Facing a 5 p.m. deadline, the team announced a couple of hours before game time that it had requested waivers on guard Blake Ahearn, forward Chris Richard and center David Harrison, putting the roster at the regular-season limit of 15 players.
Vice president of basketball operations Kevin McHale said the Wolves could re-sign one or more of the waived players if they aren’t claimed within 48 hours, but added, “Right now, if nothing changes, our roster is set.”
“Right now, this is our team,” coach Randy Wittman said. “This is what we’ll open up with on Wednesday (in the regular-season opener against Sacramento).”
Expect the Wolves to try to trade Calvin Booth’s $1.14 million salary slot for some kind of draft pick. If they can do so, they could bring Richard back. McHale said he expects Harrison to sign with a team in China. They were swayed on the Ollie-Ahearn thing by Telfair’s season-opening suspension and by the youth of Telfair and Foye and the Ollie’s experience and mentoring ability…
Opening-night rosters are finalized on Monday. The next key date after that is Oct. 31, when the Wolves must decide whether to extend qualifying offers for the 2009-2010 season to Randy Foye, Corey Brewer and Rodney Carney. Expect them to qualify Foye and Brewer and wait on Carney until next summer, when they can try to re-sign him as an unrestricted free agent if they so desire.
Contrary to speculation elsewhere, there is no chance the Timberwolves will buy out Calvin Booth’s contract. The Wolves can either waive Booth, pay him his fully guaranteed salary of $1.1 million, trade him or keep him.