Q12543 wrote:
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.
I don't blame Rubio's shooting on the Wolves bad offense that's more on Sam and his overwhelming focus on this team playing defense...
As for Rubio not being able to be a championship PG it's not exactly optimal however Dallas won a championship with Jason Kidd who basically only jacked up 3 pointers to score. Q was ready for Rubio to go that route for maybe at least a year. I've always said Rubio was too young to settle for that. Rubio has some decent 3 point shooting percentages plus FT% and was good with catch and shoot 3's in Europe so him being able to be a reasonably good 3 point shooter and play a Kidd role is somewhat reasonable. The first issue is whether he can stay healthy enough to do anything. If Rubio has enough talent around him and stays healthy he may be just fine.
Why are we giving Rubio credit for things that happened 6 years ago... while overlooking what's happened over the past two... or even 4+ years for that matter?
He CAN'T shoot. He remains the worst shooting (starter) in modern NBA history. He's in his 5th year. That's who he is. Saying he's going to get better is fool's gold at this point. That's not to say he's a worthless player. Or, a bad player. Obviously, he does other things well enough to justify some of those on/off splits and to earn a $56M payday. He's good in a lot of ways, but is he good enough?
We can't assume he's going to improve anywhere at this point. After this much time and with injuries, it's probably just as likely that he gets worse than better. Rubio is who he is.
And the question on the table is whether that's good enough or not...
I agree with your points however I I think you missed the point I was making. My point is I am comparing him to old man Jason Kidd who almost literally shot 3 pointers and FTs. I am not arguing Rubio will improve overall as a shooter I am suggesting 3 point shooting which he has some sort of track record (yeah some from years ago) of being decent at something he can do shooting 3'a I am not suggesting it's something that will happen but I also think him being able to hit coach and shoot 3's seems some sort of reasonably hopeful thing to wish for and was something he actually was good at years ago. It's not somethings brand new like becoming a good shooter AND a scorer which yeah seems pretty damn unlikely.
1. He's never even been an average 3 point shooter in the NBA.
2. Kidd was a shell of himself offensively by the end. 8 / 4 / 8 in the championship season and that was with him basically only taking wide open three point set shots as one of the last offensive options. 2/3 of his shots were three pointers. He was no threat offensively. The Wolves should demand more from Rubio than that. Rubio can give them more than that.
3. But I get your optimism. We're all hoping Rubio shows improvement somewhere because everybody knows how important he is for the Wolves.
Remember my point bringing up Kidd was that people say that Rubio can not be the starting PG on a championship team and I used Kidd as my example of how it could be possible. Remember people made fun of Cuban for trading for Kidd (I probably chuckled at the deal) and they ended up wining a championship a few seasons later. Maybe Rubio can't get to the Level Kidd did as a 3 point shooter (nobody expected Kidd to ever shoot the 3 like he did) but if healthy he would likely be able to create more opportunities for players than Kidd did at that time. But really who cares about all that if he is wearing a suit behind the bench because he can't play? That's the first issue and really at this point it's all I actually really care about.
Side note: What is happening over there in Milwaukee? They seem to be struggling and Mayo is starting and so is the guy my friend who is a Bucks fan calls Blahless.
Q12543 wrote:
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.
I don't blame Rubio's shooting on the Wolves bad offense that's more on Sam and his overwhelming focus on this team playing defense...
As for Rubio not being able to be a championship PG it's not exactly optimal however Dallas won a championship with Jason Kidd who basically only jacked up 3 pointers to score. Q was ready for Rubio to go that route for maybe at least a year. I've always said Rubio was too young to settle for that. Rubio has some decent 3 point shooting percentages plus FT% and was good with catch and shoot 3's in Europe so him being able to be a reasonably good 3 point shooter and play a Kidd role is somewhat reasonable. The first issue is whether he can stay healthy enough to do anything. If Rubio has enough talent around him and stays healthy he may be just fine.
Why are we giving Rubio credit for things that happened 6 years ago... while overlooking what's happened over the past two... or even 4+ years for that matter?
He CAN'T shoot. He remains the worst shooting (starter) in modern NBA history. He's in his 5th year. That's who he is. Saying he's going to get better is fool's gold at this point. That's not to say he's a worthless player. Or, a bad player. Obviously, he does other things well enough to justify some of those on/off splits and to earn a $56M payday. He's good in a lot of ways, but is he good enough?
We can't assume he's going to improve anywhere at this point. After this much time and with injuries, it's probably just as likely that he gets worse than better. Rubio is who he is.
And the question on the table is whether that's good enough or not...
I agree with your points however I I think you missed the point I was making. My point is I am comparing him to old man Jason Kidd who almost literally shot 3 pointers and FTs. I am not arguing Rubio will improve overall as a shooter I am suggesting 3 point shooting which he has some sort of track record (yeah some from years ago) of being decent at something he can do shooting 3'a I am not suggesting it's something that will happen but I also think him being able to hit coach and shoot 3's seems some sort of reasonably hopeful thing to wish for and was something he actually was good at years ago. It's not somethings brand new like becoming a good shooter AND a scorer which yeah seems pretty damn unlikely.
1. He's never even been an average 3 point shooter in the NBA.
2. Kidd was a shell of himself offensively by the end. 8 / 4 / 8 in the championship season and that was with him basically only taking wide open three point set shots as one of the last offensive options. 2/3 of his shots were three pointers. He was no threat offensively. The Wolves should demand more from Rubio than that. Rubio can give them more than that.
3. But I get your optimism. We're all hoping Rubio shows improvement somewhere because everybody knows how important he is for the Wolves.
Remember my point bringing up Kidd was that people say that Rubio can not be the starting PG on a championship team and I used Kidd as my example of how it could be possible. Remember people made fun of Cuban for trading for Kidd (I probably chuckled at the deal) and they ended up wining a championship a few seasons later. Maybe Rubio can't get to the Level Kidd did as a 3 point shooter (nobody expected Kidd to ever shoot the 3 like he did) but if healthy he would likely be able to create more opportunities for players than Kidd did at that time. But really who cares about all that if he is wearing a suit behind the bench because he can't play? That's the first issue and really at this point it's all I actually really care about.
Side note: What is happening over there in Milwaukee? They seem to be struggling and Mayo is starting and so is the guy my friend who is a Bucks fan calls Blahless.
No idea about Milwaukee. They went from a horrible defensive team to a really good one... to lousy again. Last season was the fluke?
Dallas won that title after Kidd was relegated to 2nd or 3rd tier status on that team. He helped them a lot more defensively though.
Hopefully, Rubio gets healthy and stays healthy and then we can figure things out from there.
on top of that Kidd was beastly good defender and complete one, Ricky as a defender is nowhere near him on this side of a ball too, he is not that far as a help defender i will give him that, but overall defensive impact of Kidd, oh man
Ricky is who he is, average NBA starter with many pluses and minuses, who has shown very little ability to improve during his NBA career.
TeamRicky wrote:Jason Kidd couldn't shoot and he was a perennial all star. Kidd started off in Rubio territory for his first 3 years and climbed up to around 40%. If Rubio can stay healthy I'd expect his shooting does improve to around 40%. Despite his shooting, he helps our offense by getting others better looks and is an excellent defender and is a great teammate. We just have to hope Kander works his magic and he stays healthy when we make our run starting next year. In either case, we should be looking to pickup a quality backup in free agency and work on developing Tyus. We got 3 young talents to build around and a healthy Ricky is a bonus.
Kidd's first 5 seasons:
38.5%
38.1%
40.3%
41.6%
44.4%
Rubio's first 5 seasons:
35.7%
36.0%
38.1%
35.6%
34.3% (still early though)
I get the comparison. But, it's not like Rubio is destined to follow the same career arc as a 1st ballot HOFer just because they're both lousy shooters. Why do we keep comparing Rubio to Jason Kidd but it's blasphemy to compare him to a guy like Brevin Knight... a guy who remained the decent but flawed player he always was?
To me, those stats show Rubio is improving. He only played 22 games last year and 12 so far this year. IMO - You can't put the same weight on those years as the prior ones where he played 57 and 82 games. If he shot lights out during the 22 games last year, people wouldn't be convinced he's turned into Steph Curry due to sample size. The same holds true in reverse. I'd just throw that year out. And as far as this year - we should wait more than 12 games before we pass judgement. So what you are left with is a three year improvement arc and a "TBD" for this year.
TeamRicky wrote:Jason Kidd couldn't shoot and he was a perennial all star. Kidd started off in Rubio territory for his first 3 years and climbed up to around 40%. If Rubio can stay healthy I'd expect his shooting does improve to around 40%. Despite his shooting, he helps our offense by getting others better looks and is an excellent defender and is a great teammate. We just have to hope Kander works his magic and he stays healthy when we make our run starting next year. In either case, we should be looking to pickup a quality backup in free agency and work on developing Tyus. We got 3 young talents to build around and a healthy Ricky is a bonus.
Kidd's first 5 seasons:
38.5%
38.1%
40.3%
41.6%
44.4%
Rubio's first 5 seasons:
35.7%
36.0%
38.1%
35.6%
34.3% (still early though)
I get the comparison. But, it's not like Rubio is destined to follow the same career arc as a 1st ballot HOFer just because they're both lousy shooters. Why do we keep comparing Rubio to Jason Kidd but it's blasphemy to compare him to a guy like Brevin Knight... a guy who remained the decent but flawed player he always was?
To me, those stats show Rubio is improving. He only played 22 games last year and 12 so far this year. IMO - You can't put the same weight on those years as the prior ones where he played 57 and 82 games. If he shot lights out during the 22 games last year, people wouldn't be convinced he's turned into Steph Curry due to sample size. The same holds true in reverse. I'd just throw that year out. And as far as this year - we should wait more than 12 games before we pass judgement. So what you are left with is a three year improvement arc and a "TBD" for this year.
I... ummm... you see... ummmmm... ahhh... oh... just nevermind.
[Note: For the 1,235th time on here, I actually include the caveat... yet still get called on the caveat anyway. I wrote "still early though")
TeamRicky wrote:Jason Kidd couldn't shoot and he was a perennial all star. Kidd started off in Rubio territory for his first 3 years and climbed up to around 40%. If Rubio can stay healthy I'd expect his shooting does improve to around 40%. Despite his shooting, he helps our offense by getting others better looks and is an excellent defender and is a great teammate. We just have to hope Kander works his magic and he stays healthy when we make our run starting next year. In either case, we should be looking to pickup a quality backup in free agency and work on developing Tyus. We got 3 young talents to build around and a healthy Ricky is a bonus.
Kidd's first 5 seasons:
38.5%
38.1%
40.3%
41.6%
44.4%
Rubio's first 5 seasons:
35.7%
36.0%
38.1%
35.6%
34.3% (still early though)
I get the comparison. But, it's not like Rubio is destined to follow the same career arc as a 1st ballot HOFer just because they're both lousy shooters. Why do we keep comparing Rubio to Jason Kidd but it's blasphemy to compare him to a guy like Brevin Knight... a guy who remained the decent but flawed player he always was?
To me, those stats show Rubio is improving. He only played 22 games last year and 12 so far this year. IMO - You can't put the same weight on those years as the prior ones where he played 57 and 82 games. If he shot lights out during the 22 games last year, people wouldn't be convinced he's turned into Steph Curry due to sample size. The same holds true in reverse. I'd just throw that year out. And as far as this year - we should wait more than 12 games before we pass judgement. So what you are left with is a three year improvement arc and a "TBD" for this year.
I... ummm... you see... ummmmm... ahhh... oh... just nevermind.
[Note: For the 1,235th time on here, I actually include the caveat... yet still get called on the caveat anyway. I wrote "still early though")
You made a side by side comparison of five year careers. I certainly think it's fair to point out that Rubio's five years on your comparison are the equivalent of Kidd's first three years with regard to total games played.
