Rubio meet Mike Penberthy

[bleedspeed]

The Minnesota Timberwolves have hired Mike Penberthy as a full-time shooting coach to help Ricky Rubio and the rest of the team with their shooting during the season.

New Timberwolves shooting coach Mike Penberthy worked with Ricky Rubio for a week this summer.
The Timberwolves announced the hire on Thursday, along with Jason Hervey as a scout and the promotion of Derek Pierce to advance scout. Penberthy played briefly for the Los Angeles Lakers around the turn of the century and spent much of his playing career overseas.

One of his biggest priorities will be helping Rubio improve his shooting. The point guard is a career 37 percent shooter and has been working hard to improve that number to take the next step in his career.

Penberthy worked with Rubio for a week this summer in California.



http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/11587255/mike-penberthy-hired-minnesota-timberwolves-shooting-coach

[thedoper]

How it took this long to have an announcement like this is the strange part of this story. Good news either way.

[bleedspeed]

I am impressed Rubio spent a whole week working on his shot. The guy is coming up on the biggest pay day of his life and he spent a week working on the part of his game that needs the most work. Impressive.

[Phenom]

I am impressed Rubio spent a whole week working on his shot. The guy is coming up on the biggest pay day of his life and he spent a week working on the part of his game that needs the most work. Impressive.

Is that what it said? Or did it say he spent one week working on it with Penberthy?

[bleedspeed]

I am impressed Rubio spent a whole week working on his shot. The guy is coming up on the biggest pay day of his life and he spent a week working on the part of his game that needs the most work. Impressive.

Is that what it said? Or did it say he spent one week working on it with Penberthy?

Week with Penberthy. Seriously he need to spend the summer working on it with him. He need to treat this like working with a pitching coach.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

I hope he's good...Ricky needs a lot of help. Penberthy has a career NBA 41.5 shooting percentage, so maybe he's a "do as I say, not as I do" kind of guy. I didn't find much about him on the net, but did see that he is the all-time scoring leader at basketball power The Master's College. Maybe more importantly, he was a Biblical Studies major in college...prayer may be needed in this rebuilding year!

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Well, Penberthy's worked with Paul George, Dwayne Wade, Andre Iguodala and Kyrie Irving and has been a shooting coach/trainer for a good amount of time. Can only hope he helps Ricky out a ton.

[alexftbl8181 [enjin:6648741]]

Penberthy worked with Rubio for a week this summer in California.

whew glad that's over. Rubio's shooting could of been a real problem going forward. Glad he got that fixed.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

I understand the frustration with Rubio's shooting...I'm frustrated too. But there seems to be a prevailing opinion that this is something that is easily fixable, if only Ricky would work on it harder. I'm not there. I think it's more likely that he just isn't a very good jump shooter. He's an excellent free thrower and a pretty good set-shooting three-point shooter, but he is a terrible jump shooter...and I don't think that is likely to change.

Ricky by all accounts is a gym rat, so I reject the premise that he is not taking enough practice jump shots. And a week is plenty of time to spend with a coach working on your form. It shouldn't take any more than a week to analyze his stroke, make suggestions about how to improve it, and then watch him put this into practice for a few days. After that, it's up to Ricky to practice his jump shot, and from what I know about Ricky, he's probably in the gym a couple hours every day shooting jumpers. He just isn't very good at it.

This may be perceived to be a buzz-killing negative spin on Ricky's shooting, but I don't see it as such. I don't think Ricky will ever be an average jump shooter, but I still think he has a very high ceiling. He is naturally gifted at passing and ball handling, and also possesses enormous natural defensive instincts. And while he is not good at finishing at the rim, unlike his jump shot, I see this as an area where he will improve. He has clearly added some muscle to his frame over the offseason, and this should allow him to be more physical around the rim. That alone should help him improve his layup shooting percentage, and lead to many more "and ones"

I may be too pessimistic about Ricky's ability to become an adequate jump shooter, but I think he can be a 15 PPG scorer even without improvement in his shot. He seems to have the ability to consistently beat his defender and get to the rim, and his new bulk should lead to more successful layups. He has the ability to draw fouls and is an excellent shooter at the line. And finally, he has shown the ability to make open 3-point set shots. The mid-range jump shot is not an efficient scoring tool, and I don't see it as a major problem if Ricky never improves there...he should just deemphasize that part of his game and concentrate on areas where he can score efficiently.

In summary, I'm not excited about the new shooting coach. But I am excited about Ricky's potential to become a top 5 PG

[bleedspeed]

I wish we could just have Corey Brewer help him with his 2pt shooting.