The Ringer NBA Show - What Does It Mean to Be on a Winning (Or Losing) Streak? | The Answer

Episode Date: February 19, 2021

Chris is joined by The Athletic’s Tony Jones to discuss the success of the Utah Jazz, who currently sit at the top of the league standings (2:00). They look at the team’s offseason turnaround after getting bounced in the bubble, Jordan Clarkson’s success, and more. Later, Chris is joined by The Ringer’s Megan Schuster to discuss the pain of rooting for the worst team in the league, the Minnesota Timberwolves (33:30). Host: Chris Ryan Guest: Tony Jones and Megan Schuster Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to the Ringer NBA show. It's The Answer. I am Chris Ryan. It is the best of times. It is the worst of times. Hey, everybody. Thanks for listening to another episode of The Answer. I'm Chris Ryan. And this week, just like I did in college, I've discovered jazz.

The Utah Jazz of won 20 out of 21 games as of recording. They're playing the Clippers tonight on Friday. And they have won a lot of those games by taking the opposing team out behind the woodshed. They have the third best offense, the second best defense. They are going to probably have two all-star. with Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert, and they will be playing for their coach, Quinn Snyder,

who's going to be coaching the Western Conference All-Stars. So how did this happen? What is going on? How are the Utah Jazz coming out of losing to the nuggets in the bubble, being at the center of so much controversy with Rudy's stuff in March with COVID anyway, then going in the bubble and losing to the nuggets? Nobody thought that this was going to happen, right?

And I wanted to find out what it's like to follow a, juggernaut. What does it like to follow a team like the Jazz? So I talked to Tony Jones from the athletic about covering the Utah Jazz this season. But then I also wanted to do the flip side of the equation, which is the worst team in the league. And that's the Minnesota Timberwolves. And they're not even bad. They're depressing. It's it's kind of like almost uncomfortable to watch. So I wanted to talk to my buddy Megan Schuster, who I work with over at the Ringer, who is a Timberwolves fan, about whether or not the Timberwolves are kind of drifting into Curstown, like whether this is starting to become almost mystical and how bad it is

and what can be done to fix it. So let's get into my conversation with Tony Jones on this week's episode of The Answer. All right, to talk about the jazz, I wanted to talk to Tony Jones from over at The Athletic because I've really been loving is writing this season about this team. And Tony, my first question about this remarkable season is whether or not you have noticed a different energy to your writing this year

because I imagine it's got to be a pretty inspiring team to cover. That's a great question because, you know, I don't know that there's a right answer to that, right? Because, like, as journalists were taught that, you know, you follow the story and not necessarily, you know,

whether a team is winning or losing and there's their stories, their storylines to everything. But this is a unique experience for me. I've never covered a team that that's 124, their first 29 games. You know, it's kind of ridiculous,

for lack of a better word to me, because, you know, there are so many games where I'm like, ah, you know, I don't think the jazz have it tonight. I don't think the jazz have it tonight. And then,

you know, they go through a 10-minute stretch where they go on a, you know, And, you know, I'm like, oh, no, I was trying to figure out, you know, how to say that the jazz don't have it tonight. And now I have to figure out for the 17th consecutive time to say that the jazz hit a team with a 24 to 3 run over 10 minutes. You know, so I think that that part has been a unique experience for me. You know, and I think, you know, the good thing about this jazz beat,

And, you know, it's kind of underrated, you know, when you talk about it for amongst the rest of the country in terms of journalists is that, you know, this beat is really competitive. There are so many, you know, really good writers and beat writers, you know, on this specific jazz beat. People like, you know, Andy Larson and Sarah Todd and Eric Walden, you know, there are a lot of very good beat writers. So, you know, that kind of keeps you on your toes because you want to be competitive, you know, just internally. But this is certainly a unique experience. I was wondering if I would ever be able to cover a team that's been as good as the Jazz are right now. I was in New York for Linsanity, and I grew up in Philly, so I saw some great Sixers teams. I remember very fondly like the wild thing, Lenny Dykstra, Philly's team, you know,

in the 90s and the way that like kind of a pro sports team or a college team can capture the imagination of a city. And given, you know, the social restrictions that are there in place, I understand that it's different. But do you feel a vibe around town in Salt Lake? You know, and that's where the social restrictions kind of take place because, you know, I'm not really, you know, I kind of, this is what I do. I go, I go to the gym, I go home. and I drive my kids, you know, wherever they need to be driven. And so it's not, you know, like, you know,

