Taj Gibson sign with Timberwolves: 5 biggest questions we have

1. Are the Timberwolves a top-4 seed in the West?

The word tough is an understatement about the competioion in the Western Conference. Golden State brought the band back together and are prohibitive favorites to repeat. Houston added Chris Paul and P.J. Tucker and appear tougher than ever. Oklahoma City even found their Kevin Durant replacement so to speak with the one-year rental of Paul George. San Antonio, well, is San Antonio and always wins regardless of who’s on the floor. Minnesota is just one of many teams that have joined the arms race out West.

The Wolves are clearly better than the 31 win showing we saw a year ago. The 4 and 5 seed in the West won 51 games last year which would have been good enough for second in the East. We sort of known what we’re getting with Jimmy Butler but even his Bulls team only won 41 games. A 20 win improvement is easier said than done, especially given the competition.

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Should the Wolves make the playoffs this upcoming year? Yes, but a top-4 seed hinges on the continued improvements of Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins. With Butler in town, a huge scoring burden will be lifted off Andrew Wiggins who took the eighth most attempts in 2016-17 (19.1 attempts per game) so we will likely see a much more efficient player. Towns, 21, is already among the best centers in the NBA and is truly the future of the position with the ability to protect the rim and shoot from the outside. Whether it’s now or in a year, look for the Timberwolves to be major players this season.