Minnesota Timberwolves: Predicting which players will return next season

Karl-Anthony Towns of the Minnesota Timberwolves talks to Ricky Rubio and teammates. (Photo by Will Newton/Getty Images)
Karl-Anthony Towns of the Minnesota Timberwolves talks to Ricky Rubio and teammates. (Photo by Will Newton/Getty Images) /
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Minnesota Timberwolves, Karl-Anthony Towns, Ricky Rubio
Karl-Anthony Towns and Ricky Rubio of the Minnesota Timberwolves speak with teammates. (Photo by Will Newton/Getty Images) /

Despite a disappointing 2020-21 season, the Minnesota Timberwolves ended the campaign with multiple reasons for optimism.

The emergence of Anthony Edwards as a potential star, the offensive acumen shown by new head coach Chris Finch, and a 9-7 record over their last 16 games are all reasons for Timberwolves fans to look forward to 2021-22.

Minnesota Timberwolves: Predicting which players will return next season

Looking ahead to next season, it’s difficult to imagine what the Wolves roster will look like.

Beyond the team’s primary building blocks in Edwards, Karl-Anthony Towns, and D’Angelo Russell, there are really no guarantees as to which players will return next season. Perhaps the only guarantee is that Wolves president of basketball operations Gersson Rosas will explore every avenue to improving the roster this offseason in order to capitalize on the momentum gained from the second half of this season.

With this in mind, there are many factors that play into predicting which players will be back next season: performance, long-term fit, contract, potential trade returns, and positional needs are all factors that come into play. Players come and go for different reasons, and no one knows this better than Gersson Rosas and right-hand man Sachin Gupta.

Roster turnover is inevitable when attempting to improve a team, so let’s take a crack at predicting which players will and will not return to the Wolves for the 2021-22 season.