a regular season or a regular year where, you know, you're downtown for every home game and you're out and about or you go to bars or whatever, you know, there's really none of that around Salt Lake. So, you know, that part is weird because, you know, if you go to a home game, you know, there's 3,000, 4,000 people there, normally, but normally it would be, you know, 20,000 and it would be, you know, super loud and, you know, I do feel the vibe on social media. There's, you know, definitely, you know, jazz fans saying,

hey, you know, this is obviously the best team since 1998 or jazz fans enjoy this. This is, you know, once in a generation, you know, that type of thing. So, you know, there's, there's obviously a vibe. you know, on social media, but, you know, and I think that the in-person vibe is kind of tough to do that with the times that we're living through right now. Do you feel like the home crowd has made a difference? I feel like I watched, it might have been one of those Dallas games that was a national TV game, and that was one of the first times

that I was like, whoa, is this crowd noise real? Like, because, you know, I'm now conditioned to just have the piped-in kind of white noise, machine that goes through the NBA games. And it definitely seemed to be powering the team. I think that it was one of, it was some game where they had a little bit of a comeback, one of those runs like you're describing. Do you get the impression that they,

they are feasting off of whatever limited fan energy they've got in the building? Yeah, I think there's definitely fan energy in the building. And you say that $4,000 out of $20,000 is an inconsequential number. but it's like top three in a league right now. Yeah. In terms of capacity of what teams are letting in. So, you know, I think that Utah is one of the few places

and one of the few buildings where you do feel, where you do feel a fan presence. And, you know, I think that the most that you could feel out of that is that, you know, in Vivint, you know, they put everything, they're putting all the fans in, in the lower bowl. So, you know, there's still, you know, a little bit of clumpage in terms of family sitting together, you know, so you can have, so you can generate fan noise that way. You know, plus, like you said, I mean, the team is playing so well.

And, you know, the jazz naturally have one of the best home fan bases in the league in terms of, in terms of involvement. So, you know, it's one of those things where I think that, you know, when you look at, you know, some of the close games that the Jazz have had on their home floor or some of the games that have been close because, you know, not really, none of them are really ended close. You know, you could, you could feel the presence, you know, especially when a team goes on a run, hits a few shots, gets a few stops. and, you know, it kind of pulls away and it kind of does this thing over the course of time. You wrote a feature this week called the Utah Jazz, our legitimate NBA title contenders, here's how it happened. I definitely recommend anybody go check this out on The Athletic because it's a really cool snapshot of both this team and the present, but how they kind of built what they built.

But I wanted to ask you, if I told you that you were going to be writing this feature in February, if I told you that after the bubble last year, after their exit from the bubble, how hard would you have laughed at me or would you have said, yeah, you know what, maybe there's something here. They just need to put it together. So I'm going to take about a 50% victory lap here. Okay. 50%. And the part of the victory lap that I'm going to take is that I thought that the jazz were going to be a lot better than people thought they were going to be.

I thought that they were going to be the second best team in the Western Conference. And the reason why I thought that is because if you look at their starting five net rating from last year, you would see that it was one of the top, you know, six to eight in the league. Where the jazz lacked last season was the minutes that Rudy Gaubert sat. that's what sunk in last year. And I knew that getting Derek Favors back would help drastically in that area. And I thought that if the jazz played even or if, you know, they had a positive net rating in the non-Rudy-Gobert Minutes, I thought that with the net rating of the starting five, I thought that they were going to win a lot of games.

So I actually picked them number two in the West. That being said, I did not think that they were going to be 24 and 5. And just absolutely steamrolling teams. You know, so I would have said, if you had said, hey, if you had said, hey, you know, you'd be covering an NBA title contender in February. And you said that to me after the bubble. I would have said that means everything has gone, you know, exactly right. That means everybody's playing at peak level.

That means, you know, they, that means that they stayed healthy. That means that, you know, the Lakers and the clippers are essentially jogging through the regular season. I would not have said it was impossible, but I would have probably said it was improbable. Yeah. And, you know, one of my favorite quotes from this piece is one you've got from Brad Stevens, the Celtics coach where he said, I think it's the closest team to the 2014 San Antonio Spurs that we've played the way the ball moves

and how quickly the right decision is made, the ball doesn't stick. That really clicked with me, not only because I think you can see that aesthetically when you watch the jazz play, and there are some lineup similarities, I am not comparing Donovan and Rudy to Kauai and Tim Duncan, but I think that somewhat,

like in terms of how the roster was shaped, there's some similarities, but it also seems like the Spurs, but they were always the model for how a smaller market team could be competitive. When Brad said that, did you feel like that unlocked this team

a little bit for you? Yeah, you know, it's funny because I think it's tough to compare this jazz team to some of the historical teams, right? And I agree with Brad with the ball movement and, you know, the ball doesn't stick with this jazz team.

