The Minnesota Timberwolves helped their rookie guard find a creative solution to the past few weeks spent in isolation. Plus, more talk about the Wolves’ options at the 4.
If there’s one thing that this NBA hiatus has taught us, it’s that surprisingly few NBA players have basketball goals at their homes.
Perhaps it isn’t all that surprising that 20-year-old Minnesota Timberwolves rookie Jarrett Culver didn’t have a huge home with a private court this early in his career, but in case you were wondering, he was leaving in a hoop-less apartment in downtown Minneapolis.
Not any longer.
According to a fun story by NBC Sports NBA Insider Tom Haberstroh, Culver worked with the Timberwolves front office to find an AirBnB rental home that has an indoor basketball court.
The article explains the saga, including looking into renting Kevin Garnett‘s former abode, which turned out to not be available, and former Minnesota Vikings star Randy Moss’s house, which was apparently out of Culver’s price range.
They settled on a new build in Eden Prairie that has an indoor half-court, yet still without lines painted on the floor.
The piece also goes into the Wolves’ overall response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which we’ve covered a bit already here at Dunking With Wolves. But Haberstroh also goes into detail on some of the team-building exercises that the team’s leadership has enacted.
"Virtual training sessions with the team’s strength coaches and athletic trainers are held daily. Every Wednesday, the team hosts a Zoom guest speaker call, with appearances from Clemson football coach Dabo Swinney, Disney executive chairman Bob Iger, motivational speaker Inky Johnson, ABC host Robin Roberts, best-selling author John Gordan, NBC analyst and Pro Football Hall of Famer Tony Dungy and hip-hop preacher Eric Thomas.On Fridays the Timberwolves initially held a weekly book club, but that all changed when the “The Last Dance” began airing on ESPN. Now, the book club call has morphed into a weekly discussion of “The Last Dance” with players, coaches and front office staff, generating kernels of team-building wisdom and providing a forum for players to discuss the culture of champions."
The Wolves are in a unique place, with their response to the pandemic being led by VP of Basketball Performance and Technology Robby Sikka. Sikka is a sought-after consultant at both the state and national level with his unique background and expertise.
Be sure to check out Haberstroh’s piece in its entirety, as it’s a fairly in-depth look at how the Wolves are operating as a franchise during this unique time in history, as well as what Culver is doing on a daily basis to keep himself sane, not to mention in shape to play NBA basketball.
Elsewhere, Chris Hine of the Star Tribune put together a mailbag column that included a question regarding the power forward spot long-term. Our own Dylan Jackson has already gone on record as suggesting that Myles Turner could be the Wolves’ third star, and that is an idea posed in this particular mailbag.
Hine’s take is that Juan Hernangomez, the incumbent who was acquired at the February trade deadline, has the inside track on the starting job moving forward. Of course, he’ll need to be retained in restricted free agency, and it’s still unclear what kind of market he might have.
Hernangomez played extremely well after he arrived in Minneapolis, and if he’s going to shoot north of 40 percent from deep, play decent defense and hold his own on the glass, it certainly feels like he could be exactly what the Timberwolves want next to Karl-Anthony Towns.
The future power forward slot is just one of many things to keep an eye on in the coming weeks and months for the Wolves. We’ll be keeping a close eye on that aspect of the team’s offseason here at DWW.