Things weren’t going well for Thaddeus Young and the Timberwolves last season. They were mired in a season-long injury crisis that sapped the roster of its veteran talent, trying to lean on rookie Andrew Wiggins on their way to finishing with the worst record in the NBA.
Young, then in his eighth NBA season, was not thrilled, and it seemed certain he would explore free agency when his contract expired after the season.
But instead of handling the situation as most NBA teams would, shopping Young around the league until they got the highest price for him, Flip Saunders — then the team’s coach and president of basketball operations — and general manager Milt Newton did something very out of the ordinary: They helped Young get to a destination he would be happy with.
That’s how Young wound up being sent to the Nets at the trade deadline for Kevin Garnett. It worked out for both sides: Saunders was able to repair a broken relationship between Garnett and the franchise where he’d spent the majority of his career (mostly playing for Saunders), and Young landed with a Nets team he helped get to the playoffs and eventually re-signed with in July.
“[Flip] and Milt, they basically gave me a chance to pick a few destinations I would like to be in, and they were willing to work with those teams, and those teams only, to help the situation we were in,” Young said after Monday’s practice, a day after Saunders passed away at 60 after a battle with cancer.
It was just one of many examples of Saunders’ kindness that have poured out in the hours since his passing was announced by the Timberwolves, NBA players, coaches and executives all praising him for how he carried himself.
Young was acquired by Saunders’ Timberwolves from the 76ers before last season in the three-team deal that sent Kevin Love to the Cavaliers.
“No, that’s definitely not something a lot of teams would do,” Young said, laughing. “The Sixers didn’t do that.
“But it was definitely a good situation to be in. I think it would’ve worked out, but we had a lot of guys get hurt early. When guys go down and you’re just playing with a lot of guys who don’t know the game too well, you’re going to get taken advantage of by the veteran guys on other teams who have played together for three or four years.
“It just became a situation where it wasn’t working out, and they wanted to go in a different direction with the young guys, which they’re doing now, and I think it’s going to work out for them. But they definitely worked with me, and Flip was 100 percent with me every step of the way.”
Despite the losing, Young said he was always impressed with the way Saunders kept things fun – even while trying to teach young Timberwolves such as Wiggins and fellow rookie Zach LaVine the basics of NBA life, things that Young had learned years earlier.
“When you’re going through the process and you have a lot of young guys and you continue to learn every day … When you’re a veteran, that gets boring,” Young said with a smile.
“But, at the end of the day, when you have a coach that’s going to make it fun, who is going to integrate some things that’s going to make it fun for the veterans. It makes you believe in what he’s trying to teach, and it makes you believe in him as a coach.
“We all believed in him as a coach, and I think every team he’s coached believed in him, and they still do to this day. You’ve seen the tweets, you’ve seen the Instagram posts, and everything else about what type of person he was, what type of coach he was. He was a great man.”