Game Report - Wolves v. Lakers

[BizarroJerry [enjin:6592520]]

We also lost the fast break points battle again, why is this even close? Is Sammich slowing the game down to keep us fresher for better D? I hate watching these half court sets, we should be playing Loyola Marymount style with our PG and freak athletes.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Here's the thing though, Some of the things that Rubio does is pretty overrated. Rebounding? Eh. You would think it would lead to more fast breaks, but they never do. Is he getting a rebound that Towns or someone wouldn't get? I dunno.

Steals. A lot comes from gambling but Ill admit that Rubio is done a better job of not gambling. You would think all these steals and rebounds would lead to a ton of fast breaks, but they dont.

Defense is good, but what we see, perimeter defense is not really important to interior defense. Some people see Rubio getting burned, other point out that the help defense was bad. Fact is point guards can't "shut down" other point guards. They get screens and every point guard can probably score on an other in 1 on 1. Nobody is shutting down guys like Paul, or Curry or Wall. Not one guy that is.

Even the assists are kinda overrated. Curry and Parker are considered "shoot first" point guards yet their teams are the best passing teams in the league, compared to the Wolves who do a bad job of moving the ball. In today's NBA you would much rather everybody have 2-3 assists then just one guy having double digits.

And Rubios "shooting" is way more then just shooting. It affects on how the offense runs. Nobody respects Rubio to shoot. He's not breaking down the defense to get someone an open 3 or dunk because people would rather him make the layup, which he can't do

IF the other things he does are overrated as you suggest...how do you explain the .533 winning percentage with him vs. .167 winning percentage without him? That would seem to contradict your assumption that it's overrated.

And IF nobody respects Rubio to shoot.....then how do you explain the fact that he's drawing so many fouls (far and away more than anyone on the team this year)? Why would teams be fouling a guy if they think he can't score anyhow?

Explain in bold, please.

Wiggins has more than 2x as many free throw attempts as Rubio.

[alexftbl8181 [enjin:6648741]]

Here's the thing though, Some of the things that Rubio does is pretty overrated. Rebounding? Eh. You would think it would lead to more fast breaks, but they never do. Is he getting a rebound that Towns or someone wouldn't get? I dunno.

Steals. A lot comes from gambling but Ill admit that Rubio is done a better job of not gambling. You would think all these steals and rebounds would lead to a ton of fast breaks, but they dont.

Defense is good, but what we see, perimeter defense is not really important to interior defense. Some people see Rubio getting burned, other point out that the help defense was bad. Fact is point guards can't "shut down" other point guards. They get screens and every point guard can probably score on an other in 1 on 1. Nobody is shutting down guys like Paul, or Curry or Wall. Not one guy that is.

Even the assists are kinda overrated. Curry and Parker are considered "shoot first" point guards yet their teams are the best passing teams in the league, compared to the Wolves who do a bad job of moving the ball. In today's NBA you would much rather everybody have 2-3 assists then just one guy having double digits.

And Rubios "shooting" is way more then just shooting. It affects on how the offense runs. Nobody respects Rubio to shoot. He's not breaking down the defense to get someone an open 3 or dunk because people would rather him make the layup, which he can't do

IF the other things he does are overrated as you suggest...how do you explain the .533 winning percentage with him vs. .167 winning percentage without him? That would seem to contradict your assumption that it's overrated.

And IF nobody respects Rubio to shoot.....then how do you explain the fact that he's drawing so many fouls (far and away more than anyone on the team this year)? Why would teams be fouling a guy if they think he can't score anyhow?

First point, is sample size. For his career Rubio being on the court, the Wolves were still an under .500 team.

Second point is I'm assuming his free throw rate? Because Wiggins shoots a lot more free throws, but also shoots the ball a lot more then Rubio so the percentages are going to be off.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Here's the thing though, Some of the things that Rubio does is pretty overrated. Rebounding? Eh. You would think it would lead to more fast breaks, but they never do. Is he getting a rebound that Towns or someone wouldn't get? I dunno.

Steals. A lot comes from gambling but Ill admit that Rubio is done a better job of not gambling. You would think all these steals and rebounds would lead to a ton of fast breaks, but they dont.

Defense is good, but what we see, perimeter defense is not really important to interior defense. Some people see Rubio getting burned, other point out that the help defense was bad. Fact is point guards can't "shut down" other point guards. They get screens and every point guard can probably score on an other in 1 on 1. Nobody is shutting down guys like Paul, or Curry or Wall. Not one guy that is.

Even the assists are kinda overrated. Curry and Parker are considered "shoot first" point guards yet their teams are the best passing teams in the league, compared to the Wolves who do a bad job of moving the ball. In today's NBA you would much rather everybody have 2-3 assists then just one guy having double digits.

And Rubios "shooting" is way more then just shooting. It affects on how the offense runs. Nobody respects Rubio to shoot. He's not breaking down the defense to get someone an open 3 or dunk because people would rather him make the layup, which he can't do

IF the other things he does are overrated as you suggest...how do you explain the .533 winning percentage with him vs. .167 winning percentage without him? That would seem to contradict your assumption that it's overrated.

