There’s a buzz of excitement you can hear every time you walk towards Target Center…unfortunately, it’s coming from either (a) the Twins stadium construction site or (b) the neon lights in the hallway to Target Center. As a commuting downtown Minneapolis worker that has parked in Ramp C for the past year-plus, I have walked through Target Center at least twice a day, five times a week. I took the picture above this morning and it pretty much sums up the excitement level involved with this team. Unfortunately, this shot is right at ground zero for the Wolves idea makers, and it’s the management’s failure to keep this team in the minds of fans in the offseason (and in the regular season, based on this year’s attendance). Perhaps the front office can blame it on the Large Hadron Collider.
When the RNC was in town, the national media mentioned St. Paul’s love for the Wild, and the state’s affection for the Twins and Vikings…no mention of the Timberwolves. Now, this is hardly anything to get livid about, but the image above reflects laziness on the front office’s part. Immediately to the left of those empty display cases is a vacant retail location that used to house the Wolves’ gym. With NBA City and its merchandise store downstairs, the Gym became expendable. However, as you walk down this hallway, you can see the clear failure on the part of the Wolves’ management to capitalize on the team’s other recent marketing opportunities. Immediately after Kevin Love was drafted, the team quickly put up his picture on the walls next to all of the large pictures of the other Wolves “stars.” I was very impressed, and I thought that the Wolves were really going to start plugging these young players and generating excitement for this team. Since then, nothing has been done to the facade of these hallways. It’s my understanding that subsequent to the draft, the Wolves unveiled a new secondary logo, a revamped primary logo and, oh yeah, did you hear we have new uniforms? Well, nothing in the hallways of Target Center reflects any of those changes. Can the team at least put a new jersey in the display case? The only occupied display case still contains the pathetic remains of Sweetwater Jones, the least effective ad campaign since Reebok pimped Dan and Dave.
That being said, much like the tree falling in the woods, if the Wolves lose 60 games again this season and no one is there to watch it, do the clangs off the rim make a noise?
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