Minnesota Timberwolves are still a top-tier contender for Ben Simmons

Despite a recent front office change and a unique blend of potential trade assets, the Minnesota Timberwolves are still considered top-tier contenders when it comes to trading for Ben Simmons.

ESPN front-office insider and former Brooklyn Nets executive Bobby Marks ranked the Wolves alongside the five other teams who have the best shot at landing the Philadelphia 76ers superstar via trade.

Minnesota Timberwolves are still a top-tier contender for Ben Simmons

The Timberwolves’ pursuit of Simmons has been well-documented. It reportedly won’t change much in terms of intensity simply because of the firing of Gersson Rosas, the now-former president of basketball operations.

The Wolves have also gone through various stages of folks believing the team could pull off a trade. At times, they’ve sat along atop oddsmaker’s lists as the favorite to land Simmons. However, a recent ESPN panel ranked the Wolves behind a pair of other teams when it came to their chances of getting a trade together.

Now, ESPN insider and former Brooklyn Nets boss Bobby Marks has placed the other 29 teams in tiers based on how well-equipped they are to be Simmons suitors (subscription required).

Marks’ first tier consists of six teams, and it only includes a pair of the teams that are most frequently linked to Simmons discussions: the Portland Trail Blazers and the Minnesota Timberwolves.

The other teams in the first tier are all franchises mentioned as long-shot landing spots: the San Antonio Spurs, Indiana Pacers, Toronto Raptors, and Cleveland Cavaliers.

Outside of Portland and Minnesota, the most frequently mentioned destinations are the teams in California. According to Marks, the Golden State Warriors land in Tier Two, along with the Atlanta Hawks, Boston Celtics, and New Orleans Pelicans. The Sacramento Kings are in Tier 3.

The interesting thing about Marks’s analysis is that it comes from the perspective of someone with intimate front-office knowledge. Marks understands every angle of these discussions, from salary matching to the type of assets that the Sixers may be looking to garner in a Simmons deal.

As we’ve said before here on Dunking With Wolves, the Timberwolves’ ability to provide a combination of starting-caliber talent and affordable role players with upside (think Malik Beasley, Jaden McDaniels, Naz Reid) and first-round draft picks while allowing Philadelphia to send Simmons to the Western Conference is attractive.

Marks notes in his Timberwolves write-up that it’s “unclear” if the Wolves have the players to get a deal done without a third team. He also notes that the entire possibility basically hinges on what other teams think of D’Angelo Russell as a star-caliber player.

Remember, even though the Wolves would prefer to keep Russell, it’s a cleaner salary-match to include his deal in any trade, and Russell has the most star-power of any current Wolves player not named Karl-Anthony Towns or Anthony Edwards.

At any rate, it’s encouraging to see the Wolves again listed as a top-tier contender for Simmons. It’s a crowded tier, of course, but the Minnesota Timberwolves are squarely in the conversation as a potential destination for the two-time All-Star.