Minnesota fixed its backcourt and broke its frontcourt in the same phone call. Pairing LaMelo Ball with Anthony Edwards gives the Timberwolves one of the most dangerous guard tandems in the league, but the cost was Naz Reid, the floor-spacing big who anchored the second unit and gave Rudy Gobert a stylistic opposite in the frontcourt. Now the job is replacing what Reid did, and the Wolves have to do it with almost no money.

That last part is the whole story. The trade aggregated salary, which hard-caps Minnesota at the second apron for the coming season. With Edwards on a max near $49 million, Gobert above $36 million, and Ball's contract worth roughly $40 million a year, the Wolves are a tax team with a ceiling they are not allowed to cross. That means no salary aggregation in a follow-up trade, no full midlevel exception to wave around, and no way to absorb a big incoming contract. Their real tools are minimum deals and small, salary-matched swaps. Every name worth discussing has to fit through that narrow door.

Reid was not a star, but he was a specific and hard-to-replace piece. He could stretch the floor to the arc, punish a switch in the post, and slide between both frontcourt spots so the Wolves never had to play Gobert and a non-shooter together. The fan wishlist to fill that role already has names on it: PJ Washington, Santi Aldama, Karlo Matkovic, John Collins. All four can do a version of the job. The question is not whether they fit on the court. It is which ones Minnesota can actually get.

PJ Washington is the best two-way player of the group and the one Wolves fans should let go of first. Dallas signed him to a four-year extension worth about $88 million last September, so he is neither a free agent nor a friendly trade target. Bringing back his roughly $22 million salary would mean sending out matching money Minnesota is not permitted to aggregate, off a roster that has nothing in that range it would actually want to move. He is the dream, not the plan.

Santi Aldama is the cleanest stylistic match. He is still only 25, he shoots it, he passes well for a big, and he can hold up defending in space, which is exactly the modern four Minnesota just lost. The problem is timing and price. Memphis re-signed him last summer to a three-year deal worth $52.5 million with a team option, which both keeps him off the open market and pushes his salary near $17 million. The Grizzlies have no reason to give him away, and the Wolves have no clean way to match the number. A fit on paper, a non-starter on the cap sheet.

John Collins is the one name actually available. He hits unrestricted free agency this summer after playing out his option year with the Clippers, and he is a proven stretch four who can space the floor and finish well above the rim. The catch is what he costs. Collins will be looking for a multiyear deal in the neighborhood of the full midlevel exception, which starts around $15 million, and a team hard-capped at the second apron cannot offer that. Minnesota's only honest pitch is a steep discount on a short contract or a sign-and-trade, and neither is the route a player coming off a starter's salary usually wants to take.

That leaves Karlo Matkovic as the most realistic name on the list, precisely because he is the cheapest. The young Croatian big is on a minimum-scale contract that pays about $2.3 million next season, the rare salary a capped-out team can actually absorb. He is bigger and more physical than the others, and he flashed legitimate rotation value for New Orleans. The complication is that the Pelicans hold a team option on that bargain and have every reason to keep it. Prying him loose would cost Minnesota real draft capital, and the Wolves just spent most of theirs to land Ball.

Put the four together and the pattern is impossible to miss. The players who fit best are the ones Minnesota cannot afford, and the one it can afford is the one another team is least likely to sell. This is the bill that comes due when you go star-hunting at the second apron. The Wolves bought a backcourt that can win a playoff series and traded away the depth and the flexibility that round a roster out. Whoever ends up replacing Naz Reid is far more likely to be a minimum-salary veteran or a second-year flier than any of the names trending on a graphic. Edwards and Ball will sell the dream in Minnesota. The front office has to fill in the rest out of the couch cushions.