4 Big Thoughts on the Timberwolves' All-in Trade for LaMelo Ball

Tim Connelly has made his big swing. After years of pursuing Kevin Durant and Giannis Antetokounmpo and most recently checking in on Jaylen Brown, the Timberwolves' president of basketball operations has found his second superstar to pair with Anthony Edwards. On Thursday morning, news broke that the Wolves are acquiring LaMelo Ball from the Hornets for a package centered around Naz Reid and a first-round pick seven years in the future.

It's a fascinating move for a Minnesota team that is looking to get over the hump and truly contend for a championship in the loaded Western Conference as Edwards enters the heart of his prime. Both the upside and the risk feel monumental. There's a ton to unpack from this trade, so let's dive into four big thoughts that have been running through my mind since it happened.

This could be incredibly fun and successful

The ceiling of what the Timberwolves can be with Ball and Edwards sharing a backcourt is immense. The Wolves have been looking for a point guard who can take pressure off of Edwards and allow him to spend more time off of the ball as an elite catch-and-shoot option. Ant will still have the ball in his hands a ton as the No. 1 option in Minnesota's offense, but it's going to be harder for teams to double him when someone as talented as Ball is also on the floor.

And while there are questions that come with Ball, there's no denying his talent. He beat out Edwards for rookie of the year in 2021 and then made an All-Star team in year two after averaging nearly 20 points, 7 rebounds, and 8 assists. Ball is a shifty ball-handler and a remarkably gifted long-range shooter and playmaker from the point guard position. He's one-of-a-kind as a 6'7" lead guard with a unique confidence and flair to his game.

The Wolves have apparently been trying to acquire Ball for a couple years, believing he could be a perfect fit alongside Edwards in their backcourt. It's easy to see the vision. Charlotte had the best offense in the NBA in the second half of last season, with Ball leading the way and making everyone around him better. He's going to create good looks for Edwards and Jaden McDaniels and Ayo Dosunmu and all of the Wolves' other perimeter players. He's a perfect lob-throwing pick-and-roll partner for Rudy Gobert, which the Wolves haven't really had in Gobert's tenure.

"He’s going to make everybody better. That was the thing that was missing." -- Wolves source on the addition of LaMelo Ball.
— Jon Krawczynski (@JonKrawczynski) June 25, 2026

Offensively, the Timberwolves now have a chance to be extremely hard to stop. Defensively, they still have McDaniels and Gobert, and perhaps Edwards can commit a bit more to defense now that his life should be a bit easier on offense. Ball needs to buy in defensively, but he's got long arms and has a career average of 1.4 steals per game. The Wolves will also presumably make another move of some sort to acquire a power forward and balance their roster.

Minnesota's Western Conference Finals losses to Dallas and Oklahoma City in recent years laid bare their need for a true point guard to pair with Edwards. In Ball, they went out and got one of the best, most exciting options they possibly could've. There's no real limit to how good the duo of Edwards and Ball, two of the top-three picks in the 2020 draft, can be in the years to come.

It could also go up in flames

We also can't avoid talking about the ways in which this could go wrong. Ball is an incredibly talented player who comes with a lot of question marks, the first and most notable of which is his injury history. He's played a full season twice in six years, doing so in 2021-22 (his All-Star season) and again this past season. In total, Ball has played in 303 of the Hornets' 482 regular season games in his career (63 percent). Recurring ankle injuries have been the primary issue, and he's also missed time with wrist ailments.

There are also questions about Ball's game when he's healthy and on the court. Shot selection is one of them. Ball has been a bit of a shot chucker throughout his career. Over the past four seasons, he has an overall shooting percentage of 41 percent on 19 attempts per game. Over 10 of those attempts come from three, where he's shot 36 percent. Ball can get ridiculously hot from deep and hit seven or eight threes in a game. He's also very capable of going 1 for 9 from deep. The Wolves will be hoping that playing with Edwards can provide a boost to Ball's efficiency.

LaMelo Ball has missed 37 percent of the Hornets' games due to injury since he was drafted | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

More broadly, there have been questions about Ball's maturity, leadership, and commitment during his career. Can he do what it takes to be a championship-level player? We saw him contribute to winning at a high level during the Hornets' hot stretch last season, but he's spent most of his career piling up numbers on bad teams. The closest he's gotten to the postseason is this year's play-in tournament, when he had 30 points and 10 assists (albeit on 31 shots) in a dramatic win over the Heat before Charlotte was blown out by the Magic in the game that decided the 8 seed.

The Wolves need Ball to stay healthy. They need him to commit to playing defense and dial in his shot selection a bit. They need him to step up and deliver in the postseason against teams like the Spurs and the Thunder despite never having played on that stage. It's all possible. It's also far from guaranteed. And if it doesn't work out, things could go south quickly now that the Wolves are basically out of draft picks and have sent the Hornets a few first-round swaps. At the risk of being dramatic, there's a world where this trade ends up with Connelly fired and Edwards forcing his way out of Minnesota.

Losing Reid stings

The hardest part about this trade for Timberwolves fans is parting with Reid, who was pretty easily the second-most-popular player on the roster behind Edwards. He was not only the Wolves' longest-tenured player, he was a fan favorite and something of a cult hero in Minnesota. From towels to tattoos and so much more, it's hard to describe the kind of special relationship that formed between Reid and the city of Minneapolis. His rise from being an undrafted free agent without a clear position to winning sixth man of the year and earning a $125 million contract was incredible to watch.

It's not going to be easy to come to grips with Reid no longer being on this team. It's particularly tough to think about the fact that he never got his chance to start for the Wolves. He was on track to finally receive that opportunity after Julius Randle was traded on Monday night. It was going to be Reid next to his good friends Edwards and McDaniels as the Wolves' core moving forward. That plan didn't even last three full days.

Naz Reid, Jaden McDaniels, Anthony Edwards | Brad Rempel-Imagn Images

With that said, you have to give something to get something. The Wolves made McDaniels untouchable and probably felt they had to keep Gobert for defense and rebounding, so Reid became the logical piece of their core to move. The good news is he should get his starting opportunity in Charlotte, where he joins a promising young core led by Kon Knueppel and Brandon Miller. One thing is guaranteed: Timberwolves fans will be rooting hard for Reid to have all kinds of success.

The risk is probably worth taking

When this trade first went down, I wasn't sure what to think. My initial feelings were shock and sadness over Reid's inclusion, as well as questions about Ball's ability to be a No. 2 on a championship-caliber team. But as I've thought about it more and more, I've started to come around.

The bottom line is that the Wolves needed to do something to give themselves a chance to compete with the Spurs and the Thunder and the rest of the NBA's elite. The status quo wasn't going to be good enough. This trade comes with a lot of risk, but a certain level of risk might be unavoidable in order to shoot for the ceiling of getting through this Western Conference and playing for a championship.

"If you don't win, what's the risk?" Connelly said after the Wolves were eliminated by the Spurs. "I’d rather get fired for trying than sit here and just be in job-survival mode. Risky, I think is if you're a championship-level team and make a huge trade. I don't know what level of risk (there is) when you're bounced in the second round. ... Until you win it all, I think you've gotta just keep playing hands."

That's the right mindset to have. You can't let risk scare you off from doing something that could pay off massively. Ball is a rare talent who is about to be 25 years old, just like Edwards. On paper, their skills should complement each other wonderfully. With Ball, Edwards, and McDaniels, the Wolves now have a young core trio that might just be good enough to win a title in the next few years. And that's the only thing that matters. Even if it's a small chance, it's probably a chance worth taking.

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