The Timberwolves have signed 27-year old point guard J.J. Barea to a 4-year, $19 million dollar deal. Barea played in 81 games (2 starts) for the Mavericks last year and he averaged 20.6 minutes, 9.5 points, 2.0 rebounds and 3.9 assists per game. He has now played in 315 games (45 starts) in his first five years in the NBA and he is averaging 17.4 minutes, 7.1 points, 1.8 rebounds and 2.9 assists per game. J.J. Barea is a very solid basketball player as he brings energy to the basketball court. It will be interesting to see how head coach Rick Adelman will dole out the minutes between Ricky Rubio, J.J. Barea and Luke Ridnour at point guard this year.

The Timberwolves have dealt 25-year old small forward Lazar Hayward to the Oklahoma City Thunder for two second round picks. Hayward played in 42 games (0 starts) for the Timberwolves last year as a rookie and he averaged 10.0 minutes, 3.8 points, 1.7 rebounds and 0.7 assists per game. He only shot 35.7% from the floor last year. The Timberwolves are loaded at small forward for the 2011-12 season, so they shouldn’t miss him too much.

The Timberwolves have invited 35-year old SG/SF Bonzi Wells to training camp. Wells last played in the NBA back in 2007-08 with the Rockets & Hornets. He has played in 591 games (275 starts) in his NBA career and he is averaging 25.6 minutes, 12.1 points, 4.6 rebounds, 2.1 assists and 1.3 steals per game. He will be a longshot to make the Timberwolves this year.

UPDATE: (12/23/2011) - The Timberwolves have waived Bonzi Wells.

The Timberwolves bought 27-year old shooting guard Tanguy Ngombo from the Trailblazers last night. The Blazers used the 57th overall pick on Ngombo last night. Ngombo is a 6′6″, 204 pound shooting guard out of Qatar, Africa. Ngombo played in 7 games in the Asian Club Championship last year and he averaged 32.9 minutes, 16.3 points, 9.7 rebounds and 1.6 assists per game. With the revelation earlier today that Ngombo is really 27 years old instead of 21 years old, it’s not looking like the T-Wolves did good background work on him.

The Minnesota Timberwolves acquired 21-year old, 6′5″, 200 pound shooting guard Malcolm Lee from the Bulls as part of a draft day deal with them. Lee was picked 43rd overall last night. Lee played in 33 games for UCLA last night and he averaged 33.1 minutes, 13.1 points, 3.1 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game. Lee played in 94 games in his three years in college and he averaged 26.7 minutes, 9.7 points, 3.0 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game. Lee will try to fight for playing time at shooting guard, where the Timberwolves are pretty deep.

UPDATE: (12/30/2011) - The Timberwolves will be without Malcolm Lee for about the next six weeks as he had surgery today to repair a torn meniscus in his left knee.