A Neutral Observer’s Totally Unbiased Western Conference Final Preview
- Watt
- May 19
- 5 min read
Which Teams Are Competing?
Minnesota Timberwolves
The slam dunking manifestation of the pull yourself up by your bootstraps to rise from nothing American Dream. The Timberwolves are historically the worst franchise in the NBA with a dismal cumulative winning percentage of .416. This is only the 3rd time they have ever advanced past the first round of the playoffs in 36 excruciating years of existence. The infernal suffering afflicted upon their fan base has been a mix of both bad luck — like going a league worst 15-67 in 1991-92 but ending up 3rd in the draft lottery forcing them to select Christian Laettner instead of Hall of Famers Shaquille O’Neal and Alonzo Mourning — and incompetence — like when the team did have two top 6 draft picks in 2009 and famously picked not one but two point guards not named Steph Curry. Gorgui Dieng is statistically the 7th most valuable player in the history of this franchise. No one should have to know who Gorgui Dieng is.
Oklahoma City Thunder
These are evil people, they are not good human beings. They stole a beloved franchise from the city of Seattle to move to obvious hoops hotbed Oklahoma City when the billionaire owner of Starbucks couldn’t get the state of Washington to foot the bill for updating his arena. The curses of millions of Pearl Jam fans have so far kept the Thunder from ever winning an NBA title even when they had 3 future MVP’s on the same team for 3 seasons. They have however more than doubled the Wolves success by advancing past the first round 7 times in the 17 years since their carpetbagging.
How'd They Get Here?
Thunder
OKC won a league high 68 games in the regular season to secure the #1 seed. They proceeded to overwhelm a Memphis Grizzlies team who was so disordered they fired their head coach with less than a month left in the season. The Thunder were then pushed to the brink of a 7 game series by the Denver Nuggets, a team in such disarray they fired both their head coach and GM even later in the season.
Timberwolves
The Timberwolves had an up and down season as they adjusted to the blockbuster trade of franchise mainstay Karl-Anthony Towns just 3 weeks prior to the start of the year. Ultimately they finished 49-33 to secure the #6 seed. They also employed head coach Chris Finch for the entire 82 game slate so that will be a major scouting adjustment for OKC to contend with. Once reaching the playoffs they beat Lebron James and the Lakers so soundly his son even got to play 4 min in the 5 game series. Injury took out another legend as Steph Curry exited Game 1 with a bum hamstring but the Wolves still used their 5 games against the Golden State Warriors to exorcise the demons of Jimmy Butler and Rachel Nichols past.
Who Plays For Them:
Wolves Starters
The most dynamic athlete in the league who after a summer spent with USA Olympic team sharpshooters Steph Curry and Kevin Durant returned to the Wolves a prolific three point shooter making a league high 320 at an efficient 39.5% clip. Despite his expanded shooting range, he has still been snatching souls at the rim this postseason:
PF #30 Julius Randle
With an offensive game reminiscent of Kevin Garnett were he playing in Timberland boots and inclinations to pound the air out of the ball he drew the ire of many Wolves fans early in the year as he struggled to adapt his game to teammates with twitch muscles. However, since returning from a groin strain in March, he’s found his complimentary game and the team has gone 25-6. Some are even saying:
Some people chuckled last year when Anthony Edwards said:
McDaniels took the comparison very serious, as he does all things, and promptly helped sweep the Suns. He’s once again stepped up his play this postseason and is averaging 15.4 ppg up from 12.2 ppg in the regular season.
PG #10 Mike Conley
At 37 years old, he is far removed from his Memphis Grizzlies heyday that once made him the highest paid player in the league but he still contributes enough to be no lower than the 3rd best point guard in Wolves history behind young Ricky Rubio and old Sam Cassell.
They say if you do not have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. If I did have something nice to say about Rudy Gobert I would immediately follow it up by mentioning his hands appear to have the same dexterity as those on Christ the Redeemer.
Wolves Bench
Naz Reid.
🤌🤌🤌
A lengthy 3 and D guard who puts even elite ball handlers like his cousin Shai in hell.
Thunder Starters
Maple Harden. SAG led the league in scoring with 32.7 ppg but, borrowing from the playbook of that former Thunder guard, did so by leading the league in free throws making 7.9 per game on 8.8 attempts. Let’s watch the presumptive MVP go to work:
PF/C #7 Chet Holmgren
What a pro wants, what a pro needs is to quickly add about 50 lbs of muscle to not get bodied and booed off the floor in front of all his closest Minnesota friends and relatives.
SF #8 Jalen Williams
A player who scored over 21 pts per game this season but genuinely elicited this response from me during research:
This man is behind Michael Carter-Williams in the Basketball Reference search result for “Williams”. He puts no fear in my heart.
Fans call his lockdown man to man defense the “Dorture Chamber” which is genuinely sick as hell.
I believe it’s actually Hartenstein’s monster. The lumbering corpse of a journeyman collecting bench boards (5 teams in his first 5 seasons) was brought to life by the hype of the New York media.
Thunder Bench:
PG/SG #22 Cason Wallace
Despite only starting 43 of his 68 games he finished 3rd in the league in steals. Nothing but a common thief. A terrible influence for the children.
SG #9 Alex Caruso
We are all excited for the ESPN announce crew heap praise on this sneaky athletic, high motor, lunch pail guy who has a lot of heart and plays the game the right way with high basketball IQ
SG #21 Aaron Wiggins
Frankly shocked to see a player named A. Wiggins that plays guard and averages no assists is not actually related to Andrew.
What Will Happen?
Years of players like Rashad McCants, Randy Foye, Corey Brewer, Wesley Johnson, and Derrick Williams being sold to me as promising young stars have removed any and all cockeyed optimism when it comes to the Timberwolves so I will certainly not be making any foolhardy predictions of a sweep.
Wolves in 5
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