The next time an owner of a professional sports team eats four years and $20 million worth of a head coach's contract will be the first.

So for a talk show or a sports section to pose a question no one is asking -- Is Flip Saunders' job as Timberwolves head coach safe? -- is an exercise in inanity. Might as well probe the pressing issue of whether Christmas soon might be moved to January.

Remember, team owner Glen Taylor, only nine months ago, handed Saunders that sweetened deal despite already having him under contract for a couple more years. If anything, to the folks frothing over at the Wolves' newly ended seven-game skid and 11-16 slump the past two months, the question was one of too much job security and not enough pressure from above.

Which, after all, is the reality.

"This is our team. I'm not going anywhere," Saunders said this week, matter of factly. "[Kevin McHale] isn't going anywhere. From that standpoint, there's no purpose to listen to what anybody's saying or talking about."

Eight weeks ago, Saunders was being mentioned as a Coach of the Year candidate. Until the Wolves' 112-80 victory over Toronto on Tuesday, though, he had spent most of March as the guy incapable of fixing whatever was broken.