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Wolves Notes: Saunders interview with Lowe, Rubio with SI, Hummel to Italy

By Ben Beecken

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Happy Day After the Andre Miller Signing, everyone. Wolves fans should be happy with how this off-season has shook out thus far.

There has been a steady trickle of Wolves-related items on this Thursday, beginning with the resurfacing of old friend Robbie Hummel. It isn’t in the NBA however, which is mildly surprising and a bit disappointing.

Hummel had played in Spain between being drafted by the Wolves with the 58th-overall pick in 2012 and debuting in the NBA in 2013 and after two years on the Wolves’ roster, the former Purdue University star is apparently headed to play for Olimpia Milano in Italy.

As I’ve discussed at great length here at Dunking With Wolves, Hummel is an effective NBA rotation player, even if the most-optimal spot for him is as the 10th man off the bench. The Wolves even initially extended the qualifying offer to Hummel as the first step to bringing him back into the fold, but after the Chase Budinger-to-Damjan Rudez trade was consummated, Hummel became even more superfluous to the current roster and there simply wasn’t room anymore.

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Elsewhere, Zach Lowe of Grantland had a fantastic and at times fascinating Q & A session with Flip Saunders. They discussed Saunders causing drunk GMs to make poor (personnel) decisions at 3 a.m. in the CBA back in the 1980s and 1990s, his philosophy on post play versus/concurrent to the three-point shot in the modern NBA, and Kevin Garnett m-effing Nikola Pekovic in practice.

It’s well worth the read, even though there are a few frustrating packages that will make Wolves fans want to bang their heads against their desks. A sampling (bold are questions asked by Lowe):

"Your new practice facility has offices for both the coach and the president of basketball operations. Which one do you use?I use both. I got one upstairs, where management meets. And my downstairs one is near where all the coaches are.Two offices? Come on.Hey, depending on what mood I’m in, that’s the one I use.…Can you generate enough spacing with a point guard who can’t shoot, at least one wing who likes to post up — and both Wiggins and Shabazz do — and two bigs who live mostly from the elbows in?Do we need to make 3s? No question. I think Andrew will become an adequate 3-point shooter. The bottom line is, you have what you have. If your best players aren’t 3-point shooters, you can’t just make them 3-point shooters. We need to build around them and get some other players who can stretch the floor.And here’s the big thing: Towns, KG, and [Adreian] Payne are not post-up bigs. They knock down 18-footers with regularity. So it’s not like we’ll have no spacing."

There’s also an enlightening interview with Ricky Rubio over at SI.com from Ben Golliver. They touch on Rubio’s ankle rehab, playing with Towns and Wiggins, and the idea of Rubio developing a floater to add to his offensive arsenal.

We’re planning some additional Andre Miller trade analysis as well as a look back at Saunders first two years as both basketball operations boss and head coach. Keep it tuned to DWW…

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