Nobody Comes Close to Matching Kevin Garnett in Minnesota Timberwolves History

When Kevin Garnett makes his season debut for the Minnesota Timberwolves on Wednesday night against the Washington Wizards, he won't just be an aging veteran. He'll be returning to his old stomping grounds at the Target Center as an enduring symbol of the organization. 

Garnett, who was traded back to the Wolves by the Brooklyn Nets just prior to the Feb. 19 deadline, may no longer be the best player on the roster. In fact, he's far from it, and he likely won't be spending all that much time on the court, instead serving as a mentor both on and off it for the many young talents on the team. 

But that doesn't change his place in franchise history. It's been a long time since he left this team for the Boston Celtics prior to the 2007-08 season, yet he still remains the historic face of the franchise, and for good reason. 

Minnesota has hosted an NBA team—and I'm not talking about the Minneapolis Lakers of old—since 1990. That's well over two decades of opportunities to rack up numbers while wearing a Wolves uniform.

Despite the myriad players who have suited up for this franchise, Garnett remains atop virtually every leaderboard. And when he's not right at the top, he isn't far off. 

First, it's notable just how much time Garnett has spent with the franchise: 

Did it seem like Kevin Love spent forever in the Land of 10,000 Lakes before departing for the Cleveland Cavaliers this past summer? Well, mouse over to his portion of that pie chart, which shows the percentage of games in Wolves history he's played in, and you'll see how the time he logged in Minnesota pales in comparison to Garnett's. 

"The Big Ticket" has suited up in nearly half of the games played by this franchise, even though he's spent the last handful of seasons in Boston and Brooklyn. Sam Mitchell, who currently works with the team as an assistant coach, and Doug West are the only players with half as many. 

And the disparity is even greater when you look at minutes played: 

Mitchell has played over half as many minutes as Garnett. But only barely, and no one else gets to that midway mark. 

Excluding his rookie season, when he averaged "only" 28.7 minutes per game, Garnett was on the floor for 39.2 minutes during the average contest throughout his Minnesota tenure. In two separate seasons, he broke into the 40s, despite lining up at a position that typically sees players take lengthy breathers to let their massive bodies recover. 

Naturally, that helped him rack up some massive counting stats:

It's just not even close in any category. 

Garnett has scored 11,880 more points than any other player in franchise history, and he even led the league in total points scored during the 2003-04 season. No one else even has more than Mitchell's 7,161. The power forward also has 6,089 more rebounds than any other Wolf, with Love in second place at 4,453.

Even though he's always been a natural forward, Garnett is the franchise's all-time leader in assists. Again, he has more than twice as many as second place, which is Pooh Richardson in this particular category. 

David Sherman/Getty Images

Steals? More than twice as many as Corey Brewer and everyone else. Blocks? He has nearly five times as many as Rasho Nesterovic, who's in second place. In fact, to reach Garnett's total of 1,576 rejections, you have to add up more than the next five players on the career leaderboard. 

If you parse through that above infographic rather carefully, you'll notice that this power forward is the only man to appear in the top 10 for all five box-score categories. Mitchell is the other lone player in at least four. Wally Szczerbiak, Doug West, Christian Laettner, Tom Gugliotta and Al Jefferson are the only ones with three appearances. 

And this unique, well-rounded dominance is true if we look at the per-game numbers. 

This time, Garnett isn't leading in any categories. He trails Tony Campbell in points, Love in rebounds and Eddie Griffin in blocks. He's a bit further back in assists and steals per game, ranking only No. 10 and No. 8, respectively. 

But again, Garnett appears on all five leaderboards, and how many other players can say that? The answer is simple—none. 

Thirty-one different players show up at least once in that infographic. Garnett is the only one to appear in all five categories—or even four of the five, for that matter. Gugliotta and Jefferson can be found on three of the different leaderboards, while another dozen are on two. 

And that's it. Once more, it's KG standing alone, even if he's not the all-time leader in any of the individual per-game categories. 

But let's move on to more advanced metrics: 

Now, Garnett is back on top. 

Player efficiency rating? He barely edges out Love, though it's possible the younger power forward will take over the lead soon once a less-productive Garnett adds more Minnesota games to his resume. At worst, the future Hall of Famer will finish No. 2, well ahead of Jefferson, Sam Cassell and everyone else in franchise history.

Though Love has earned slightly more win shares per 48 minutes, Garnett has racked up nearly as many total win shares as Love, Szczerbiak, Mitchell and Terrell Brandon combined. 

But most impressive is Garnett's value over replacement player (VORP). Essentially, this metric shows how many more wins a player provided than a replacement player—someone picked from the in-season free-agent market or out of the D-League on a minimum contract—would have in the same amount of playing time. 

During KG's first stint in Minnesota, he added 75.1 wins to the organization. No one else has contributed more than Love's 16.9. 

And here's the craziest stat of all. Based on VORP, Garnett has contributed more wins to the Wolves than the combined efforts of the next eight players on the career leaderboard. Single-handedly, he's been more impactful than Love, Szczerbiak, Gugliotta, Brandon, Laettner, Tyrone Corbin, Cassell and Richardson. 

Of course, that's basically been reflected in the number of All-Star selections: 

Only five players—Garnett, Love, Cassell, Gugliotta and Szczerbiak—have made the squad while wearing Minnesota threads. Naturally, The Big Ticket has more appearances than the other four combined.

The disparity is even more jarring when you look at MVPs: 

Garnett is the only MVP winner in franchise history, taking home the honor at the conclusion of the 2003-04 season, one in which he averaged 24.2 points, 13.9 rebounds, 5.0 assists, 1.5 steals and 2.2 blocks per game. He steered the Wolves to a franchise-best 58 wins, and Bleacher Report's Joel Cordes elaborated in a fantastic look at KG's return:

"

His team went 58-24, won the West, got to the Conference Finals and initially gave the dream-team-lite L.A. Lakers all they could handle, only to see Cassell and Troy Hudson go down with injuries.

Kevin Garnett wound up playing point guard because Darrick Martin was the only other one left. He averaged 23.7 PPG, 13.5 RPG, 4.5 APG, 1.2 BPG and 1.2 SPG for the series.

And the Wolves lost 4-2.

"

It wasn't just 2003-04. Each of the team's seven most successful seasons have come with him on the roster. 

But move past MVPs on the infographic by clicking over to MVP shares, which show what percentage of voting points a player received during any given year. If you appear on a ballot, you get at least 0.001 MVP shares, which only four players in Minnesota history have ever done. 

Love, Cassell and Gugliotta have earned 0.072 combined MVP shares. Garnett topped that number in four different seasons.

Heading into the big man's second Minnesota debut, 210 different players have suited up for this franchise. For now, all of their impacts pale in comparison to the achievements of the best player in Wolves history.

He may have worn No. 21 throughout his time with the team that originally drafted him out of high school, but he's most certainly No. 1. 

"In my 17 years of coaching, I've never seen a team so excited," head coach Flip Saunders, who coached Garnett during the early years, said during Thursday's announcement, via Lindsey LaBelle of MyFoxTwinCities.com. 

It's not hard to see why.

Note: All stats, unless otherwise indicated, come from Basketball-Reference.com and are current heading into Feb. 23's games.