Minnesota Timberwolves Draft Grade -- B

As someone who has spent his entire life watching sit-coms, all I could think of last night was the classic sit-com setup where a main character wants desperately to date some hot chick and she constantly disses him, but after he has already asked someone very nice and sweet to go on the date, the hot chick suddenly says "yes."

Now a woman would handle this with the Marcia Brady aplomb of "Something suddenly came up" and dump the nice sweet guy.

The guys, however, always seem to think they can date the two girls the same night or at the same time. Fred Flintstone, Beaver Cleaver, the kid from "Boy Meets World" -- all have to give it a try. It never ends well.

So the Wolves go into the draft last night firmly convinced that picks two through four will result in either Jonny Flynn or Ricky Rubio being drafted. So the Wolves are sitting around saying they are all set in the backcourt for 10 years with:

Flynn and Evans
Flynn and Harden
Rubio and Harden
Rubio and Evans

But hell, even if Rubio and Flynn both go, Tyreke Evans can play some point and you can go:
Evans and Harden
Evans and Curry

Again, backcourt set for 10 years.

#3 -- OKC -- apparently having received an earful from Russell Westbrook about how disrespected he will be if the Thunder select Rubio, management pusses out and picks James Harden. (By the way, how do you think Jeff Green feels about this pick? I mean, you aren't telling me Kevin Durant will be playing PF anytime soon, are you? So if it goes Westbrook, Harden, Durant...........welcome to Benchville, population YOU Jeff Green.)

#4 -- Sacto has one good player -- Kevin Martin -- off guard, scorer not a distributor
They select -- Tyreke Evans -- off guard, scorer not a distributor.
This would be like the Wolves picking Jordan Hill. (Hmmmmmm, Al Jefferson is pretty good, guess he kinda needs another backup though......)

Now, these selections made little sense, but now the Wolves are in sit-com city. They have already asked Jonny Flynn to be their special guy (I talked with Wolves personnel for 2 days pre-draft; had Jonny Flynn shot and killed a nun in front of Target Center yesterday, they still pick him).

But now the great Ricky Rubio is at their doorstep saying "Oooh, pick me; pick me!"

Fact of the matter -- you have to pick him. I mean, like a single guy who has the prom queen and head cheerleader saying "yes" before the dance, you gotta go with it. You are a guy. You have no choice.

But do the Wolves show some form of judgment and tell Flynn, "Something suddenly came up?" Nope. They pick him TOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

David Kahn -- "Well, Isiah and Dumars played together. Ainge and Dennis Johnson played together." Joe Dumars was 6'3" and one of the greatest on-ball defenders of all-time. Which one of Flynn and Rubio fits that description? Oh, neither, correct. Ainge and DJ were both 6'4". Yes, I would agree, if you picked Tyreke Evans and Ricky Rubio together that you could play them together.

Heck, I would even agree that you could play two point guard together if you have a good shotblocking big man. We have Al and Love. You won't be a good defensive team unless you play Michael Jordan and Dwyane Wade together as your backcourt.

So now the Wolves have two dates for the same night. The logical thing to do would be to cut your losses and weasel out of the deal -- trade Rubio to some big market club for a center and a veteran off guard/SF.

But Kahn won't do that. He will take the Fred Flintstone/Beaver Cleaver route and try to date both. You promised both that you would go, how can you pass it up?

At the end of the day, maybe Prom Queen Rubio makes it easy on Kahn and goes back to Europe for a year. That way Kahn can date Flynn, see if things work out, and then either take Rubio back or not based upon future events.

PICK 28

Wayne Ellington -- While I can never support picking a UNC player, I have to say, way down at #28 at least Kahn tried to fill a need and picked an American player who had shown some signs of success as a player. Ellington has huge deficiencies (mostly he can't dribble and doesn't play hard), but he is as of today the only off guard the Wolves have.

By the way, the Lawson trade effectively moved the Wolves up a few picks. I would anticipate Charlotte's pick next year being 13-15. So, worth a shot.




Bill Simmons on the Wolves 5 & 6 picks:


5:01: As we're waiting for Sota, instead of making the obligatory Jonas Brothers joke about Rubio, I'm going in a different direction: Why didn't the "High School Musical" producers hire Rubio for the third movie? He could have played a transfer student from Spain who made Zac Efron feel threatened, briefly dated Vanessa Hudgens, then became friends with them before winning the state title … and everything could have finished with a big dance number. Come on, you're telling me Rubio wouldn't have killed with Disney's audience? Hell, even I think he's cute, and I'm a heterosexual male with a wife and two kids. Wait, did I say that out loud?

5:03: Phew. Sota took him. The best part: Stern going into "I'm gonna be extra gregarious right now because they'll be replaying this in Europe!" mode as he announced the pick. Gotta say, I can't kill Kahn for turning Randy Foye and Mike Miller into Rubio. Nice work. An orgasmic Fraschilla says Rubio is "the best passer in the last decade of drafts" and he's "got a Gretzky-like feel, he sees the game two and three plays ahead." Totally agree.


5:06: Exchange of the night so far …
Jones: "For the fans that haven't seen you play, which NBA player do you think you play like?"
Rubio: "I'm Ricky Rubio, I'm not like anyone else."
(I think I'm borrowing that answer anytime my wife yells at me. "Honey, what do you want from me? I'm Bill Simmons. I'm not like anyone else.")


5:10: So much for Minnesota doing the right thing. The Wolves just took Syracuse's Jonny Flynn … whom I really like … but … well … he's a point guard. Didn't they just take Rubio? Did I black out? You're going to have two young ball handlers playing together -- one who's 5-foot-11, the other who's 18 years old and weighs 180 pounds (and 30 of that is his hair), and that's your plan? Who's guarding the Kobes and Vinces out of those two? Why didn't they just take Curry? And why aren't the ESPN guys wondering about a trade here or, at the very least, murdering this pick? THEY JUST TOOK TWO STRAIGHT POINT GUARDS!!!!!!!!!!

5:11: I'm in "Star Trek II" mode right now. "Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahn!!!!!!" So stupid. I'm never trusting a guy who worked as a TV consultant, a sports writer and a stadium campaign organizer to run an NBA team again.

5:12: Jonny drops a little third person in his interview -- we're on a streak of two right now. Bill Simmons is beside himself.