The only person that the ball sticks with on this team is Jordan Clarkson. And that's by design. You know, but everybody else, it's like, okay, you know, you get it. You get it. And within, you know, a second, you're either dribbling it, passing it, or moving it again. Or you're running or you're getting in the pick and roll with Rudy Gobert. You're getting in the pick and roll with Derek favors. Even the Joe Engels pick and rolls, you know, they're bringing them.

You know, they're bringing them off downscreens. You know, they're rolling them up to the key, and then you're going through picking rules that way. You know, there's so many intricate ways that Quinn is getting his team in the offense. You know, but, you know, that being said, you know, I find it really difficult to compare to find a really apt comparison with this team. I don't want to compare it with the 2014 Spurs because, you know, there was no Duncan, there's no Duncan on this team and there's no, no, no, no Kauai on this

team, even though Kauai wasn't fully formed. But, you know, my colony is a bit similar to Tony Parker in that way. You know, Jordan Clarkson's impact, you know, their games aren't stylistically similar, but Jordan Clarkson's impact is very, very similar this year to what Manuio Ginobley's impact off the bench was there. The shooting is similar. The ball movement is similar. Now, what nobody talks about is the defense. That Spurs 2014 team defensively was just absolutely elite, and the Jazz has been elite this year defensively.

But still, you don't want to compare this team to that team because that team was one of the best teams of this decade. You know, it was even, you know, almost, I mean, it wasn't quite 2017 Golden State. worries, you might not ever see that type of team again, but, you know, it was better than the Miami Heat teams. To me, it was better and it was better, probably better than the 2015 Golden State team. You know, a lot of, a lot of people try to draw similarities, you know, with this jazz team in the 2015, you know, Atlanta Hawks team. But I find this jazz team better because it's more built

for the playoffs because that that hawks team had one uh one dynamic ball handler and that was jeff t this team has like five or six you know so i think that this team is going to be able to stand up in the playoffs um the biggest thing with this jazz team historically is that you know at some point if it wants to go through a championship it's going to have to run through uh either lebron james or kawai lena and that's going to be a tough ask for this team to beat uh one of those two guys four out of seven times. So, you know, I think that, you know, this, this, what the jazz is doing is, is, is fantastic.

I think that they're an elite team on both ends of the floor. But I think that people are going to have to also, you know, for lack of a better term, they're going to have to take note of what's to come once the playoff start. The Clarkson thing's been pretty amazing to watch because it's an example of team really amplifying the best parts of a player and like putting him in a sit pit position where he can kind of be himself and being himself doesn't hurt the team it actually helps the team have you been impressed surprised uh did you did you when they brought clarkson in were you

like this doesn't quite make sense or are you like no it i i understand what they're going for here well when they bought clarkson in they had to do something because the jazz bench was so bad and they needed the scoring. And I think that, you know, this is a smaller scale of what you ask with the bubble. You know, when they bought Clarkson and then, I was like, okay, you know, this has a chance to work. Jordan's kind of cleaned up his shot profile a little bit in Cleveland. You know, he doesn't take so many bad shots anymore, and the jazz really needed scoring. So Jordan was really good for the jazz last year.

That being said, I don't think anybody saw this. No. You know, the scoring, the efficiency, you know, just the explosive scoring. I'm going to try to put this into context. It is so difficult to guard the jazz when Jordan Clarkson is on the floor. And the reason why it is is because the other four players are playing a completely different basketball. ball game than Jordan Clarkson is. Right?

So, you know, you have, you know, Jordan, you know, runs a lot with the second unit. But, you know, when Jordan's on the floor, the other player, the other guys are playing, you know, the regular, you know, the regular principles of jazz basketball. Everybody's shooting it, passing and moving it. You know, the quick twist decisions.

And then Jordan Clarkson gets it. And then he's just jacking. it from three point range. And he's making it. So you have to, you have to guard. So an opponent, when Jordan Clarkson is on the floor,

has to guard the, you know, they almost have to guard the jazz in two different ways. You know, one for the four, other four players that, you know,

are moving to basketball. And the other for Jordan Clarkson, when he's catches the basketball, he's almost always catching an attack mode. and Quinn Snyder's told Joyne Clarkson and said, you can take any shots you want as long as those shots are from one or three places.