Team Ricky's point (as I understood it) was that Kidd struggled his first few years and then made a modest jump to become an effective player. Rubio certainly still has that possibility. He's been held back by injuries as has been pointed out time and time again. During the seasons he wasn't injured - he's shown improvement as can be seen in his 1st three year trend. This year and last year should not be included in the trend analysis IMO because (1) they are small samples and (2) he was injured or recovering from injury - therefore may not be a true reflection of what he'll do when healthy. You did have an asterisk by this year. But IMO last year should also be flagged or simply not included due to the reasons I've stated.
Q12543 wrote:
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.
I don't blame Rubio's shooting on the Wolves bad offense that's more on Sam and his overwhelming focus on this team playing defense...
As for Rubio not being able to be a championship PG it's not exactly optimal however Dallas won a championship with Jason Kidd who basically only jacked up 3 pointers to score. Q was ready for Rubio to go that route for maybe at least a year. I've always said Rubio was too young to settle for that. Rubio has some decent 3 point shooting percentages plus FT% and was good with catch and shoot 3's in Europe so him being able to be a reasonably good 3 point shooter and play a Kidd role is somewhat reasonable. The first issue is whether he can stay healthy enough to do anything. If Rubio has enough talent around him and stays healthy he may be just fine.
Why are we giving Rubio credit for things that happened 6 years ago... while overlooking what's happened over the past two... or even 4+ years for that matter?
He CAN'T shoot. He remains the worst shooting (starter) in modern NBA history. He's in his 5th year. That's who he is. Saying he's going to get better is fool's gold at this point. That's not to say he's a worthless player. Or, a bad player. Obviously, he does other things well enough to justify some of those on/off splits and to earn a $56M payday. He's good in a lot of ways, but is he good enough?
We can't assume he's going to improve anywhere at this point. After this much time and with injuries, it's probably just as likely that he gets worse than better. Rubio is who he is.
And the question on the table is whether that's good enough or not...
I agree with your points however I I think you missed the point I was making. My point is I am comparing him to old man Jason Kidd who almost literally shot 3 pointers and FTs. I am not arguing Rubio will improve overall as a shooter I am suggesting 3 point shooting which he has some sort of track record (yeah some from years ago) of being decent at something he can do shooting 3'a I am not suggesting it's something that will happen but I also think him being able to hit coach and shoot 3's seems some sort of reasonably hopeful thing to wish for and was something he actually was good at years ago. It's not somethings brand new like becoming a good shooter AND a scorer which yeah seems pretty damn unlikely.
1. He's never even been an average 3 point shooter in the NBA.
2. Kidd was a shell of himself offensively by the end. 8 / 4 / 8 in the championship season and that was with him basically only taking wide open three point set shots as one of the last offensive options. 2/3 of his shots were three pointers. He was no threat offensively. The Wolves should demand more from Rubio than that. Rubio can give them more than that.
3. But I get your optimism. We're all hoping Rubio shows improvement somewhere because everybody knows how important he is for the Wolves.
Remember my point bringing up Kidd was that people say that Rubio can not be the starting PG on a championship team and I used Kidd as my example of how it could be possible. Remember people made fun of Cuban for trading for Kidd (I probably chuckled at the deal) and they ended up wining a championship a few seasons later. Maybe Rubio can't get to the Level Kidd did as a 3 point shooter (nobody expected Kidd to ever shoot the 3 like he did) but if healthy he would likely be able to create more opportunities for players than Kidd did at that time. But really who cares about all that if he is wearing a suit behind the bench because he can't play? That's the first issue and really at this point it's all I actually really care about.
Side note: What is happening over there in Milwaukee? They seem to be struggling and Mayo is starting and so is the guy my friend who is a Bucks fan calls Blahless.
No idea about Milwaukee. They went from a horrible defensive team to a really good one... to lousy again. Last season was the fluke?
Dallas won that title after Kidd was relegated to 2nd or 3rd tier status on that team. He helped them a lot more defensively though.
Hopefully, Rubio gets healthy and stays healthy and then we can figure things out from there.
It's almost like they added two bad defenders to the rotation in Parker and Monroe and reduced Henson's minutes. Who could have possibly seen that tanking their defense?
