Latrell Sprewell still has enough in the tank to help the Wolves
Easing the Pain
The dull pain of the Wolves fan has turned to giddy anticipation. There is, almost literally, a new team in town.
The Wolves have rid themselves of the hobbled ghost of Terrell Brandon, the mysteriously large contract of Marc Jackson, the glacial development pace of Rasho Nesterovic, and the always-loveable Anthony Peeler, and the unfortunately legacy of Joe Smith.
In their stead? Sam Cassell, Ervin Johnson, Michael Olowokandi and yesterday's latest edition, one Latrell Sprewell.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is an Upgrade.
The lineup looks like this, more or less:
C-Olowokandi
PF-Garnett
SF-Szczerbiak
SG-Sprewell
PG-Cassell/Hudson
The Wolves aren't done yet; they need more size, more rebounding. Apparently, the Wolves are talking to agents for Eric Piatkowski and Mark Madsen. Both would be a nice fit; the Wolves need another dead-eye shooter, and Madsen does the dirty work better than you might think.
Hudson and Cassell will duke it out over the starting PG spot, and the loser will be a designated scorer off the bench. I look for Hudson to be a Vinny Johnson-type for this club, coming off the bench to give them a major scoring boost.
Yes, there is baggage with Sprewell. You may have heard about that incident a few years ago, where he tried to choke his coach. Hilarity will ensue all year, because Wolves coach Flip Saunders has this nevous tick where he stretches his neck out and readjusts his collar-"Something's wrong with Flip's neck! Where's Latrell?" Well...perhaps not hilarity...
And Sprewell had issues in New York as well. I guess he didn't show up sometimes, and other times he showed up with hands that he broke while on his yacht, called "Milwaukee's Best". So, he's not a model employee. But the bottom line is, can the dude still play? Yeah, I think so. His numbers were off last year, but he was playing on an anemic Knick squad with no life whatsoever, and coming off of injury.
I submit that Sprewell, Cassell and Olowokandi's games will all improve this year, just as a result of playing with Garnett. Who do you double-team? Who do you double off of? Sprewell and Cassell are also much better at getting to the line than any previous Wolves tandem, and Garnett gets there quite a bit himself. With those guys driving the lane and kicking to KG or one of the other shooters (Hello, Wally), this offense is going to be damn tough to stop. Oh, and these guys can run a bit, too.
Defensively, Sprewell is a far better on-ball permeter defender than this team has had in any recent vintage. KG's still around, and Olowokandi is a better belly-up defender than Rasho was. They still need another rebounder, but this team has improved in both interior defense and perimeter defense, and that's tough to do in one offseason.
These moves make the Wolves a very dangerous club, if not a confusing one. There are a lot of guys who are going to want the ball. But it's going to work. Do you know why? Because Kevin Garnett can now do what he does best, which is orchestrate and distribute. Garnett and Saunders will make this work, because they will stress ball movement. Everybody will get theirs, if they work within the team. Garnett will make sure that happens.
Ironically, though, while these moves open the window much wider for the Wolves to seriously contemplate a long playoff run, that window isn't going to be open for very long.
It might only be open for one year, in fact. Garnett is a free agent at the end of the year. Cassell is 34, Sprewell 33. Wolves owner Glen Taylor has committed to taking about an $18 million loss this year to compete, and he deserves props for stepping up and taking on his burden in overcoming his prior mistakes in the Joe Smith debacle.
But it's hard to see this group being together for very long, certainly not anything longer than two years. Taylor won't take a loss forever, and you wonder what Garnett's really thinking about a contract extension.
Rooting for this team might be a bit like rooting for the '97 Marlins. The promise of building and youth is now cashed in: If it's going to happen, it's going to happen now.
It's going to be fun.
12:10:01 PM 
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