By Zack Cimini
notjustagame23@gmail.com

Most rookies in the NBA undergo rough first seasons. That wasn’t expected to be the case for Jonny Flynn. He rose to prominence at Syracuse during the Big East tournament and NCAA tournament. His stock rose and to the curiosity of fans the Timberwolves selected Ricky Rubio and Flynn. They were to be the dynamic new guards to work off each other. Whispers were Flynn might play off guard while Rubio ran point. Confusion galore surrounded those picks. Then Rubio had his public relations team release that he would not be committing to the Timberwolves anytime soon. That left Flynn as the lone point guard to showcase his talents.

Summer league 2009 Flynn was out dueling everyone. He won an award for summer league player of the week, and many expected Flynn to be in the hunt for ROY. Reality of playing in Minnesota hit, as the team that had minute talent dealt with those players having injuries. Flynn had his ups and downs but still finished the year with an average of fourteen points per game and four assists a game. Yet around the league it was noticeable that many rookie point guards drafted lower than him flourished. Too make matters worse during the second to last game of the season Flynn injured his hip which required off-season surgery.

Focus could have drifted for Flynn as the Timberwolves brought in Luke Ridnour amid heavy rumors that Flynn would be dealt. Those rumors died down and Flynn is now ready to get back out onto the practice court. With him now healthy it’ll be interesting to see how he readjusts. He’ll likely miss the first four to seven games as they monitor him in practice, and let him get acclimated. For now Ridnour will start but expect the Timberwolves to not lower Flynn’s minutes.

Last year he averaged around 29 minutes a game. At times they would go with Ramon Sessions who left via free agency. The same sort of mixture in the backcourt should happen this year. Ridnour is a veteran. You know what you’re going to get from him each night. It’s not going to be stellar but he can run the program and ease back a bit on turnovers. Flynn on the other hand is still blossoming with a ton of room to grow.

We love the fact that the sixth and seventh men off the bench will likely be rookie Wesley Johnson and Jonny Flynn. They’ll come in together and provide instant energy with their camaraderie. They’ve known each other three years dating back to when Flynn was a sophomore and Johnson sitting out his transfer year at Syracuse. There’s going to be a lot of ugly losses for the Timberwolves, and we expect Johnson/Flynn to get plenty of meaningless minutes in the fourth quarter. Padding their stats will be no problem.

As long as Flynn can avoid Rambis’s dog house he should bolster and improve on his rookie season stats. Two key things he definitely needs to have improved on where his field goal percentage and turnovers. They both were killers for rotisserie league participants. Those worried that the Timberwolves still may want to trade Flynn, shouldn’t be. They’ll have to showcase him in order to garner trade interest. The only way to do that is get him on the court and show that he is an improved player and fully healthy from his hip surgery.

Flynn went in the late stages of most fantasy drafts, and most likely should be your fourth point guard/utility man in rotisserie leagues. Upside is there though unlike most third or fourth point guards on your roster.