The Minnesota Timberwolves season is over, and it ended earlier than it had in either of the two playoffs prior, in round two — a 4-2 series loss at the hands of Wemby and the San Antonio Spurs.
As good as the past few Wolves teams have been, they weren’t able to bring Minnesota to the precipice of its first major sports title since 1991. In fact, Anthony Edwards and the boys weren’t even able to bring the Wolves to the precipice of greatness, falling twice in the West Finals, before taking a step back this postseason.
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Still, if you are a suffering MN Timberwolves fan trying to find peace of mind, you don’t have to look back very far to find times that were so, so, so, so much worse than what we are dealing with right now.
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Just ask former NBA point guard Jeff Teague, who played for the Wolves for parts of three seasons. The 2009 first round draft pick was acquired in free agency in late June, 2017 — the same day a Tom Thibodeau traded Ricky Rubio to Utah for a 2018 first round draft pick (top 14 protected).
Jeff Teague reveals true feelings on Ricky Rubio while telling crazy Glen Taylor story
Credit: IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect
Teague told the story on a recent episode of his podcast, “The Old Man and the Three”, of his first meeting with former Minnesota Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor, who essentially saw the Rubio + Teague transactions that summer as a trade.
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And when Jeff Teague first arrived in town, Taylor let him know that he was replacing Glen’s favorite Wolves player of all time. Of course, being that Teague wasn’t traded to Minnesota, he was surprised when Taylor clarified that it was Ricky Rubio.
Glen wasn’t happy at his new point guard’s reaction during their first interaction, either, even though Thibs told him, “don’t worry about that shit.”
“When I got to Minnesota — shout out to Ricky Rubio — and the owner at the time came up to me. It’s the first day. I’m about to sign. He said, “Man, you better get us to the playoffs because I traded my favorite player for you and I don’t know you.”
I said, ‘damn.’ So I’m trying to think of who’s on the team. They haven’t been to the playoffs in like 14 years, so they ass. I used to party before I played them… So, I was like, “Zach [LaVine]?” He’s like, “No, Ricky.” I was like, “Rubio?”
I was like “What the f***?!” No disrespect to Ricky but he — he’s a — okay, whatever. And I’m like, “Are you serious?!” And [Taylor] was like mad. And Thibs [told me], “Don’t worry about that shit.””
Jeff Teague – The Old Man and the Three Podcast
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Some light research reveals that Jeff Teague was drafted No. 19 overall in 2009 — the same year Minnesota picked Rubio (No. 5) and Johnny Flynn (No. 6) in the first round, over Teague, Steph Curry and a bevy of other point guards who went on to have successful careers in the NBA.
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Teague probably never liked Ricky Rubio
In other words, his opinions on the Spaniard probably date all the way back to when they both came into the league together — one with all sorts of international hype as already one of the greatest passers in basketball history — the other as just another score-first point guard from Kentucky.
Thus, the first time Minnesota played the Utah Jazz, after they swapped out point guards, Teague revealed during his show that he was out to send a message to both Taylor and Rubio with his “hard steal” attempt, which sent Rubio flying into the first row of seats. The refs weren’t fooled though, since the flagrant got him ejected.
Teague was Thibs’ final major move. to reshape the Minnesota Timberwolves roster, at the time. If you’ll remember, though, that roster construction project eventually killed the Thibs era.
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One year later, Butler blew up a divided locker room and was shipped out. Thibodeau was then fired 40 games into the 2018-19 season, and replaced by Ryan Saunders. About a year later, before the 2019-20 trade deadline, Teague was traded back to Atlanta, who originally drafted him in 2009., .
Jeff Teague never wanted to play for MN Timberwolves either
However, Jeff never wanted to play for Minnesota in the first place, which he also revealed in the clip above. He wanted to stay in Indiana, where he had spent the one season prior. They didn’t want him, though. So, he signed with the Timberwolves because he liked Jimmy and Thibs, and was running out of options in free agency.
“It wasn’t even [Rubio’s] fault. It was the owner’s fault. So I was like, you like this guy, I’m gonna show him something. I didn’t want to go to Minnesota anyways. I liked Thibs, I liked Jimmy, but I wanted to stay with the Pacers.
Jeff Teague – The Old Man and the Three Podcast
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I want to be offended over how much shade Jeff Teague throws at Minnesota during this week’s podcast. Unfortunately, a lot of it is just factual (like the Wolves being ass for so long). And the rest… well, I’m too busy wrapping my brain around his lack of respect for Ricky Rubio as a basketball player.
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In case Jeff isn’t aware, the numbers say that Ricky (698 GP: 10.8 PPG, 7.4 APG, 4.1 RPG) had an overall better NBA career than he did (826 GP: 12.2 PPG, 5.6 APG, 2.4 RPG).
However, Teague did make the playoffs ten times, to Ricky’s three… and seven times before he got to Minnesota. So maybe that’s where the disbelief came from during their interaction.
Nevertheless, there’s clearly some underlying resentment that needs to be addressed.
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