You're either shooting from three-point range or you're shooting from 10 feet from the basket or you're shooting at or you're taking a layup. If you take one of those three shots, I don't care how many shots you take. And Jordan's like, so wait a minute, you're going to let me shoot anytime I want, but I only have to shoot for one of those three areas,

bet. And that's what he's done. And he's been so good in that role. And it's really made the jazz offense so difficult to guard because you have to, you have to account for him at all times when he's on the floor. And he seems like the kind of guy, without knowing anything about him personally,

but that style of play, that kind of player can be a chemistry killer. Like I've watched teams, I've cheered for teams that have dudes like Jordan, and you're just like, oh my God, man, like, I can't believe you just, you killed this run with like a heat check or like you looked off two open guys

to do three crossovers that got you a contested two. But it seems like for as much as Jordan's buying into the jazz system, the guys around him are buying into the Jordan system. Yeah, absolutely. I'll give you a good example of this. The jazz were at Indiana almost two weeks ago. And they were playing the Pacers. And, you know, it was like their third game in 66 hours.

or something like that, like something crazy. Yeah. They had no legs. You know, Donovan Mitchell, fast forward to the fourth quarter. Donovan Mitchell was just, you know, he had no legs left. Joe Ingalls had no legs left. The Jazz were up by like six or something. Like, you know, it was a really close game.

And, you know, there was a real question of whether the jazz could finish this off. and you can see the guys on the floor. They all looked at Jordan Clarkson. They was like, hey, man, take the ball. We all want the basketball, man. We all tired. Take the ball. This has been a long road trip.

Take us home. And Jordan Clarkson went out there and scored on four consecutive possessions. Like just ISO. They didn't run an offense on any of those four possessions. They didn't get into anything. Nobody set any picks. Nobody set any picks. Nobody moved outside of Jordan Clarkson.

Jordan just took the ball. ISO got into the lane, scored four straight times on floaters. And that was just a really good example of how this team has come to rely on his scoring, especially when it matters. And I think that the guys on this, team know how valuable it is to just have a bucket getter in the rotation.

You know, another good example is that Quinn Snyder doesn't play Jordan Clarkson out rarely over 29 and 30 minutes at the very most. What was the game that he scored 40 this week? I think it was a Philly, Philly, right? Yeah. Yes, he scored 40. Yes, because it was the Ben Simmons show and then all of a sudden it was like, Jordan Clarkson has 40.

It's kind of out of nowhere. Exactly. So Jordan has 40 and 29 minutes, right? That 29th minute came with at about the 5-minute mark in the fourth quarter, and Quinn Snyder takes him out. And he goes with his closing unit. And I think it's a good example, you know, that, you know, the coaching staff knows Jordan's strengths and its limitations.

the rest of the the rest of the roster knows Jordan's strengths and his limitations. And, you know, they let him go and do his thing in 25 minutes. And then at the end of 25 minutes, that's kind of it. And, you know, off the floor, Jordan has, has fit in with his locker room really, really seamlessly. Like, he's really found a home in Utah and with the locker room. And the guys have accepted him. and he's accepted the guys. So, you know, it's been a really good fit for him.

What's the state of the Rudy and Donovan relationship? Because, you know, for as much as it was sort of fodder for social media debate with the Shaq stuff about whether Rudy had earned his deal or whatever, and I don't really even care about that. But I almost feel like did the commitment to Rudy by the team kind of settle things internally on the roster? Like, did the understanding? that look, it's going to be the two of us going forward, so we have to make the best of what we've got here.

Well, I think that, you know, those two made their peace with each other in the bubble. And, you know, I kind of wrote about this and alluded to this in the story that I wrote, you know, those guys know that they need each other professionally. you know, no matter what their personal relationship is, and frankly, what their personal relationship is, it's none of our business. But they know that they need each other professionally. They know that they accentuate each other's strengths and, you know, and they know that their strengths, you know, cover each other's weaknesses. you know, Rudy Gobert is a star borderline superstar who will never be able to get a bucket in the last five minutes of a game if you throw the ball to him in the post.

But Donovan Mitchell was that guy that's going to get you buckets in the last five minutes of a game. Donovan Mitchell knows that if Rudy Gobert was not underneath the basket erasing not only his mistakes or not only his mistakes, but, you know, every team, every guy on the rest of the team, then we will look at Donovan a lot more as a one-way player. You know, those two, they need each other. You know, they need each other to be the best version of themselves individually. And I think that they realized that.

I think they made their peace with that. And I think that because they made their peace with that, I think that the organization was able to move forward with both of those guys as centerpieces. The thing about those two, the best thing about those two is that both of those guys are really self-aware. And, you know, that their eagles weren't big enough that, you know, they let whatever rift that they had destroyed their professional relationship. and I think that, you know, they got together and they said, hey, we can win a championship together or, you know, we can kind of go our own separate ways and kind of struggle as individuals. And I think that they chose the former, and I think that that shows a sign of maturity on both ends there.

