This Is America (Well, it’s Minnesota)
By Trey Flynn
If you’re living on planet Earth, you may know about the new “This Is America” music video by Childish Gambino (an artist known as Donald Glover, and yes they are the same person).
This music video conveys Gambino’s feelings on America as a whole, which has made Twitter lose its collective mind.
This video exemplifies what 2018 art looks like, and Gambino doesn’t disappoint his social media audience, myself included. This music video wasn’t just a fun four minutes of sounds and dancing, it created a platform and delivered multiple points. Specifically, a point about the issues in America that we’re not discussing (shout out to Drake) that are in the background of Gambino in the video.
Just like that music video and it’s background, we got some other issues in Minnesota that were not discussing. The Minnesota Timberwolves seem to be falling apart even more since their 4-1 playoff loss against the highly coveted Houston Rockets. Where are the issues on the team? Head coach Tom Thibodeau feels very strongly about a new direction with the Wolves and their coaching staff, or he’s possibly been forced to make some decisions.
"VIA, The Athletic“The Minnesota Timberwolves announced Tuesday that assistant coach Rick Brunson resigned, but did not provide a reason for his departure. According to The Athletic, his resignation comes amid allegations of improper interactions with several women while on the job.”"
Timberwolves former assistant coach, Rick Brunson, has had multiple allegations having to do with women, that forced him to resign. We can assume that the Wolves weren’t going to let him go this offseason, even though they’ve been emptying their coaching closet all week. Brunson was one of the first coaches that was brought over from Chicago when Thibodeau came to Minnesota, which isn’t a great look for Thibs.
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The accusations seem to be piling on and the media frenzy around this topic will most likely grow, hopefully we’ll see some justice for the women involved. Brunson was accused of sexual assault and battery in 2014, which was an extremely quiet case, so this may lead to more investigating of the Minnesota staff as a whole, which is normal when unfortunate cases like this break out. As for the other coaches on the staff that have been let go, it’s been surprising.
"VIA, CBS“Monday night, Tom Thibodeau and Scott Layden announced the departures of Player Development Coach Vince Legarza, Shooting Coach Peter Patton and Assistant Video Coordinator Wes Bohn. Minnesota ended a 14-year playoff drought in the 201-18 season. The Timberwolves finished the regular season with a 47-35 record, good for the No. 8 seed in the playoffs. They also won their first playoff game in 14 years.”"
Legarza and Patton worked closely with Karl-Anthony Towns this year, and although his production went down, he was still very efficient. This move was most likely made due to the lack of growth Towns has shown on the defensive end. His offensive abilities are amazing but have slowly improved, even though there isn’t much to improve on from that aspect of his game in comparison to defense.
What to think of all this mess with the coaching staff? Nothing good. I will restate that if Brunson is found guilty, I hope justice is brought to the women involved in these terrible acts. Expect an extra hot seat for Tom Thibodeau if this gets worse.