Minnesota Sports Forum

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:Q, I'm only asking because it was your take. If Ricky's our "elite role player", and I think he very well could be, then why is he being paid like a franchise player? Those guys you named previously, the Kidds/Rodmans/etc., weren't the highest paid players on their contending teams. Does that not make any difference to you?

He's not paid like a franchise player. He would be the 4th highest paid player on Cleveland's team next season (assuming LeBron, Irving, and Love all stay). He's paid less than both Durant and Westbrook. He's paid less than Paul and Griffin.

I happen to think he's our best player right now, at least until Wiggins passes him in the next couple of years (hopefully). I hope our lottery pick ultimately is better than him too.

Yes, yes he is, Q. If you wanna cherry-pick your response, then so will I. Rubio will be paid more than Curry, Horford, Duncan and DeRozan. $14M a year is All-Star money, not role player money. So, if he stays the same player that he is right now, meaning little improvement in his scoring ability, then we have a problem, in my opinion.

To your second point, we need Rubio to be our third or fourth best player to have any shot at being a contender, which is the goal. Ricky being our best player isn't a good thing.

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:Q, I'm only asking because it was your take. If Ricky's our "elite role player", and I think he very well could be, then why is he being paid like a franchise player? Those guys you named previously, the Kidds/Rodmans/etc., weren't the highest paid players on their contending teams. Does that not make any difference to you?

He's not paid like a franchise player. He would be the 4th highest paid player on Cleveland's team next season (assuming LeBron, Irving, and Love all stay). He's paid less than both Durant and Westbrook. He's paid less than Paul and Griffin.

I happen to think he's our best player right now, at least until Wiggins passes him in the next couple of years (hopefully). I hope our lottery pick ultimately is better than him too.

Q, bold part is simply not factual. Let's look at comparable contracts for guys that started new contracts this year. Wall - Starting $13.7M; Cousins - starting $13.7M; Favors - starting $13M.....Rubio - $12.7M. All those other guys are franchise or cornerstone type players. The piece I would conceed here is that Rubio/Favors got 4 years, and Wall and Cousins got 5. But from a yearly salary, and cap hit (which is the important thing), Rubio is right on par with those 3 guys. Now, do we really think that Rubio is worth the same amount as any of those 3 guys? Or even close to it? You can't simply look at Rubio's talent and not consider his contract. I like Rubio just fine for $5-7M. But to say it is money well spent to pay him the same as these other players? Crazy....

Camden wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:Q, I'm only asking because it was your take. If Ricky's our "elite role player", and I think he very well could be, then why is he being paid like a franchise player? Those guys you named previously, the Kidds/Rodmans/etc., weren't the highest paid players on their contending teams. Does that not make any difference to you?

He's not paid like a franchise player. He would be the 4th highest paid player on Cleveland's team next season (assuming LeBron, Irving, and Love all stay). He's paid less than both Durant and Westbrook. He's paid less than Paul and Griffin.

I happen to think he's our best player right now, at least until Wiggins passes him in the next couple of years (hopefully). I hope our lottery pick ultimately is better than him too.

Yes, yes he is, Q. If you wanna cherry-pick your response, then so will I. Rubio will be paid more than Curry, Horford, Duncan and DeRozan. $14M a year is All-Star money, not role player money. So, if he stays the same player that he is right now, meaning little improvement in his scoring ability, then we have a problem, in my opinion.

To your second point, we need Rubio to be our third or fourth best player to have any shot at being a contender, which is the goal. Ricky being our best player isn't a good thing.

I think some of those guys are legit bargains - Curry obviously is a massive bargain. But to me "franchise player" generally implies max deal for MVP or borderline MVP caliber players. While Rubio is not a bargain, I don't think his salary is totally out of whack given his experience, age, and impact when healthy. The issue is his health.....

Hicks123 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:Q, I'm only asking because it was your take. If Ricky's our "elite role player", and I think he very well could be, then why is he being paid like a franchise player? Those guys you named previously, the Kidds/Rodmans/etc., weren't the highest paid players on their contending teams. Does that not make any difference to you?

He's not paid like a franchise player. He would be the 4th highest paid player on Cleveland's team next season (assuming LeBron, Irving, and Love all stay). He's paid less than both Durant and Westbrook. He's paid less than Paul and Griffin.

I happen to think he's our best player right now, at least until Wiggins passes him in the next couple of years (hopefully). I hope our lottery pick ultimately is better than him too.

Q, bold part is simply not factual. Let's look at comparable contracts for guys that started new contracts this year. Wall - Starting $13.7M; Cousins - starting $13.7M; Favors - starting $13M.....Rubio - $12.7M. All those other guys are franchise or cornerstone type players. The piece I would conceed here is that Rubio/Favors got 4 years, and Wall and Cousins got 5. But from a yearly salary, and cap hit (which is the important thing), Rubio is right on par with those 3 guys. Now, do we really think that Rubio is worth the same amount as any of those 3 guys? Or even close to it? You can't simply look at Rubio's talent and not consider his contract. I like Rubio just fine for $5-7M. But to say it is money well spent to pay him the same as these other players? Crazy....

I don't consider Favors a franchise player. Cousins' deal is more lucrative than Rubio's, albeit not by a ton. Wall is making close to $20M in his final year, so their numbers quickly diverge after year 1.

