Tuesday night on Sports to the Max with Mike Max, Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor spoke about the rumors that the team was for sale, a story that broke earlier in the day.
Taylor, who has owned the team since 1995 and also owns the Lynx, confirmed that they were preparing to receive an offer. Taylor expects the Timberwolves and Lynx to remain under the same ownership group.
"Well, I would say we're exploring perhaps an opportunity that it's come to us and we'll just have to see how that works out," Taylor told Mike Max. "But it wasn't something that I had thought of a few months back, but it did come to us."
Although he wasn't looking to sell, he did say he would if the right offer came. "It was a professional group that had looked at the Timberwolves and looked at maybe its value and said that they knew some families that they thought the could afford it and might be interested," said Taylor. "So they approached us and asked me if I would allow them to go talk to these families and see what value they would put on the team and see if they were correct. And then if they could find somebody, they would come back to me and then we would pursue it. And that's kind of where we're at right now."
Taylor, who is a longtime businessman based in Mankato, MN, and owns the Star Tribune, told WCCO Radio that the offer is expected to be enough for him to sell.
"They've given us an indication already. We wouldn't let them do it, do the work, if they hadn't given us an indication that that they're looking at something that would be acceptable to us."
Taylor did confirm that the group would ask he retain a "significant ownership in the team", with an option to buy him out over time.
Any deal to buy the Timberwolves comes with a provision that the team must stay in Minnesota according to Taylor. "We did have some families that had approached the group and said that they'd be very interested. They'd be willing to pay more, but we, we want to move them too. And we just told them that, that we wouldn't even consider those offers. It's gotta be somebody who's committed to Minnesota, committed to building the team, looking forward to having a, you know, a great time with these players we have now."
There is no real timeline, according to Taylor, who said "Yes and no. I mean, if we're talking to an individual, we would give that particular individual a timeframe to make an offer. So you do have a timeframe that way, but I mean, I don't have a timeframe in case things don't go exactly the way I want them to go."