per Sid:
Wolves contract
Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor knows the franchise is at a key moment as they try to re-sign Jimmy Butler and Karl-Anthony Towns.
While the team is coming off a competitive season and reached the playoffs for the first time in over a decade, the fate of those two stars remains a big question mark.
Taylor, who also owns the Star Tribune, broke down Butler’s situation.
“We made him a max offer so that he would have the [opportunity] to sign that,” Taylor said. “That was the most we could do. He said he was appreciative, but he wanted to wait until next year because he thought next year, as a free agent, he might have the opportunity to earn more money.”
There’s no doubt that typically if a star player was as close to unrestricted free agency as Butler is, the Wolves would consider trading him — as they did with Kevin Love in 2014. But they just traded two first-round draft picks, Zach LaVine and Kris Dunn, to the Bulls for Butler, and that means there’s almost no chance they would deal him.
“I think at this point we’re just going to concentrate on getting [Towns] signed and then just go forward and see what type of year we have,” Taylor said when asked about trading Butler. “And then wait until next year, and we’ll make our decision based upon where we’re at next year.”
Taylor added that the Wolves can offer Butler more money than any other team, but that might not be a motivating factor for Butler.
“You still want us to really improve as a team and we expect that he will be part of that help that we need [to achieve] a better record and to go into the playoffs further,” he said.
Money and chemistry
Taylor dismissed rumors that Butler and Towns are not getting along.
“They both want to win. They both want to improve,” Taylor said. “And they know that helping each other will only make each of them individually better. I’m not sure there’s any particular problem here. A lot of it is just based on a story that a Chicago reporter put out and as far as I know, the players have denied any knowledge of that article.”
A bigger concern for Taylor is whether or not keeping Andrew Wiggins, Butler and Towns is financially possible with the current NBA salary cap structure.
If Towns and Butler were to sign max contract extensions, Towns could earn somewhere around $32 million per season and Butler around $37 million.
That means for the 2019-2020 season, the Wolves could be spending north of $90 million on three players. Can the team afford that?
“That’s a good question. I think you know it’ll depend upon some other players that we have on our team, too,” Taylor said. “It’s going to be a stretch. We have Wiggins in there, too. We’d have three highly paid players that would use up most of the salary.”
http://www.startribune.com/twins-goal-of-making-playoffs-turns-into-rebuilding-plan/489821421/
Howl Wolves!!
