- D’Angelo Russell has been traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves from the Golden State Warriors.
- Russell was an All-Star in 2019 and is averaging 23 points per game this season.
- The Warriors received Andrew Wiggins, a first-round draft pick, and a second-round draft pick for Russell.
MINNEAPOLIS – The biggest deal of the trade deadline just went down between the Golden State Warriors and the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The Timberwolves have long coveted Warriors guard D’Angelo Russell, partially for his on-court play, but notably also for his strong friendship with Karl-Anthony Towns, the foundational star piece for the Timberwolves.
On the court, Russell has been a good player, averaging 23 points this year on a truly awful Warriors team, and putting up roughly similar numbers to what he put up last year for the Brooklyn Nets, a year that saw Russell breakthrough as a premier player, making the All-Star game for the first time.
Basically, the Timberwolves see this as a chance to upgrade their team as well as help cement Towns’ desire to stay with Minnesota for the foreseeable future.
The full terms of the trade were released by Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, and no matter what anyone thinks of the players involved, they are fascinating.
Golden State has agreed to trade D'Angelo Russell to Minnesota for a deal that includes Andrew Wiggins, a 2021 protected first-round pick and a 2022 second-round pick, league sources tell ESPN. Warriors will send Jacob Evans and Omari Spellman to Timberwolves too.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) February 6, 2020
Right now, it appears as though the deal is as follows:
The Warriors send: D’Angelo Russell, Omari Spellman, Jacob Evans.
The Timberwolves send: Andrew Wiggins, 2021 protected first-round pick, 2022 second-round pick.
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This is an incredibly interesting trade because it allowed the Timberwolves to offload Andrew Wiggins, who is on a massive contract and has not performed nearly to the level of said contract.
The Warriors clearly believe that bringing Andrew Wiggins into a winning environment -- something he has really never experienced -- will take him to a new level. They will face no shortage of skepticism ...
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) February 6, 2020
Per Mark Stein, the Warriors believe they can fix Wiggins, per se, which seems like it could be a tall order. Wiggins has been a unique player during his time with the Timberwolves, a guy who clearly had potential, but lacked either the willpower or setting to live up to it.
Wiggins is likely on one of the worst contracts in the league if he continues to be the player he is right now, but the Warriors evidently see something the rest of the league does not. Time will tell if they’re right – Wiggins will have to grow exponentially to become the player they want him to be, but he has always had the potential to be great.
If a given NBA bettor has bet on the Timberwolves this season, the most likely bet they made is on their season-long win total over/under. Before the season, the Timberwolves win total over/under line was set at 34.5 at most sportsbooks.
Right now, they only have 15 wins, and 32 games left to play. The question for people who made that bet is if D’Angelo Russell and the loss of Andrew Wiggins are good enough for the Timberwolves to boost them to winning 20 of those last 30 games.
This could be a nail-biter if the Timberwolves start rolling with Russell in the fold.
Maxwell joined the USAOnlineSportsbooks team in 2019. He focuses on creating sports betting content that informs and educates. He focuses on the NBA, the NFL, College Football and Basketball, and whatever else comes across his desk.