Q12543 wrote:

Hicks123 wrote:

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:Q, I'm only asking because it was your take. If Ricky's our "elite role player", and I think he very well could be, then why is he being paid like a franchise player? Those guys you named previously, the Kidds/Rodmans/etc., weren't the highest paid players on their contending teams. Does that not make any difference to you?

He's not paid like a franchise player. He would be the 4th highest paid player on Cleveland's team next season (assuming LeBron, Irving, and Love all stay). He's paid less than both Durant and Westbrook. He's paid less than Paul and Griffin.

I happen to think he's our best player right now, at least until Wiggins passes him in the next couple of years (hopefully). I hope our lottery pick ultimately is better than him too.

Q, bold part is simply not factual. Let's look at comparable contracts for guys that started new contracts this year. Wall - Starting $13.7M; Cousins - starting $13.7M; Favors - starting $13M.....Rubio - $12.7M. All those other guys are franchise or cornerstone type players. The piece I would conceed here is that Rubio/Favors got 4 years, and Wall and Cousins got 5. But from a yearly salary, and cap hit (which is the important thing), Rubio is right on par with those 3 guys. Now, do we really think that Rubio is worth the same amount as any of those 3 guys? Or even close to it? You can't simply look at Rubio's talent and not consider his contract. I like Rubio just fine for $5-7M. But to say it is money well spent to pay him the same as these other players? Crazy....

I don't consider Favors a franchise player. Cousins' deal is more lucrative than Rubio's, albeit not by a ton. Wall is making close to $20M in his final year, so their numbers quickly diverge after year 1.

TT supposedly turned down 4 years 52 million from the Cavs. Players that have varying worth to a team get paid over 10 million per year some are obviously overpaid and quite a few of them are not franchise players. I think the question to ask Q is what kind of contract Rubio is worth or whether he is concerned with the contract Rubio has right now when evaluating his worth going forward.

1. Alex, if we had Ty Lawson you'd bitch too. Still have yet to see you actually make a positive comment on this board OR the ESPN board. And to suggest that scoring is more important than defense/rebounding is far more laughable than me suggesting that Ricky is 1 made FG per game from being a considered a solid shooter. If we had Ty Lawson you'd be complaining that he can get posted up on defense on any given play.

As Q mentioned, the on/off court numbers are about as good of proof of effectiveness as you could ask for. I'm not sure who it was that challenged Q's comment that Ricky's on/off court numbers are flawed based off our weak bench, but although you could argue the off court numbers could be somewhat skewed for that reason, as Q mentioned, the 13-14 year we had one of the most effective starting units in the league and Rubio was a top 2 player on that unit. Additionally, the Wolves had like 14 games that season where we had 30+ point leads. Just think about that stat for a second...it's not only staggering, it's an all-time type of number. That's with that same unit.

I do realize that there's more to it than to just say Rubio is 1 shot away from being considered a solid shooter, but by the percentages it's actually a true (even if it is simplistic) statement. I realize defenders back off of him. If he starts hitting a better clip on shooting, maybe they'll guard him closer..but if they do that, then he'll also be more likely to have his other strengths shine even more. Also, just as you're suggesting that he gets more open looks than most guards and therefore he should shoot even better than 1 more shot a game to be considered a solid shooter, I can equally say that he's an 80%+ free throw shooter, which believe it or not, IS a shooting statistic as well.

Rubio might be overpaid, but it's not by a whole lot if he could stay healthy. Can he stay healthy? We'll see...but to suggest it's as easy as trading Ricky for Mudiay for injury reasons isn't taking into account that Mudiay ALSO missed time this season due to injuries.

Side note...wonder what the Cavs will do with TT vs Love this offseason.

There is also at least Gordon Hayward and Chandler Parsons that make more money than Rubio and I don't consider either yet all star level talent. Although I think that if they continue to still improve both players might be all start at some point of their current contracts.

From older contracts at least Hibbert and Eric Gordon are currently making more than Ricky and I wouldn't consider either same level than Ricky even though Hibbert has been selected twice to all star game. (wouldn't trade Ricky for either of them)

Watching Delly shut down Curry in game 2 reminded me of what Rubio can do for us. You just don't see many guys play like that.

But like some.others have said, we need 2 other all star.caliber players to play with him

Mikkeman wrote:There is also at least Gordon Hayward and Chandler Parsons that make more money than Rubio and I don't consider either yet all star level talent. Although I think that if they continue to still improve both players might be all start at some point of their current contracts.

From older contracts at least Hibbert and Eric Gordon are currently making more than Ricky and I wouldn't consider either same level than Ricky even though Hibbert has been selected twice to all star game. (wouldn't trade Ricky for either of them)

Yeah, we can go on and on with examples of guys that are overpaid, underpaid, and paid just about right.

I will concede that Rubio's contract errs a bit on the generous side, but I don't think it's a bad deal or one that severely limits our options going forward. If he stays healthy, I think he's worth every penny.

Yes. Rubio is one made basket away from being a "solid" or respectable shooter.

As it is, however, after four years he's the worst shooting regular starter in modern NBA history. Just thought I'd throw that out there. I don't think his contract is egregious (the big rise in salary cap helps). I think he does a lot of things well. And I like to watch him play. But he's a terrible shooter and finisher. That's not all there is to a basketball player, obviously. Some are more willing to live with it than others.

Others live with it but realize that the shooting is a significant concern that could even compromise some of the things he does well. I dig Rubio enough to welcome him back for another go. And I'll have fun watching him. But I won't sugarcoat what he does well... or doesn't do well.