I often thought of David Kahn as that pesky squirrel, starving, from his inability to both see and hunt for inanimate prey in the vast forest of Minnesota during his time in the front office there.
Okay, I never really thought about him like that specifically before just now, but I do think that his hiring of Rick Adelman is the NBA equivalent of that blind squirrel finally finding and feasting on that ever elusive acorn. Dude lucked into this thing somehow, but irregardless of that, the Timberwolves will be better for the time Adelman spends patrolling their sidelines.
Adelman was introduced to the Minnesota media yesterday, alongside the beaming Timberwolves VP, and said all the right things as expected.
This from Jerry Zgoda of the StarTribune Sports:
“I thought about the situation with the young group, thought it was a great chance, a great challenge and a very good opportunity,” Adelman said. “As soon as we get started we’ll find out what kind of players we have.”
His decision to return to coaching took most of the summer.
“I was looking for very good teams, there were some there at the start of the summer, but I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do,” he said. “As the summer went on … I was approached by David and the Timberwolves, we talked a number of times, the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to coach one more time.”
Now just real quick on that, if Mke Brown isn’t hired in LA than Adelman probably isn’t available and who knows what David Kahn ends up doing then. It’s not really clear what all shook out between Rick and the Lakers, but he seemed to be the leading candidate for a moment out there earlier this summer, and they certainly would qualify as a “very good team”. Not that Kahn’s upset about Brown landing that gig out of nowhere, though.
Adelman then went on to talk about the youth movement currently underway in Minnesota:
“I kept looking at this team and the challenge. I really enjoyed the last two years in Houston, when we lost our superstars because of injuries and things … you saw the growth of that [young] group. It was a real pleasure coaching in that atmosphere.”
Adelman has watched film of the Timberwolves, and said this:
“They were a good offensive team, got better as the year went on, have quality players at that end …but on the other end, there’s go to tbe some responsibility at the defensive end. That’s the challenge.” “There’s a lot of potential, lot of length, obviously a lot of youth.”
To me there’s also some potential for similarities to the Sacramento teams he had annually challenging for the Western Conference back in the day too on this roster. Now they’ll to develop, and there’s no Webber to be sure, who was for a couple year period a top-10 NBA talent, but Kevin Love’s a pretty good PF too and who knows how good he can be. Like Webber, he’s a willing passer, in addition to hitting the glass, and there is a lot of length out there to be sure as well. Rookie Derrick Williams, Love, Brad Miller (who was on those SacTown teams a decade ago), Anthony Randolph, and whoever else maybe could be younger versions of Vlade, Webber and Hedo one day if they respond to Rick’s tutelage – who knows.
Adelman is also right about another thing though, they will most definitely need to defend a little bit better than the not defending anyone at all thing they did last season. That will either make or break them no matter how many points and Old Spice commercials they convert on next year, and Adelman’s time there will be ultimately judged on the Timberwolves willingness to do just that.
It does seem they’re pointed in the right direction at the moment though, which is just about the first time anybody can legitimately say that about an NBA team that David Kahn’s been involved with.
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Photo: NBA.com
