How Timberwolves can pull off a win-win trade for Bones Hyland

Would the Timberwolves make this trade?

What has been reported about the situation is that Minnesota is interested in Bones Hyland, Denver is among the many teams interested in Naz Reid, and the Wolves like Reid and hope to sign him to an extension. That’s all standard fare, but paying Reid when they already have both Karl-Anthony Towns and Rudy Gobert is a tough pill to swallow. Trading him makes a lot of sense.

This deal also makes sense. Bones Hyland fills a role on this team that no one has stepped up to fill as of yet. He can create his own shot, run in transition, and spaces the court reasonably well. He’s a terrible defender, but putting him in front of players like Kyle Anderson, Jaden McDaniel and Rudy Gobert can help to mitigate that. Minnesota isn’t expecting him to play 35 minutes a night.

Given that the Wolves are so asset-poor after the Gobert trade, most of their improvement will need to come internally; it already has in the past couple of weeks, and hopefully as the season goes on it can continue in that direction. This small trade affords another avenue to improvement, and for a player under contract at a low number for the next couple of seasons.

It’s not a game-changing deal, but it probably is a smart one and meets the needs of both teams in the trade, always an important factor. Perhaps Bones could come in and give a spark to bench groups that are often lethargic and help the Wolves play their best basketball for all 48 minutes of a game.