Saunders was diagnosed in June by Wolves team doctor Sheldon Burns and started treatment at the Mayo Clinic soon after. Sam Mitchell was the interim coach.
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Flip Saunders’ legacy will live on, not only in Minnesota but in the game of basketball.
Harkless said that the ankle injury still “hurts a little bit” but that there was never any swelling in the ankle.
On the day of Flip’s press conference to officially introduce him as the new president of the basketball side of the organization, he was asked if he wanted to coach again. Last month, the team announced that Saunders would sit out the upcoming basketball season. He also coached the Detroit Pistons and Washington Wizards.
Margenthaler says, “Flip was a great guy”.
“It was just weird, I was going to like dig in the post and my foot just rolled”, Harkless said.
When an uncle once told him he wished little Flip were four inches taller, little Flip answered back, saying he wouldn’t have tried so hard if he had been four inches taller. “He was a great mentor, he was a great leader – a special, special person”. He made stops in Rapid City, South Dakota; La Crosse, Wisconsin; and Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and often retold stories of his adventures in the minor league while expressing affinity for the National Basketball Association coaches who followed similar paths.
Donovan still remembers Saunders getting out on the court during practice and challenging players to shooting contests.
At the time, I knew Wall would be an important building block in the Wizards’ rebuild.
Eventually, he renewed through the years a friendship with Taylor that led to discussions in 2012 when Taylor sought to sell the team.
Whenever they’d see each other, Donovan said, conversation was easy.
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I write this because I suspect that Flip Saunders is one of those people whose public persona was real. He also acquired the Cleveland Cavaliers first-round pick Tyus Jones to bring the Apple Valley native home in hopes of developing the rookie point guard alongside Ricky Rubio. And that’s why Donovan reached out to make sure they connected one last time, through that letter.
