Minnesota Timberwolves: A Political Comparison

I always get very excited to watch election coverage every two years. People that probably know better tell me that after a while that the empty rhetoric all sounds like white noise and the commercials even makes watching TV a bitter experience.

They say that, in the end, nothing really changes and it is only a real benefit for the elected official. I try to convince myself that they’re right, but the political persuasion game is just too strong a pull for me. I love the stuff. The excitement is already building for 2016 in my mind.

It’s that art of convincing people to have faith in you and that you are the right man for the job that keeps me so vexed, yet so captivated. It’s that chameleon way, which they all have, yet can’t make obvious, that gets me thinking about all the other ways that the public is presented with information to try and gain their support.

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On election night, I was watching some pundits wax poetic about new Sen. Tom Cotton from Arkansas, apparently a Republican “golden boy” because of the fact that he grew up on a farm, yet got a law degree from Harvard and served in the military after 9/11.

This prototype, they explained, was exactly what the party needed in a leader to alter their image and make them more viable on the national scale.

After some mental gymnastics, I thought it was similar to what the Minnesota Timberwolves are trying to do with their brand. In Andrew Wiggins, they’ve got their Tom Cotton now in that guy who checks off all the boxes that “game changer” has.

But in the Senate, there are all those other guys, the ones that seem like lifers who are solid and reasonably reliable who will still command attention. They’re more ready to handle the load and take on the responsibility while that young guy reads up on policy and decorum in order to not make a fool of himself.

There are probably too many of these guys to name. We know what they are and they aren’t bringing anything new or exciting to the table.

On the Timberwolves, this “senator” is Kevin Martin. He’s going to play minutes and he’s going to take shots like he has been appointed the go-to guy in a sort of warped “last man standing” kind of reality.

The thing is, he’s only played two of the three games and had 33 in the Wolves near upset of the Chicago Bulls. I want the Wolves to play well and I want them to win games. And I really want Martin to continue to light it up.

We need to cheer for anything that is going to make him more attractive at the trade deadline. I fail to see a downside to that.

Remember that during the Wolves’ trade conversations with the Golden State Warriors, one of the sticking points was Saunders’ insistence that they take back Martin in any deal for Kevin Love but the Warriors balked at the idea. That’s understandable, given that he is only in the second year of a deal that is paying him $28 million.

However, the competitive landscape of the NBA this season seems as wide open as it has in years. If Martin—good play isn’t an aberration for him, he’s a very solid, if one-dimensional, player—continues to play well I am certain that there will be a market for him at the deadline.

And the Wolves will jump on the chance to rid themselves of the contract and open up some of avenues for minutes that are hard difficult to allocate right now with the logjam at the wings.

So for the sake of the long-term vision, it may be best that Andrew Wiggins is outplayed early by Kevin Martin to boost that value, even if we know exactly what he is. This basketball team’s version of Tom Cotton can only stay locked in his office reading the newspaper for so long.

At some point we have to be sure it isn’t more empty promises bound for disappointment.

Or you could blast me for making such a stretch of an analogy. But sports and politics are just too good to ignore.

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