VALENCIA (Jeff Taylor's Eurovision) - Do you know what 16 wins gets you in the NBA?

The Minnesota Timberwolves do.

It gets you the worst record in the league.

The T-Wolves also know the lowest win total ensures they will get a very good draft pick.

Remembering that Minnesota picked up the Cleveland Cavaliers' number one selection overall from the 2014 draft, Andrew Wiggins, in a trade that sent Kevin Love to the Cavs, the Timberwolves could end up with the top picks of the last two years.

They will have a better chance than any other team to get that No. 1 pick because of their abysmal record.

Now if Ricky Rubio can have a good pair of ankles again, play more than the 22 games he did in 2014-15 and start making the jaw-dropping passes in transition that he is famous for, Wiggins continues to improve and they add terrific player from the draft, you know Minnesota are going to be a fun team to watch next season.

What this team could really do with, though, is an injection of Nemanja Bjelica.

A great, all-round talent for Serbia's national teams since EuroBasket 2009 and nothing short of terrific for Fenerbahce Ulker this season, his second with the team and second under Zeljko Obradovic, the time may be coming for the 2.09m Bjelica to leave Europe for the NBA.

He's long, runs the floor, passes well and plays defense.

Confirmation of just how excellent he has been arrived when he was named the Euroleague Player of the Month for March.

When Fener punch their ticket to the Turkish Airlines Euroleague Final Four, which looks inevitable after their 82-67 Game Two triumph over defending champions Maccabi Tel Aviv on Thursday, they will be know that Bjelica has been one of their most important players.

Bjelica has averaged 10.5rpg in his last 16 Euroleague outings.

He is ranked second overall in the league in Performance Index Rating. 

In 2010, when he was unveiled to the Minnesota media after the draft, Bjelica said he had a lot of work to do before he could compete at the NBA level.

In December of 2012, when I interviewed him after one of his games with Caja Laboral, he spoke about practice, practice, practice.

"You just have to wait your time," he answered, when I asked him about the NBA.

"That means play hard, practice hard."

At no time since his selection in the 2010 NBA draft has Bjelica believed the hype, that maybe he'll be another Toni Kukoc, for example.

If you play good, practice good - that's the most important thing - Bjelica

He's remained grounded.

Maybe that is not surprising because Svetislav Pesic, Dusko Ivanovic and Obradovic have been some of his club coaches, and Dusan Ivkovic and Sasha Djordjevic have coached him in Serbia's national team.

Pesic, in fact, made a decision that helped Bjelica take his game to a different level.

"I also have to give credit to Coach Svetislav Pesic for playing me at the point guard position when I played for Crvena Zvezda," Bjelica said to euroleague.net.

"It was a big opportunity and now it is much easier to create for others from the power forward position.

"That was very important in my career."

Will he leave Fener at the end of the season and go to Minnesota, or will he stay?

Bjelica may not even know the answer to that question right now.

All that he knows he's got a lot of practices and games coming up.

One certainty is that he is going to keep getting better.

Jeff Taylor

FIBA

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