Karl-Anthony Towns’ name appears on the list every team keeps of superstar players that might shake loose and become available (via trade or free agency). It’s not that Towns has asked out or done anything to encourage this talk, but he has shown frustration and the addition of Rudy Gobert has not exactly gone as envisioned.
Other teams are talking about him, however, The Athletic’s Jon Krawczynski told Zach Lowe on ESPN’s “Lowe Post” podcast the Timberwolves are not there yet.“Teams are already talking about it. There’s no doubt that other teams are eyeing this situation and looking to see if KAT will become available.
“I can tell you from everyone that I’ve talked to within the organization, they very much believe in KAT. They believe that once he comes back and they have some time to build around [Anthony Edwards] and Gobert and KAT, they very much believe that can still work. Chris Finch believes it. Tim Connelly believes it. They don’t have any plans to trade him. But if the bottom falls out of this thing and they go forward that way, there are going to be teams knocking on the door.”
Chill out Timberwolves fans. This is just how the NBA works. Teams are always looking for value, players they can poach from another team at under-market value. Especially stars. Towns has missed a lot of time due to a calf injury, but even before that the fit has been far from seamless in Minnesota with the addition of Gobert and the growth of Anthony Edwards.
Minnesota shouldn’t throw in the towel on this experiment yet. However, if next season starts and things still look a lot like this season, there will be some hard choices to make coming up. And that’s when they might start taking those calls from other teams.