I wanted to ask you, you know, there was a part in your piece where you talked a little bit about the front office there. and you kind of outlined how Utah has this ability to make their mistakes into successes. You know, if you take Trey Liles over Devin Booker, some teams might lick their wounds for a few years and it takes a while to live that down. They turn Trey Liles into Donovan Mitchell, you know? And even when it seems like they get out ahead of their skis

and do something wrong, they have ways of fixing it. Bringing back favors is a perfect example of this. They realize that he was more important to the team, in Green and Ed Davis, Jeff Green and Ed Davis. What is it about this front office that is resilient in that way? Because a lot of, I think we're looking around the league and we're seeing teams, you know, I'm going to be talking about the Timberwolves later in the pod, where they committed to a duo and now that is kind of like for a variety of different reasons.

It's just obviously not working with Kat and DeAngelo Russell. What is it about the Jazz Front Office that's able to kind of fix their own mistakes when they make them? Well, the Derek Favorist thing wasn't a mistake. They knew, and they, you know, they knew as they were letting him go, they were like, we're really going to miss this guy. You know, they had to let go Derek Favoris because that was a cap thing because they wouldn't have been able to get Bogdanovich and key favors. They would have had to, they, they wouldn't have had the cap space. Jeff Green and Ed Davis, I think everybody was shocked that that didn't work out. Like everybody, I think media, we were shocked because, you know, when they signed those two, we were just like, wow.

Like, those are great signs. Yeah, I was like, that's serious. Like, this team is serious about it. Right, because you traded for Mike Conley. You signed Boyan Bogdanovich. They stole Boyan Bogdanovich, by the way. And, you know, you get those two. And then you sign Jeff Green and Ed Davis to, I mean, we were, I mean, they were, you.

universally prays for those moves. And I think everybody involved was just, you know, beyond shocked when it, when it didn't work out, especially with Jeff Green, because, you know, he was seeing, he seems like, he seemed like the ultimate, you know, jazz player in terms of his versatility, in terms of everything that he does well, you know,

he does a little bit of everything well. And Jeff is going on and, you know, And he went on and he played terrific in Houston. He's playing even better in Brooklyn than he did in Houston. So I think everybody was shocked that, you know, they didn't work out. But, you know, Justin Zanick and Dennis Lindsay and David Moray, I mean, they had the ability to, you know,

when they realized that something isn't working, you know, they're aggressive enough to go out and try to fix it. You know, the Donovan Mitchell thing, you know, they bought Donovan in and, you know, they immediately fell in love with him. They kind of knew right away what they were, what Donovan had a chance to be. And they jumped on that early, you know, turning Dante X him into Jordan Clarkson is now looking like one of the best trades in the NBA team has made in this decade. you know, and, you know, finding Rudy Gobert, you know, that's turning, you know, this front office has had enough success stories that, you know, they know that, you know, they could take whatever hit, you know, for something that doesn't work. But, you know, when they notice something isn't working to their credit, you know, they haven't let it linger. Like, You know, they could have easily, you know, kept Jeff Green and kept trying to make that work. But they realized really, really, really early on that, you know, that just wasn't a good fit.

And, you know, they went to Jeff. And that was kind of a mutual parting because they said, hey, you know, it's, you know, we respect you enough as a veteran, you know, that if we let you go early enough, we know that you're going to catch on somewhere else. And I think they've been really cognizant of treating people the right way. And I think that they've been really cognizant of being corrective when they know that they haven't done something right. Is there anywhere that this team needs to improve? Like, buyout market, trade deadline. Do you think that this is the group of players that we're going to see in the postseason?

I think that they're going to scan the biomarker for sure to see what shakes out. you know, I think that if something makes sense, I don't think that they would hesitate to pull a proverbial trigger. I think that, you know, if they could find a bigger wing that can defend, I think that they would try to look at that, you know, but whoever they bring in, I think that they want that person to be able to shoot the basketball. You know, so I don't know how easy that's going to be able to find. find, like, can you find a big wing on the buyout market who can also come in and shoot

35 to 40% from three point range? That's what everybody's looking for, right? Right. That's what everybody's looking for. And if they could find that, you know, he's probably not on the buyout market. Yeah, if there were only 15 more J. Crowders, everybody would be happy. Exactly. So, you know, do they look at somebody like Trevor or reason?

