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Year-Round News & Updates on the Minnesota Timberwolves
The Minnesota Timberwolves are in the midst of contract negotiations with swingman Andrew Wiggins. The five-year extension is rumored to be worth roughly $148 million. When asked about the extension and whether Wiggins truly believes he's worth "max money" he replied, that he's worth "nothing less" than a max contract.
Whether that is true or not, still remains to be seen. The versatile wing has never shown the kind of consistency that you would like to see from a former number one overall pick. His lack of "killer instinct" has also been a hindrance during his tenure in the league. He's developed into somewhat of a go-to scorer in crunch time and his offense has steadily improved each season. While you'd still like to see more from him, it stands to reason that the Wolves brass is somewhat hesitant to throw max money at the young forward. The key reason being, his defense and his effort on that end of the floor. With the versatile Jimmy Butler now in the mix, the hope is that some of his tendencies on the defensive end wear off on Andrew, he's got plenty of improvements to make. The craziest thing about this contract extension is that Andrew Wiggins is already one of the better players in Timberwolves franchise history. A year or two ago, max money for a player like Andrew wouldn't have even really been a question. Now with Jimmy Butler in the mix and an improved roster around him with the likes of Karl-Anthony Towns (who still has improvements to make on the defensive end himself), Jeff Teague, Butler, and Taj Gibson -- Andrew's flaws are being brought more to the forefront in these kind of negotiations. I recall the year Michael Beasley was Minnesota's starting small forward, this was when K-Love was still in the fold and just on the cusp of becoming a bonafide star in the League. If you transported that offseason to this offseason, with the skyrocket in cap, I probably would have advocated for Beasley to get a max extension from the Wolves (despite his many -- and more glaring -- deficiencies on the defensive side of the ball). Because at that time, Beas was coming off a really good season in Minnesota where Rambis had given him the green light to fire at will. He was a high-volume shooter and he scored a lot of points. For the first time in about five years, at that point, the Wolves seemed to have a potent duo in Love & Beasley that could grow together. I would have seriously considered giving Beasley a lot of money to stick around Minny. It just goes to show how this franchise has changed since Tom Thibodeau has taken over lead in the Wolves front office -- and also how drastically the League has changed in the past few years. Assuming Andrew Wiggins isn't shipped out of town, back to Cleveland, in a deal that nets the Wolves Kyrie Irving -- Andrew will remain in Minnesota, and get a nice bump in salary to boot (starting at roughly $25 million per year). Stay tuned to HOWL for all the updates!
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Cody AndersonA TWolves fan, bringing you the daily updates. News Archives
August 2017
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