If you are not a die-hand NBA fan, you may be wondering why there is any fuss being made about the Minnesota Timberwolves and their decision to feature All-Star shooting guard Anthony Edwards going forward. After all, in terms of the day-to-day team operations, nothing has really changed, has it?
And yet, here I am, pushing that ‘agenda,’ upon Timberwolves fans, as though everything has changed. So let’s slow all of this down and discuss, in lay terms, exactly what the Minnesota Timberwolves are actually committing to by backing a very young and elite NBA shooting guard Anthony Edwards, and why it actually is a pretty big deal after all.
To begin this article, let’s start with some basic facts about the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Minnesota Timberwolves are one of the most recent NBA teams to join the league, as they joined in 1989 alongside the Orlando Magic. Although the Timberwolves did not win more than 29 games in any of the team’s first seven years in the NBA, the team quickly turned the tables with the arrival of star Kevin Garnett.
Same passion as Timberwolves legend Kevin Garnett
And it was Garnett’s firey passion that fueled the Minnesota Timberwolves to eight consecutive NBA Playoff appearances. Unfortunately, Garnett alone was not enough to help the Timberwolves consistently advance in postseason competition, managing to get past Round 1 of the NBA Playoffs just once, all the way to the 2004 NBA Western Conference Finals.
But the Timberwolves faded away, accelerated by the trade of Garnett to the Boston Celtics that remains burned into the souls of Timberwolves fans to this day.
The Timberwolves would appear in the 2018 NBA Playoffs, this time fueled by the passionate but controversial guard Jimmy Butler. The Minnesota Timberwolves would struggle once more until the team selected shooting guard Anthony Edwards with the first overall pick of the 2020 NBA Draft.
Since Edwards’s arrival, the Minnesota Timberwolves have earned a berth in the NBA Playoffs for two consecutive years, a feat not accomplished since the Kevin Garnett-led Timberwolves appeared in the 2004 NBA Playoffs. So Anthony Edwards’s arrival is a bit of a big deal in terms of impact on the Timberwolves roster. But we’ve more ground to cover, so don’t stop now: