Pork-O-Meter

[Yosimar]

This garbage again?

The guy will most certainly always be a bad shooter. However he's an amazing passer of the ball and helps handle a team well from the floor, while also being a very good rebounder for his position and pretty good defensively. Not to mention this team without a doubt is better when he's on it.

Do i wish he was a better shooter and could stay healthier? of course, i'd be happy if he could just stay healthy, the shooting doesn't concern me that much. Until this team can actually find a better option (i believe this team is better suited with a pass 1st point guard/floor general type player with the other players that are on this team) i'd stick with him.

[khans2k5 [enjin:6608728]]

This garbage again?

The guy will most certainly always be a bad shooter. However he's an amazing passer of the ball and helps handle a team well from the floor, while also being a very good rebounder for his position and pretty good defensively. Not to mention this team without a doubt is better when he's on it.

Do i wish he was a better shooter and could stay healthier? of course, i'd be happy if he could just stay healthy, the shooting doesn't concern me that much. Until this team can actually find a better option (i believe this team is better suited with a pass 1st point guard/floor general type player with the other players that are on this team) i'd stick with him.

I don't agree with this. This team lacks scoring in the starting unit outside of Wiggins and Towns would be way more deadly out of a PnR with an actual threat running it with him. It doesn't have to be an Irving/Lillard type guy who scores 25+ a night, but the CP3 type should be the furthest we go on the playmaking to scoring spectrum. I think Tyus can be that guy on offense, but I don't think he'll ever be that good of a defender so who knows if he'll ever be good enough offensively to offset the defense.

Hey Russell Westbrook,

Do you want to win all the titles and be the alpha dog when you become a free agent after next year? Westbrook/Lavine/Wiggins/Whoever/Towns. Shut it down. Let's go home.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Q, speaking of Wiggins. Did you see McPherson's article about Wig and why advanced stats are un-Wig friendly? If you did see it, what's your take on the points he made?

Well, he was a little all over the map with what he said, but I think it boiled down to something like a) advanced stats don't like Andrew a whole lot, and b) he shows enough potential and has enough natural tools that as he continues to grow and mature as a player, the advanced stats will "catch up" to his prodigious potential.

I guess I can buy that. I'm still don't see future "superstar" as being a no brainer outcome for him. Good to great player? Absolutely. Still not sold on superstar.

[Yosimar]

This garbage again?

The guy will most certainly always be a bad shooter. However he's an amazing passer of the ball and helps handle a team well from the floor, while also being a very good rebounder for his position and pretty good defensively. Not to mention this team without a doubt is better when he's on it.

Do i wish he was a better shooter and could stay healthier? of course, i'd be happy if he could just stay healthy, the shooting doesn't concern me that much. Until this team can actually find a better option (i believe this team is better suited with a pass 1st point guard/floor general type player with the other players that are on this team) i'd stick with him.

I don't agree with this. This team lacks scoring in the starting unit outside of Wiggins and Towns would be way more deadly out of a PnR with an actual threat running it with him. It doesn't have to be an Irving/Lillard type guy who scores 25+ a night, but the CP3 type should be the furthest we go on the playmaking to scoring spectrum. I think Tyus can be that guy on offense, but I don't think he'll ever be that good of a defender so who knows if he'll ever be good enough offensively to offset the defense.

Hey Russell Westbrook,

Do you want to win all the titles and be the alpha dog when you become a free agent after next year? Westbrook/Lavine/Wiggins/Whoever/Towns. Shut it down. Let's go home.

Hey that's what happens when you chose to start Kmart over Lavine at the 2 guard, someday hopefully soon Sam will get it through his thick head. CP3 would be better suited for this team than the all 3 of the PG's you mentioned in your post. Only argument against it would be CP3's age, the other guys being much younger. But if they were all around the same age i'd take CP3. While that line up looks amazingly delicious im not sure there's enough ball there for everyone.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Ricky has already proven that he can quarterback a high-powered offense. Let's rewind two years ago to the starting lineup of Rubio-Martin-Brewer-Love-Pekovic. Their offensive rating (points per 100 possessions) that season was 112.4. Guess which other NBA starting lineups had a better offensive rating?

No one.

This is true, on the other hand at that season we were 1-13 in close games and Ricky was not playing 4th quarters for a reason, he was historically bad in 4th quarters so Adelman played J.J. instead. .

If Adelman was playing JJ in the 4th quarter, then shouldn't J.J. be the person to blame for that 1-13 record in close games? When I go to NBA.com and look up "clutch" stats from that year, Barea was the only guy on the team that had a negative Player Impact Estimate (PIE) in those clutch situations. JJ was -6.6. Rubio was positive 5.4.

This comes up every so often. Clutch stats are bogus IMO. They are based on small samples of data. If you want to know the effect a player had on the team's performance, there are much better gauges to use. Even if you choose to believe in "Clutch" - you can't ignore 30 minutes of a player's performance in a game and judge them exclusively on the final 3. Would only of those 14 games have even been close had Rubio not played? There's plenty of data out there to show Rubio makes the team better.[/quote]

Well said Carlos, but there is even more to this story. I'm not sure how Abe and mgor are defining "close games", but I believe the generally accepted definition is games decided by 4 points or less. And it's true that the Wolves started off 0-11 that season in close games by that definition. They lost them in all sorts of ways.

However, starting at exactly the halfway point of the season - when yes, we were still in the playoff hunt - the worm started to turn. We went 6-2 the rest of the way in close games. And Rubio was our starting and ending point guard in every one of those games.

So what happened? A whole bunch of stuff, not the least of which is random variability. Was it Ricky's fault that Gerald Green hit a prayer 3-pointer with a guy draped all over him? How about when Love was clearly hacked on the arm and there was a no-call (Ed Malloy!!!).

We weren't nearly as bad to go 0-11 and we probably weren't nearly as good to go 6-2. Yet that's what happened. Suggesting that Ricky was a big reason we went 0-11 without breaking down the individual reasons why we lost those games and then not acknowledging the fact we went 6-2 the rest of the way seems to ignore how noisy close game situations can be.

Bottom-line: It's a pretty flimsy argument against Ricky.

[Porckchop]

Ricky has already proven that he can quarterback a high-powered offense. Let's rewind two years ago to the starting lineup of Rubio-Martin-Brewer-Love-Pekovic. Their offensive rating (points per 100 possessions) that season was 112.4. Guess which other NBA starting lineups had a better offensive rating?

No one.

This is true, on the other hand at that season we were 1-13 in close games and Ricky was not playing 4th quarters for a reason, he was historically bad in 4th quarters so Adelman played J.J. instead. .

If Adelman was playing JJ in the 4th quarter, then shouldn't J.J. be the person to blame for that 1-13 record in close games? When I go to NBA.com and look up "clutch" stats from that year, Barea was the only guy on the team that had a negative Player Impact Estimate (PIE) in those clutch situations. JJ was -6.6. Rubio was positive 5.4.

This comes up every so often. Clutch stats are bogus IMO. They are based on small samples of data. If you want to know the effect a player had on the team's performance, there are much better gauges to use. Even if you choose to believe in "Clutch" - you can't ignore 30 minutes of a player's performance in a game and judge them exclusively on the final 3. Would only of those 14 games have even been close had Rubio not played? There's plenty of data out there to show Rubio makes the team better.[/quote]

Well said Carlos, but there is even more to this story. I'm not sure how Abe and mgor are defining "close games", but I believe the generally accepted definition is games decided by 4 points or less. And it's true that the Wolves started off 0-11 that season in close games by that definition. They lost them in all sorts of ways.

However, starting at exactly the halfway point of the season - when yes, we were still in the playoff hunt - the worm started to turn. We went 6-2 the rest of the way in close games. And Rubio was our starting and ending point guard in every one of those games.

So what happened? A whole bunch of stuff, not the least of which is random variability. Was it Ricky's fault that Gerald Green hit a prayer 3-pointer with a guy draped all over him? How about when Love was clearly hacked on the arm and there was a no-call (Ed Malloy!!!).

We weren't nearly as bad to go 0-11 and we probably weren't nearly as good to go 6-2. Yet that's what happened. Suggesting that Ricky was a big reason we went 0-11 without breaking down the individual reasons why we lost those games and then not acknowledging the fact we went 6-2 the rest of the way seems to ignore how noisy close game situations can be.

Bottom-line: It's a pretty flimsy argument against Ricky.

More flimsy than he may shoot 40% and he may play 60 games this year?

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Pork, Yes, the "not clutch" or "can't help win close games" argument actually is more flimsy than the two issues you cite because at least those are backed by honest-to-goodness data. He shoots what he shoots, no arguing about it. Now we CAN argue about whether his shooting % makes him a drag on the team. I think I have pointed to data time and again that suggests it doesn't.

And as I mentioned earlier in the thread, I'm 30% Pork because of the health issues. There is no arguing that point either until he proves otherwise.

What I argue most vociferously about when it comes to Rubio is how the man impacts the game when he actually is healthy and playing. Even the other night that we lost, guess how many turnovers by Orlando were attributed to Rubio? 8! He caused 8 turnovers either by taking charges, getting a steal, or causing a travel. No one else on the team does that shit.

[Porckchop]

Doesn't his unpredictability health wise and shooting wise hold this team (and fans) ransom? We have a young team now full of potential, do we hold fast to Ricky being the future when there's so many doubts about his health and or ability to truly improve or do we start looking at other avenues? We've been banking on Ricky and the proof lies in the back ups. Miller, Moe, Luke. Serviceable old guys that were meant to play spot minutes while Ricky rests . But then theyre thrown into starter minutes and rotations are thrown into Flux and everything falls apart. Now some argue that's to Ricky credit, I'm just not sure how. He shows his lack of value by always putting this team in shitty situations depth wise and that to me far out weighs his positives

[BizarroJerry [enjin:6592520]]

Deandre Jordan misses a lot of free throws, if he's not a good free throw shooter, why does he start then?

[AbeVigodaLive]

Ricky has already proven that he can quarterback a high-powered offense. Let's rewind two years ago to the starting lineup of Rubio-Martin-Brewer-Love-Pekovic. Their offensive rating (points per 100 possessions) that season was 112.4. Guess which other NBA starting lineups had a better offensive rating?

No one.

This is true, on the other hand at that season we were 1-13 in close games and Ricky was not playing 4th quarters for a reason, he was historically bad in 4th quarters so Adelman played J.J. instead. .

If Adelman was playing JJ in the 4th quarter, then shouldn't J.J. be the person to blame for that 1-13 record in close games? When I go to NBA.com and look up "clutch" stats from that year, Barea was the only guy on the team that had a negative Player Impact Estimate (PIE) in those clutch situations. JJ was -6.6. Rubio was positive 5.4.

[/quote]

Well said Carlos, but there is even more to this story. I'm not sure how Abe and mgor are defining "close games", but I believe the generally accepted definition is games decided by 4 points or less. And it's true that the Wolves started off 0-11 that season in close games by that definition. They lost them in all sorts of ways.



We weren't nearly as bad to go 0-11 and we probably weren't nearly as good to go 6-2. Yet that's what happened. Suggesting that Ricky was a big reason we went 0-11 without breaking down the individual reasons why we lost those games and then not acknowledging the fact we went 6-2 the rest of the way seems to ignore how noisy close game situations can be.

Bottom-line: It's a pretty flimsy argument against Ricky.

I never wrote Rubio was a a "big" reason. But I've read about many scapegoats that season. Love. Martin. Barea. Adelman. I merely said Rubio can't get off unscathed and that he was "part" of the problem... not THE problem.

So, they were still 7 - 15 or whatever in close games. And it was still a front-running team that skewed some of those incredible stats. Remember they won multiple games by 30+ points. It was an insane season. But ultimately, a disappointing one from a disappointing team.

A lot of people to blame for that. The starting PG who went 16 games without a 4th quarter field goal as the team lost multiple close games is going to get SOME of the blame. How could he not? Just like Barea should for playing even worse. Or, Adelman for his decision-making.

Here's an excerpt from a column back in January, 2014 when the Wolves were just 19 - 21 and in one of the most remarkable and zany half seasons in franchise history... 10 games with a 30 point lead... 11 straight losses in games within 4 points.
_______________


"I've focused on Rubio's wayward shot numerous times, most prominently in this column. He is on pace to become the most inaccurate shooting point guard in modern NBA history. The bad news is that he is even worse during crunchtime.

Again we go to the statistics pages at nba.com. It shows that in "clutch" situation of five minutes or less to play in the game and the teams separated by five points or less -- a total of 59 minutes overall -- Rubio is shooting 12.5 percent from the field and missed the only three-point shot he attempted. In the fourth quarter overall, he is shooting 18.2 percent from the field and 20 percent from three-point territory.

There simply is no incentive for opponents to closely guard such a reluctant and terrible shooter. Nor can Rubio easily force opponents to cover him; his dribble penetration game leaves him with the option of a short jump shot or an attempted layup at the rim, areas where his shooting plunges even further below the league average in accuracy. His personal best bet to score would be to launch three-pointers, but is that really the prime option for the Wolves with the game in the balance?

The problem is compounded by the fact that the Wolves need the ball in Rubio's hands at crunchtime. When the games are late and close, properly executing sets run in the half-court offense are increasingly important. This is especially true of the Wolves, who don't really have an uber-athletic scorer who can create his own shot. Their best scorers, Love and Martin, rely on creating fouls for much of their offense, and we just finished explaining how that is less effective in these circumstances.

If that weren't bad enough, without the need to cover Rubio with any diligence, opponents are also now free to devote more attention to scorers such as Love, Martin, and Nikola Pekovic late in close games. Put it all together and you have a team that shoots 36.2 percent from the field and 23.3 percent from long range in "clutch" situations, while losing the "foul game" along the way.

Oh, and Barea is shooting 13.3 percent from the field and has missed all nine of his three-pointers in "clutch" situations."