In his annual column breaking the teams down into tiers, ESPN’s Zach Lowe sees the Wolves a tier below the teams competing for the final couple of playoff spots in what appears to be another brutal Western Conference competition. He places them in a tier along with only the Oklahoma City Thunder just above the also-rans of the league but below teams like the Kings, Mavericks, Spurs, and Pelicans in the Borderline Playoff Teams tier.
The Wolves-Thunder tier he calls The Netherworld of the West tier, as the 22nd and 23rd best teams in the league, and has this to say about the Wolves:
• Several projection systems -- including Kevin Pelton’s at ESPN and the 538 forecast -- treat the Wolves more kindly.