Minnesota Timberwolves: Buying or selling 5 power forward trade targets
Minnesota Timberwolves Trade Target: Danilo Gallinari
The temptation to copy large chunks of the Markkanen write-up and paste them here was overwhelming, but we’ll opt to break out the thesaurus and write a (slightly) different section for Dino instead.
Besides, Danilo Gallinari comes with another, significant issue: durability. In his career, Gallinari has played 82 games in a season exactly zero times. In 2009-10, his sophomore season, Gallinari played in 81 games. But since then, he’s managed to crack 70 games played just once in twelve attempts.
For a team riddled with injury concerns last season, is a guy who is virtually guaranteed to miss substantial time really a sound investment?
Otherwise, concerns about Gallinari are largely similar to those surrounding Markkanen. His defensive rating of 114 last season was right in line with his career mark. That’s particularly concerning in Dino’s case. While Markkanen, at 24, still has ample time to improve, Gallinari, as a 14-year veteran, probably is what he is at this point in his career.
Which, if you didn’t know, is a very solid offensive player. That 123 offensive rating is absolutely a lot more attractive than his rating on the less glamorous end of the floor.
However, he simply does not fit the defense-and-spacing role the Timberwolves should covet at the four spot. Couple that with the fact that Gallinari is under contract with the Atlanta Hawks, meaning the Wolves would have to part with assets to acquire him, and the verdict wasn’t difficult to reach in this case.