Big Al's Tavern Closed: Timberwolves' Al Jefferson Has Torn ACL

The proverbial crap has hit the fan in Minnesota. Their best player, Al Jefferson , went down with a torn ACL. So how do you go about replacing 23.1 points and 11.0 rebounds a night? The quick answer is “you can’t”. However, even on bad teams, somebody has to rebound and somebody has to score. Some of those numbers will get gobbled up. The key is to figure out who’s going to feed a little more now that Big Al is out of the trough.  The logical choice is their big man Kevin Love . He’s having a solid rookie season and has a steady diet of double-doubles is in his future. His minutes have steadily increased as the season has gone along. With Big Al out, he should start seeing 32-34 minutes a night.  Love should improve to around 12-13 points and 10-10.5 rebounds per night. Another player that has a chance to step up is Ryan Gomes . He has increased his scoring since the calendar turned to 2009. He’s averaging 13.4 points per game in ... (link)