The Wolves desire to hire Adelman has been well known but today it became official, Rick Adelman will be the new coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves. This is a great hire for Minnesota, he brings a ton of experience and an authoritative figure in the locker-room that the young Wolves desperately needed.

This will be Adelman’s 5th head coaching job; with stints with Portland, Golden State, Sacramento, Houston, and now Minnesota. He began his NBA coaching career in 1984, under the great Dr. Jack Ramsay in Portland. Adelman was eventually named Portland’s head coach in 1988, initially as an interim but later named the full-time for the 1989 season. Adelman went on to lead the Trailblazers to two NBA Finals in 1990 and 1992 losing to Detroit and Chicago.

Adelman has coached in over 1,500 NBA games, compiling a record of 945-616 (60.5 win %) and has coached in 157 playoff games with a 79-78 record.

It’s impossible to deny Adelman’s success but one has to wonder how long he can stay motivated to coach a young Wolves team. He is 64 years old and has previously stated that he wouldn’t coach this season, so this move is kind of a surprise on his part. Also the fact that he has to work for the worst GM in basketball, David Kahn, certainly doesn’t help. If the Wolves don’t show significant improvement this year then I could see Rick retiring after the year. It’s always hard to keep an older coach, with past success, motivated while coaching a young, sub-par team.