Seems Ricky turned down $43m...

[bleedspeed]

It can't help that Spain lost to France. Look at the comment below. Basically calling out Rubio as the weak link.

"The second problem was holding them in the half court," France coach Vincent Collet said. "You cannot stop Pau Gasol all the time but we were digging a lot. We took risks with their group of outside players. We used [Ricky] Rubio's defender to give extra help inside, leaving him open sometimes. We tried to put pressure on their big men every time."

Rubio scored only four points on 1-for-7 shooting and was part of Spain's 2-for-22 effort from 3-point range. The Minnesota Timberwolves point guard simply was outplayed by Thomas Huertel, who scored 10 of his 13 points in the fourth quarter.

[Monster]

Just looking at the box score Spain shot an absolutely sad 32% from the floor and was almost doubled up on rebounds. It looks to me like plenty of guys sucked except Pau. Ibaka and Marc combined to shoot 2-14 and grabbed just 6 rebs. Basically it looks like to me Spain's bigs got outplayed by France's bigs. I always thought Spain was a little overrated in this tourney although they deserved it and so I'm a little less shocked by this. Gobert might end up being a major steal for Utah. I liked him in that draft I would have loved to get him but we ended up with Dieng who I like more, but Gobert would have made me happy if we missed on Dieng.

[Coolbreeze44]

I'm now on the side of Ricky needs to decide whether he wants to commit to his NBA career. I've seen no evidence he has improved as an offensive player. These national team events take away from his NBA prep time. He needed to make a thousand jump shots every day this summer to improve. Obviously he's not doing that. He can still be good with all the elements of his game, but he's not going to be great and deserving of a max contract.

[kekgeek]

Just wondering if you guys watched the game because I did, he was not Spain weak link on the team, and if he was it is how they use him. In the game he was elite defender in the game. If you look at the box score you see that his guy scored 10 points in the 4th quarter but three of them came when the dude elbowed Ricky in the face and he fell over (Fiba officiating so inconsistent both ways) and he knocked down a three because ricky was on the ground. One was a end of a shot clock prayer that went in. A fast break 2 and the other one he beat ricky off the dribble. Ricky shot three jump shots, he made one (looked good caught it and went up with it right away and it was a swish. One was a fade away end of the shot clock. The other miss was end of the game he missed a wide open mid range jumper. I am more worried about him near the hoop, his misses at the basket were not even close.

Spain also uses ricky weird, be playing him off the ball, of course you will double pau when you play ricky off the ball. Ricky in no means was great, but he was not the reason they lost or either there weak link.

I am fine with a person wanting to represent their country we might as well get used to it with Wiggins and Bennett going to represent Canada

On a side note: Mikel Gelleball had a hell of a game for france, I don't know if the box score will show that or not.

[Porckchop]

Ricky has more apologists than any other athlete Ive ever followed. What is the love affair with this guy?

[kekgeek]

Ricky has more apologists than any other athlete Ive ever followed. What is the love affair with this guy?

I am not apologizing for Rubio game, he was not as bad as the box score said. Also the reason why Rubio has so many fans is he is a top 5 PG in every aspect of his game besides Shooting where more than likely he is the worst in the NBA. if he could just become an average finisher at the rim, he would be a very special player. Also I remember reading a stat last year that on catch and shoot opportunities Rubio had the second be FG% on the team behind Love.

[60WinTim]

I just watched the game last night. There's no need to apologize for Ricky -- Ricky does what Ricky does: create scoring opportunities for other players and be a disruptive force on defense. It was Ricky's teammates that did not do what they usually do: score and rebound. It was a very subpar performance by many of the Spanish team's players.

[Hicks123 [enjin:6700838]]

I just watched the game last night. There's no need to apologize for Ricky -- Ricky does what Ricky does: create scoring opportunities for other players and be a disruptive force on defense. It was Ricky's teammates that did not do what they usually do: score and rebound. It was a very subpar performance by many of the Spanish team's players.

Your right..."Ricky did what Ricky did"....which was absolutly nothing on offense. And while I completely realize that the whole Spain team laid an egg, the other coach's comments lay to bare Ricky's issue. He is absolutely NOT a concern for the other team at all, especially in critical moments, thus they completely ignore him and put pressure on the guys that will actually do damage on the floor. This absolutely creates a mismatch in favor of the other team as they can slide over and help defend at will, as Ricky isn't a concern around the perimiter or taking it to the hoop. This is why a similar guy like Rondo is much more valuable, IMO. While not a great outside shooter, he somehow manages to shoot nearly 48% for his career.

And you made a great point that Ricky's teammates didn't do their "typical" job of scoring the basketball. And this proves out why Ricky needs to develop his game further to be considered a top 10-15 PG. He at least needs to have some semblance of ability to score points when his team needs that from him...which they clearly could have used the other night. While his other skills are certainly an asset, I just believe that at the end of close games, when you need your ball handlers to dominate and score, he becomes a completely useless tool in too many situations. This is not the guy I want making $13-15M on my roster.

[mjs34]

I just watched the game last night. There's no need to apologize for Ricky -- Ricky does what Ricky does: create scoring opportunities for other players and be a disruptive force on defense. It was Ricky's teammates that did not do what they usually do: score and rebound. It was a very subpar performance by many of the Spanish team's players.

