2 quarters or so of Wolves-Golden State.

Got in the car after the game, turned on KFAN and heard the Warriors score to go up 53-23. 

30 points. In the second quarter. Are you freakin' kidding me.

Ugh.

More Bobby Brown please

So I subscribe to the Timberwolves feed on Twitter. A little while, news crossed that Bassy is going to miss his second consecutive game with a groin issue and that Kevin Ollie was going to start his second consecutive game at PG tonight.

One word: Why?

Another word: No.

I don't know Kevin Ollie at all. He might be a nice, upstanding guy. Might kiss babies and pet dogs and walk little old ladies across the street. But Kevin Ollie is as slow as I am. And, trust me on this, that's pretty darn slow.

After being in attendance for both games over the weekend -- a completely wretched performance against Portland that required many beers to get through and a better effort against Houston -- all I want to see is more Bobby Brown. He's quick, he can get into the lane, he makes adequate decisions, he forces the defense to react and, in turn, get out of position.

While he freaks me out because he looks a little too much like McCants with the head band, arm sleeve and that he wears No. 1, I like me some Bobby Brown. He did some nice things in garbage time against Portland and he was clearly the Wolves best point guard against Houston.

A quick check of the Popcorn Machine shows Ollie at minus-14 against the Rockets and Brown at only minus-2. So, large man with the bad sweater collection, can I have more Bobby Brown please. It really is My Prerogative.

This did seem inevitable. Or, when will they win again?

I think everyone realized that the fortunes of the Timberwolves had changed the moment Al Jefferson landed on the floor of the New Orleans Arena, his knee blown up. The team's overall talent level simply isn't high enough to lose a should've-been All-Star.

But the results have been pretty staggering. 

Barring a victory tomorrow night against Portland, the Wolves will finish February with two victories. That, for the record, is one less than they registered in November and the same number as they had in December. And that was back when the Wolves were, you know, crappy.

This team hasn't won a home game in more than a month -- since that late January OT win over the Bulls -- and have lost seven in a row at Target Center.

The thing is, this team really hasn't played that poorly of late. Ryan Gomes has started to score more and looks more and more like a guy who could contribute for a good team. Bassy has shown improvement and is playing with more confidence. Randy Foye has fewer moments where you wonder what he was thinking. And Kevin Love is getting some much needed experience in a non-pressure situation.

But the Wolves simply don't have enough bodies. The past two nights have shown that. The Wolves hung in there against Toronto for much of the night and had a lead late in the third quarter on Wednesday night against an improving Utah team. Last night was especially difficult to watch down the stretch as the Wolves simply weren't deep enough (or tall enough inside) to win.

This folks isn't going to change this season. Al Jefferson isn't coming through that door. Neither is Corey Brewer. Shelden Williams and Bobby Brown aren't the answers. So what do you do? I don't know. The easy thing is stay away from the arena and save your money. The easy thing is to not watch the games on TV. But I'm hoping there are reasons to watch down the stretch. 

It will be like pounding your head against the wall a little bit, I'm sure. Because, let's face it, there aren't a lot of options for wins left.

When Jefferson went down, my prediction was that they Wolves would win eight games after the All-Star break and get to 25 victories. They have gone 1-5 since the break. I might have been a bit too optimistic. This weekend, despite a pair of home games, doesn't look terribly optimistic. Portland and Houston - despite their injuries - simply have far more talent than the Wolves. Golden State at home next weekend seems like a possibility, but the Warriors have played better of late. Monday, March 9 against Washington might be the next chance for a win.

If it happens before that, that would be great. I just don't see it happening.

This wasn't going to be easy or all that much fun. But we knew that.