Too soon to trade Karl-Anthony Towns?

David Thorpe plays with the trade machine

BY HENRY ABBOTT AND DAVID THORPE

HENRY: Many years ago, Phil Jackson pointed out that you basically never trade an elite NBA big man, because you can never get enough in return to make it worthwhile. This is all the truer if that big man is just 24 years old. So the Minnesota Timberwolves probably should not trade their star, Karl-Anthony Towns, who is among the elite of the elite on offense and presumably could be almost as good on defense in the right setting.

More to the point: Every team is in search of two stars. The toughest to get is the first.

But if I ran an NBA team, I would call the Timberwolves front office every day, just to make sure. Because:

1. Raise your hand if you think the Timberwolves are likely to contend with Towns as their star. (In the second half of this podcast, Ethan Strauss notes Towns is following in the footsteps of Kevin Garnett and Kevin Love as big men who succeed after leaving Minnesota. Amin Elhassan makes a case that Towns might be amazing one day, but—fo…