Your right..."Ricky did what Ricky did"....which was absolutly nothing on offense. And while I completely realize that the whole Spain team laid an egg, the other coach's comments lay to bare Ricky's issue. He is absolutely NOT a concern for the other team at all, especially in critical moments, thus they completely ignore him and put pressure on the guys that will actually do damage on the floor. This absolutely creates a mismatch in favor of the other team as they can slide over and help defend at will, as Ricky isn't a concern around the perimiter or taking it to the hoop. This is why a similar guy like Rondo is much more valuable, IMO. While not a great outside shooter, he somehow manages to shoot nearly 48% for his career.

And you made a great point that Ricky's teammates didn't do their "typical" job of scoring the basketball. And this proves out why Ricky needs to develop his game further to be considered a top 10-15 PG. He at least needs to have some semblance of ability to score points when his team needs that from him...which they clearly could have used the other night. While his other skills are certainly an asset, I just believe that at the end of close games, when you need your ball handlers to dominate and score, he becomes a completely useless tool in too many situations. This is not the guy I want making $13-15M on my roster.

No question that Ricky has to improve his scoring ability, whether that is at the hoop or midrange, but please don't bring Rondo into this. The guy's TS% jumped the year KG and Allen came to the Celtics. He isn't the same guy without those players around him, and stating that he is "not a great outside shooter" is like saying Donald Sterling isn't a hero in the black community. Rondo is a horrendous perimeter shooter as well as at the charity stripe. Rubio shoots 18% pts better at the FT line, and 7% pts from 3.

Ricky definitely needs to change his off season priorities though. If he doesn't start putting in significant time on his shooting skills, he should be ready to accept a 10mil/yr deal. They did say on the broadcast earlier in the week that he had been working a great deal on his shooting during practices over there, so hopefully this the stage where he gets worse before getting better.

[Monster]

I just watched the game last night. There's no need to apologize for Ricky -- Ricky does what Ricky does: create scoring opportunities for other players and be a disruptive force on defense. It was Ricky's teammates that did not do what they usually do: score and rebound. It was a very subpar performance by many of the Spanish team's players.

Your right..."Ricky did what Ricky did"....which was absolutly nothing on offense. And while I completely realize that the whole Spain team laid an egg, the other coach's comments lay to bare Ricky's issue. He is absolutely NOT a concern for the other team at all, especially in critical moments, thus they completely ignore him and put pressure on the guys that will actually do damage on the floor. This absolutely creates a mismatch in favor of the other team as they can slide over and help defend at will, as Ricky isn't a concern around the perimiter or taking it to the hoop. This is why a similar guy like Rondo is much more valuable, IMO. While not a great outside shooter, he somehow manages to shoot nearly 48% for his career.

And you made a great point that Ricky's teammates didn't do their "typical" job of scoring the basketball. And this proves out why Ricky needs to develop his game further to be considered a top 10-15 PG. He at least needs to have some semblance of ability to score points when his team needs that from him...which they clearly could have used the other night. While his other skills are certainly an asset, I just believe that at the end of close games, when you need your ball handlers to dominate and score, he becomes a completely useless tool in too many situations. This is not the guy I want making $13-15M on my roster.

No question that Ricky has to improve his scoring ability, whether that is at the hoop or midrange, but please don't bring Rondo into this. The guy's TS% jumped the year KG and Allen came to the Celtics. He isn't the same guy without those players around him, and stating that he is "not a great outside shooter" is like saying Donald Sterling isn't a hero in the black community. Rondo is a horrendous perimeter shooter as well as at the charity stripe. Rubio shoots 18% pts better at the FT line, and 7% pts from 3.

Ricky definitely needs to change his off season priorities though. If he doesn't start putting in significant time on his shooting skills, he should be ready to accept a 10mil/yr deal. They did say on the broadcast earlier in the week that he had been working a great deal on his shooting during practices over there, so hopefully this the stage where he gets worse before getting better.

So Rondo was a really nice PG with good players around him...so we need to have good players around Rubio?

People talk about. Rubio's development or lack thereof. Its interest practice skill. Rubio is unselfish to a fault and also willing to do what he is told for the better of the team. Because of that and. In addition to that his scoring hasn't come along. He is like some weird duck in the age of a ridiculous depth of scoring PGs or PGs that can also score.

Rubio has a set shot that does work as you can see he shoots FTs at a good enough rate and as someone else mentioned his catch and shoot numbers are solid. If I remember right his catch and shoot 3's have always been a strength going back to his time in Europe. The problem is a set shot isn't going to work off the dribble fading etc etc. For a guy with wizardry passing the ball he doesn't have much feel for putting the ball up around the rim either. Its kinda like Wayne Ellington's offensive game as a SG. He has that sweet jumper that's good for getting outside jumpers off but he has nothing really once he gets to the paint as a scorer unless is a wide open opportunity or maybe looking good using his leaping ability for an uncontested dunk. Rubio's set shot is a big reason why he isn't a scorer. Its a no-brainer he needs to change that shot but really he needs IMO to change how he shoots the ball with the feel in his hand as well as his mechanics. I don't know if he can pull that off at this stage at this level. If he could improve his set shot that may even be good enough to take advantage of his other strengths as a player. I never expected him to score a ton so I'm not reallyas dissappointed as others in where he is at but its behind what I thought he would be.