From TrueHoop: Ripping the Timberwolves Down to the Studs
The Minnesota Timberwolves announced the team has traded guard/forward Quentin Richardson to the Miami Heat in exchange for center Mark Blount.
For the fourth time this summer, Quentin Richardson(notes) has been traded. This time, his new team, the Miami Heat, plan to keep him.
The Minnesota Timberwolves traded Richardson to the Heat for forward Mark Blount(notes), two league sources told Yahoo! Sports on Thursday night.

This time, Richardson has found a home for his expiring $9.35 million contract. Heat president Pat Riley wants him to bring scoring punch off the bench, and the team plans to give him significant minutes this season.

The Wolves traded away veterans Blount and Ricky Davis to the Heat in October 2007 in a deal that brought Antoine Walker and a 2009 first-round pick, which Kahn — the new president of basketball operations — then dealt on trade night two months ago to Denver for a future first-round pick.

This time, he brings back Blount’s expiring $7.96 million salary slot in exchange for Richardson’s $9.35 million expiring contract.

Don’t expect Blount to get a locker stall, much less his Wolves uniform back. Kahn will either save nearly $1.4 million by waiving Blount outright instead of Richardson or use his expiring contract in another trade.

From Jonah Ballow/Timberwolves site: The Petersen Perspective
Jim Petersen: You’ve got to be able to rebound to be able to run. You’ve got (three) who are pretty good at rebounding. You’ve got Ryan Gomes, Kevin Love and Al Jefferson. You’re going to be able to rebound, I think, for the most part. That’s one important aspect of running that Minnesota will have to address.

The second part of it is how much team speed do you have? Love and Al don’t run particularly well. Ryan Gomes is a good runner, not a great runner. He’s definitely effective. It’s going to be guys like Corey Brewer coming into their own. Jonny Flynn can certainly push it. Are there going to be enough guys who are going to run with him to make it work?

I heard David Kahn say this that run and gun sort of has a negative connotation to it because it implicates not a lot of though. I don’t think that’s going to be Rambis’ m.o. He is going to be an opportunistic running team. The thing I noticed about Jonny Flynn in (Las) Vegas was that dude can flat out pick and roll game and get to the rim.

He’s going to create easy baskets for our bigs inside by driving and dishing, for perimeter jump shooters by driving and kicking like Chris Paul does with New Orleans. It’s harnessing that ability that Jonny Flynn has, that special ability to break the defense down and get guys around him that can make plays.

While former Idaho coach Larry Krystkowiak has been contacted about the job, he’s not necessarily the favorite that reports have made him out to be.

Sources close to Krystkowiak tell CBS 2 that coach K is in San Diego awaiting a return to the NBA and was not interested in coaching at the NBADL level. Krystkowiak is thought to be a finalist for an assistant coaching position with the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, and is also close friends with new Minnesota Timberwolves coach Kurt Rambis who has yet to assemble an assistant coaching staff of his own.
The Mayor still reigns. This week, Timberwolves assistant general manager Fred Hoiberg’s kingdom is not Ames, Iowa, and Iowa State, where he starred collegiately. It’s the PGA Championship locker room, where Hoiberg — a Hazeltine National member — is volunteering as locker-room attendant.

Just call him the state’s most famous towel boy (Clayton Wilson excepted, of course).

“Just keeping the peace in there,” Hoiberg said with a smile.

His job in a room filled with water, soda, sports drinks, fresh towels and souvenir flags laid out everywhere for players to sign? “Whatever they need,” he said.

It’s hard to get excited about NBA basketball around these parts, we realize. The Twin Cities host a franchise that epitomizes mediocrity.

But you have to hand it to new Timberwolves President David Kahn on one count: in the three months since taking over the reigns, Kahn has shown notable aggression in revamping the floundering franchise.