Does Trevor A Reza have enough juice, you know, to come in and be able to help a contender. And I'm sure that a lot of contenders are going to be looking at Trevor Reza. I think, you know, the Lakers are probably looking at them. The Nets are probably looking at them. I think a lot of teams are probably looking at them. You know, it's so ironic because, you know, the two guys are real friends. But man, you know, I wonder if the jazz knew that Nick Baton would be as good as he's been this season. You know, I wonder if the jazz would have tried to tried to go in that route when he became, when he became available as well. Because he's tight with Rudy?

Yeah, because he's tight with Rudy. Yeah, that would be an ideal thing. I mean, in a weird way, it's, it's funny with the jazz because they are, they are so in the zone right now that you almost don't want to tweak it too much. You don't want to mess with what they've got and mess with the mojo. But yeah, I would imagine that, that also you never know with injuries and stuff like that where they might feel like they need to bolster and back somebody up. Tony, man, thank you so much for joining me today.

It was really informative. And I'll be really curious to see whether or not we have a conversation in a couple months, whether this team is still where they're at. Listen, I'm sold on what they can accomplish in a regular city. I mean, they are really, really good. And, you know, they have nine guys that I don't think, you know, it's hard to duplicate what they can put out, what those nine guys can put out on a nightly basis.

The question to me is, you know, can they make a deep playoff run? And, you know, I mean, when they inevitably meet one of the Los Angeles teams what happens in a seven-game series there. Yeah, it'll be fascinating. Tony, man, thank you so much for joining me today. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.

Now I'm joined by my good buddy and my fellow ringer editor, Megan Schuster. Megan, what's up? Oh, you know, Chris. I have been preparing for this all morning, emotionally, spiritually, physically, and I'm still not quite sure I'm ready, but we're here. Megan and I are here to talk about the Timberwolves. I feel bad about this. I adore Megan, but I did want to talk to somebody about what's happening in Minnesota because it was the perfect sort of counterbalance to what's happening in Utah. And in some ways, I've been where Megan's been.

You know, I'm a Sixers fan. Sixers went through the process years. there were some really experimentally bad experiences then. But they were experimental. They did seem like they were concocted by a scientist named Sam Hinky to build the monster that is the Sixers now eventually. And there was a process. There was a plan.

Megan. It doesn't look like there's like a plan, right? In Minnesota? Well, Chris, I would have to say that for the majority of my life, there has not been a plan with the Minnesota Timberwolves, like at least since Kevin Garnett left, it's felt like a series of hodgepodge regime changes. And every time somebody knew came in, they like, quote unquote, had their own idea of how things were going to go. And weirdly enough, none of them have ever paid off. So this is sort of the latest in a long line of disappointing seasons and

disappointing teams. And I think the frustrating thing or the extra frustrating thing with this one in particular is like there was a lot of hope. Like when Rose, like when Gerson Roses came in, like a lot of Timberwolves fans celebrated this. We're very excited about this. He has, you know, a pretty good track record of helping build decent teams in the NBA. And so I truly don't know what exactly happened, but somewhere along the line, the rails fell off. And, um, here we are. Here we are. So let's just go over a little bit of where we are.

So the Timberwolves, it's Friday. They started the season 2 and O. That was great. And then they lost seven in a row in December and January. And since then, have never won more than one game in a row this season. They are currently seven and 22. Cat is essentially,

I would say, this is the worst case scenario of playing basketball this season is what's happening to Carl Anthony Towns. not only has he had to deal with the emotional stuff from the people that he has lost, including his mother from COVID, but now he is also a COVID survivor himself. And he's just had, like, random injuries pop up. So he has been basically out this season.

And now that he is back, DeAngelo Russell is out. And the entire premise of this team is the two of them paired together. Like, do you ever start to wonder whether or not there is, this is like more than just mismanagement? And we're starting it into the mystical. Oh, 100%. Because like I said, for most of my life, September wolves have been bad.

But this is not a team being bad. This is like straight up a team being cursed. And I was thinking about this today. And I was like, I feel like the only solution is for Ryan Saunders to go full Ted lasso and like try to exercise some demons in Target Center and like have everyone bring in, you know, their special piece of memorabilia and like burn it all

and like try to stage the arena like Kyrie Irving style because there is something sincerely messed up when like both of your star players cannot get on the court together and haven't been able to get on the court together, you know, since DeAngelo came really. I mean, they have had such limited time between COVID layoffs and, you know, obviously not being in the bubble. And then this year with both of their respective injuries

and like you said, Kat, getting COVID and being out for such a long time, time, there's something very odd going on here. And yeah, and yeah, just concerning for sure. And also, I hate to tell you this. But like, you know, when we're like working together and we're like, oh, we should do Cleveland Week and we should talk about how like it's been such a long time. And this was before, I think this was before, you know, LeBron won with the Cavs. And you're like, we should talk about how long it's been since there was a championship there.

