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?
I think there is a definite argument either way and as a business person - I see the logic of 15 vs. 22 wins and the lottery impact of securing a big name player, but as A FAN, I can not accept losing on purpose and I am afraid that losing only leads to more losing and a slippery slope the Wolves wouldn't be able to recover from (regardless of lottery day results). Come on Timberwolves, WIN A GAME! If I was Rambis, they would all be running laps and laps and laps today - the 4th quarter melt down was 100% laziness.
ReplyDeleteI have a hard time accepting losses too - especially ones like last night's loss. I think it's pretty shameful and almost cheating to "try" to lose as many as possible to get more ping-pong balls. What kind of front office has that little faith in their ability to build a decent team?
ReplyDeleteDie Hard Wolves iPhoneman76:
ReplyDeleteLove the Wolves and i agree with your buddy i love to see them doing awesome and I hope we lose 9 outta ten games. We need this pick! and we all know it! Just hang in there guys and remember its gonna get greater faster than you think once talent starts coming in.