There are millions of Kevin Love rumors circulating the internet these days and it's obvious why the All-NBA forward who averaged 26.1 points and 12.5 rebounds per game this past season wants out of Minnesota.
The Timberwolves are bad.
Minnesota's professional basketball franchise is poorly managed and has become a joke throughout the NBA.
They won just 40 games this past season in missing the playoffs for the tenth straight season.
They have botched draft pick after draft pick since 2009. In that draft they took Jonny Flynn with the 6th pick, skipping over Stephen Curry. 2009 was the year they had four first round picks and drafted three point guards (Ricky Rubio was taken with the5th pick and Ty Lawson, who was immediately traded to Denver, with the 18th pick) and a shooting guard (Wayne Ellington with the 28th pick).
In 2010 they took forward Wesley Johnson with the 4th pick, missing out on DeMarcus Cousins, Greg Monroe, and Paul George.
In 2011 they picked Derrick Williams with the 2nd pick. While the entire top ten of that draft has been lackluster other than the overall top pick Kyrie Irving, Enes Kante, rJonas Valanciunas, and Klay Thompson have all turned into good pros.
So, if you were Kevin Love, would you want to stay in a place that in a hypothetical perfect world could have put out a starting rotation of Rubio, Curry, Thompson, and Cousins next to you this season?
While many places make sense for Love, Boston may be the only team with enough ammunition to land him in a trade. The Celtics are armed with as many as 10 first round picks from 2014-2018 and have developed some good young players of their own to use as trade chips.
Would Minnesota turn down a package of Jeff Green (contract expires after 2017, and an above-average NBA player), Brandon Bass (expiring after 2015), Joel Anthony (expiring after 2015), Keith Bogans (expiring after 2017), and Jared Sullinger (the one player with serious on-court value for the Timberwolves) along with the 6th overall pick in this year's draft and at least one more first round pick in the future? The Celtics could even take back some bad deals from Minnesota along with Love, like Kevin Martin and J.J. Barea.
Yes, for the record, ESPN's trade machine says that works.
That would give the Celtics two stars - don't forget about Rajon Rondo - to build around with a bunch of draft picks left over and a decent amount of money to spend with Kris Humphries and Avery Bradley coming off the books.
A great start to the rebuilding process started a year ago when Danny Ainge dealt away Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett.
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