And IF nobody respects Rubio to shoot.....then how do you explain the fact that he's drawing so many fouls (far and away more than anyone on the team this year)? Why would teams be fouling a guy if they think he can't score anyhow?

First point, is sample size. For his career Rubio being on the court, the Wolves were still an under .500 team.

Second point is I'm assuming his free throw rate? Because Wiggins shoots a lot more free throws, but also shoots the ball a lot more then Rubio so the percentages are going to be off.

Free throw rate? If so...

Yikes. We're going pretty deep in finding ways that Rubio's shooting isn't a problem.

[JasonIsDaMan [enjin:7981157]]

I don't believe Mitchell will be back for the simple fact that Joerger is going to be fired and Taylor cannot pass on a Minnesota native when he can hire one.

That being said, I like the way he tries to limit minutes of older players like KG to keep them fresh, and he seems to finally figure out that Payne never will figure it out.

[The Rage Monster [enjin:8010341]]

The constant Rubio bashing is so annoying. He couldn't shoot yesterday, he can't shoot today, and guess what he probably won't be able to tomorrow. He is who he is, a poor shooter but does basically everything else at a high level. He helps the team win, it's been posted how much better the team's winning percentage is with Rubio vs without him. He played 33 minutes and was +22 which means in the 20 minutes he didn't play the team was -21, we are clearly a better team with him and it's not even close.

[Carlos Danger]

First point, is sample size. For his career Rubio being on the court, the Wolves were still an under .500 team.

Second point is I'm assuming his free throw rate? Because Wiggins shoots a lot more free throws, but also shoots the ball a lot more then Rubio so the percentages are going to be off.

I don't think you can explain the record that easily since we can expand the data to Rubio's entire career:

Games Rubio Played: 94-123 (.433) vs. Games he missed 28-88 (.241). So...that's like an 80% better winning percentage over a 333 games sample. That's not insignificant.

And yes, I was referring to Free Throw Rate. Rubo is at .584 which leads the team - by a WIDE margin. And as noted earlier he's second in the NBA for Point Guards in Free Throw to FGA ratio. He's drawing plenty of fouls so far this year. In fact, he's 3rd on the team in total free throws/attempts even with missing six games.

[AbeVigodaLive]

As noted many many times...

Rubio is a very polarizing player. Unfortunately, there seems to be no middle ground when discussing Rubio lately.

Guys who repeatedly point out that he's "good" still are bashing him apparently. It's ok to point out things that a player struggles with and wonder if it will ultimately hold the team back or not. There' no crime in analyzing every player's game (good and bad)... even your favorite player.

[AbeVigodaLive]

First point, is sample size. For his career Rubio being on the court, the Wolves were still an under .500 team.

Second point is I'm assuming his free throw rate? Because Wiggins shoots a lot more free throws, but also shoots the ball a lot more then Rubio so the percentages are going to be off.

I don't think you can explain the record that easily since we can expand the data to Rubio's entire career:

Games Rubio Played: 94-123 (.433) vs. Games he missed 28-88 (.241). So...that's like an 80% better winning percentage over a 333 games sample. That's not insignificant.

And yes, I was referring to Free Throw Rate. Rubo is at .584 which leads the team - by a WIDE margin. And as noted earlier he's second in the NBA for Point Guards in Free Throw to FGA ratio. He's drawing plenty of fouls so far this year. In fact, he's 3rd on the team in total free throws/attempts even with missing six games.

No offense. But FTR seems like a cherry picked stat du jour especially because the Wolves broadcast discussed it last night. One way to look at a stat like that is to see that he gets fouled at a great rate. ...OR... part of the reason for it might simply be because he shoots less than most other PGs.

What doe sit really mean?

Add it all up and he's shooting fewer than 5 attempts per game. That's not a bad thing. But I wouldn't look at that and say "Holy shitballs... we are winning a lot of games by Rubio's ability to get to the line."

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

The constant Rubio bashing is so annoying. He couldn't shoot yesterday, he can't shoot today, and guess what he probably won't be able to tomorrow. He is who he is, a poor shooter but does basically everything else at a high level. He helps the team win, it's been posted how much better the team's winning percentage is with Rubio vs without him. He played 33 minutes and was +22 which means in the 20 minutes he didn't play the team was -21, we are clearly a better team with him and it's not even close.

Yup, that's been demonstrated time and again.

In defense of the bashers, I think there are legitimate concerns about a) his ability to stay healthy, and b) how his shooting would affect the offense in a 7-game playoff series.

I'd like to actually get to the playoffs for once so that we can find out! Given the state of our current roster, no Ricky = no playoffs. The sooner he isn't our best player anymore, the better. It would be nice to be able to depend on Wiggins, LaVine, and KAT to carry the vast majority of the load, with Rubio as the conductor. None of those guys are there yet, although KAT seems to be the closest, which is pretty damn amazing.