And, you know, the Timberwolves have missed the playoffs 15 out of 16 years. Like, this is, we're getting there. You know what I mean? Like, you're living through it. How does that feel as a, as a Wolves fan? I saw some article the other day, and I think it was maybe like Texas Monthly or some publication in Texas. And this was after the Harden Trade. And they had declared Houston the most cursed sports city.

And I, like, wanted to raise my hand and raise a formal objection because that's horseshit. And like, like, you don't get to be a cursed city just because, like, a few of your good players got traded away when like you've had world series victories and like i've had dishan watson and james hardin and you know rocket success like like that doesn't just because you lose a couple guys doesn't make you cursed like like come visit here once or twice and you'll see what like actually cursed sports fandom feels like um so yeah i would say we are we are like firmly taking the mantle back um in a big way you know arguably too big of a way but uh i don't think anyone can deny anymore, like, where our position is in the hierarchy of, you know, NBA curses.

Like, I guess, like, I'm curious because you're, you're there now. So, like, do you get this sense that people are, what, are they engaged with this team? Are they, like, hiding their faces? Is there just so much other stuff in life to worry about that it's like people are kind of ignoring the wolves? Like, what is the Minnesotan relationship to the Timberwolves this year? I will say the best part of this Timberwell season for me personally has been the fact that it's given me a lot of time to re-engage with hockey, which has been a lot of fun for me. I've been in Los Angeles for the last five years, and so being back here, it's been fun to kind of rejoin that hockey culture. But I think the thing, like people are still watching it and are still engaging with it, but in sort of like existential way. Like before DeAngelo went down with his injury, like most of the tweets I saw about the wolves were like, should the wolves bench DeAngelo Russell and like start Anthony Edwards.

And like what kind of machinations can we make with this team to make it at least interesting and at least like a somewhat enjoyable or like different experience night to night versus just this like crushing defeat that like, you know, even with Russell on the court, nothing was going right. They have been getting crushed. Like the margin of victories have been pretty bad. Yeah. There hasn't been anything redeemable about this. I mean, now that's sort of turning a corner, like Anthony Edwards has been better lately and has at least been, you know, turning into a bright spot.

But even so, like, he's getting, you know, all of the number one pick pressure. And when you have, you know, somebody like Lamello Ball, who started the season on fire and has been so excited. Like even that has, you know, kind of taken a dart like a shadow over Anthony Edwards. And that's another good example of like a kind of mid-market team in the same way Utah is, where you're like, oh man, so even like Charlotte has it more together than us. Yeah.

It's not it's not just like these like sort of bigger market teams. But yeah, yeah, I'm sure he is feeling a little bit of footsteps where it's like, Andy Edwards is really good. But like, but like Weissman and Weissman's on the Warriors and is playing in really consequential games. And Lamello's got Charlotte like contending for a playoffs. Which is another thing is the fact that both Andrew Wiggins and Zach Levine are having good seasons. Like, Zach Levine is going to be an NBA all star for the first time. Andrew Wiggins has had like, but like by all calculations, like a solid rebound season with the Warriors.

And it's like I'm starting to feel like the Timberwolves or that movie. I forget who this star is. But like where he dates a girl, breaks up with her. And then the girl goes and like meets her future husband like in her next. partner. It's starting to feel like the Timberwolves are that for for NBA players. Like you spend, you know, your couple down seasons in Minnesota pay your dues and then your next stop, you'll like turn into what you're supposed to be. It seems like over the years the Timberwolves have had issues where they really deeply commit to, in the parlance of relationships like this,

they deeply commit to somebody and then realize like it's too late. Whether or not it's because like the financial investment or is too large or it's just, just somebody like Kevin Love is actually not the franchise player. It's, you know, it's got to be someone who, you know, you've got to use that money in different ways in the NBA salary cap era. And it's just like Love was awesome at his peak, but is probably not the kind of guy who actually wins you games. He's just the kind of guy who fills up a statute, but can be very useful with the LeBron and Kyrie. Are you worried that you guys have arrived at that point with towns.

Yes. Yeah, I'm very worried about it. And not because I think he's a Kevin Love or because I think he's an empty stats guy because I honestly think he is like a player you can build a team around. But the Timberwolves have failed to do so for the last, you know, five, six years.

And like obviously that speaks to sort of franchise incompetence and just generally like, you know, the fact that you can't put a good team around a number one pick like him and like a, you know, generational talent like him is frustrating and really concerning. But it also makes me wonder, like, at some point, do you have to kind of like set him free? Yeah. And like give him the opportunity to like turn into the kind of player he should be somewhere else. Yeah, I mean, and you do have Edwards there. So there is sort of an inheritor there. Like, if you were to try and trade high on towns.

And let's just, whether you were like trading towns to the thunder, you know, for a draft hall or trading towns to, I don't know, the rockets or something like that, you know, whether you were going to flip him like that, you know, I'm sure that the Timberwell's fans probably would be like, okay, that's, you know, this didn't work out. The Russell one is a little tougher. I don't know how you get rid of a guy who's going to make 60 million over the next two seasons who performs like that.

I don't either. I mean, you know, granted we somehow managed to get rid of Wiggins, which I thought was a miracle at the time. But now it seems like that's going to turn around and bite us in the butt because, A, they have, you know, him performing at a high level. And B, they might get our first round pick. It's top three protected. So if the wolves wind up in. There's a good chance we keep it because probably we'll finish in the bottom three. You've got that going for you. And we'll have a good, you know, good lottery odds of keeping it.

but I mean there's also you know every chance that we give that to Golden State too and it's just so we I mean if you look at it in total like we've basically given the Warriors Andrew Wiggins potentially this other

top pick yeah and Steph Curry that's right so you're welcome Golden State we've given you like half your team at the moment so what's the situation right now with ownership

because I know that Glenn Taylor's basically been trying to sell this team for the last 10 years on and off, right? And there was the Kevin Garnett bid, or that was at least like his ownership group wanted a shot at it. And then there was this guy, Daniel Strauss, right, who got a term sheet. Yeah, because Kevin Garnett and Torrey Hunter were kind of combining to try and like turn this ownership group into something that had enough juice to buy the team. And I just don't think they could, or at least not on the timeline that Glenn wants to sell. I think he's ready to sell right now. His big media promise has been that he wants in the contract that the team is going to stay in Minnesota.

And I don't know if that's like a sticking point for anyone. Like I could kind of see it at this point. Sure. You know, cut your losses and move on. But I haven't heard anything new about that in a while. So I don't know that there are many updates outside of like it seemed like they had a buyer for a while. and then nothing has progressed. Yeah, this guy Daniel Strauss had gotten to a term sheet.

Windhorst had an article about this in January, but there was basically a lot of fluctuation with the value of the franchise due to COVID. Because like you're basically looking at this and being like, I guess I'm betting on fans being back in there. Do you think that ultimately, though, I mean, is it something that needs to, like, do you feel like it needs to have, like just a complete top-down new owner, probably a new franchise player?

let's just kind of like out with the old in with the new the Taylor errors over like is that like the probably the best case scenario is just like a complete home makeover? I think it's time. And I'm willing to give like the front office the benefit of the doubt because they haven't been there very long and I mean I don't know that anyone could have like

predicted what the last few seasons have been like and you know the ramifications of that. And so I'm willing to give them a chance. I think there, you know, there should have been a new ownership group in there years ago. Yeah, maybe 2013, 2015. Like, it could have happened, right? Yeah, exactly. So I think that that, you know, obviously needs to be done.

I think Ryan Saunders will probably be out. Yeah, I think they just need a reboot. I mean, the, like, there has to be some way to get this curse gone. And maybe that is just to, like, burn it all of the ground. Yeah. And, like, you know, try and spread the. ashes out somewhere positive. Maybe you should be the first basketball team to

NBA team to play outside. You know what I mean? Maybe you should embrace the Great North and just kind of be like, if you come to Minnesota, you've got to play basically on a frozen tunnel. Our competitive advantage. Yeah, we're going to play basketball in negative degree weather.

I think, you know, who knows? If you, so now, since the Wolves have sort of freed you from your responsibilities this season as an NBA fan, Have you adopted a new team? I have not. I've sort of let the NBA pass me by this year in the hopes that next year I can rejoin.

Sure. It's like a train going on a loop. And you're just going to wait for it to come back. I can just hop back on it next year. I have been enjoying a lot of NBA-related memes, like the Kevin Durant memes from last night. We're great. I love Brooklyn as like a meme generator of a team.

I've gotten back into college. hockey with all my time. I'm like big into, I'm big into Formula One now. I just binge all of the drive to survive stuff on Netflix and have become really invested in a few drivers. And then just player championships coming up. Like you got that going for you. I'm diversifying my interests and, you know, trying not to let the Timberwolves hurt me anymore. So some days are better than others. I appreciate you being vulnerable on this podcast and talking to me a little bit about what it's like to cheer for these guys. It must be hard. And anytime.

Thank you so much for joining me on The Answer.