3 Minnesota Timberwolves players who should be traded

After the Minnesota Timberwolves returned to the NBA Playoffs, what is their next step to ensure they do so again?

Pruning. The Minnesota Timberwolves had just returned to the NBA Playoffs again, and I dare to utter the word “Pruning”. That just reads wrong, doesn’t it? Well, if you do any gardening, you know that you need to clear and aerate the soil to make room for new planting. If you are talking about a rose bush, you know that you must prune off the old growth before grafting stems intended to be new growth.

Even grassy fields of old dead grasses grow better if you burn away the old organic matter. What remains are all of the nutrients, the sun warms the soil more quickly, and new young healthy grass gets a jump start on the new spring.

For an NBA team, there has always been that fine line between dealing away players who are no longer value added to the team, or who fail to develop to expectations, in order to make room for players to assume their minutes on the court and either perform to a higher standard or simply cost the team less money to do it.

Of course, the NBA, like any professional sport, is designed that way with the short-duration contracts that ultimately expire. That allows the team to swap out for a different player for better value while allowing players who have outplayed their contracts to negotiate better compensation with that team, or peddle their wares to an NBA team for the highest bidder.

The Minnesota Timberwolves roster has come to a fork in the road. The team is young, the second youngest in the NBA.  But this team is also successful. The team can score points seemingly at will but needs to be better defensively. So the Timberwolves roster is ripe for some pruning, and then, perhaps, we can talk about who or which positions can be added to make this team reach even higher heights in 2022-23. So let’s get started.