Minnesota Timberwolves: 3 players that improved their value – Malik Beasley
Malik Beasley had one of the more memorable years for any player in the NBA. In the first part of the season, he was downright electric for a poverty Timberwolves team that couldn’t string together a series of wins.
He was averaging 21 points, five rebounds, and three assists per game on 46/41/85 splits. Beasley had improved to the point where the contract he signed in the 2020 offseason looked like a bargain – earning about $13 million per season until 2023.
Malik Beasley looks like a high-level rotational piece, and before his injury was the best player for the Timberwolves due to Towns missing a large portion of the beginning of the year. Beasley was, in fact, more efficient and made more winning plays than D’Angelo Russell in the first half of the season.
He also is likely to emerge as a candidate major playoff contenders will look to trade for this coming offseason, because of his fit (or lack thereof) in Minnesota, as well the team skirting close to the luxury tax line. The Timberwolves have something of a logjam at the win position, and possibly moving him for a versatile two-way forward might be beneficial.
That said, Beasley drastically improved upon his consistency and proved that what he showed towards the end of the 2019-20 season (before it was… cancelled) was not a fluke.