MINNEAPOLIS – It's not quite pouting, what transpires in that folding chair after losses.
It's not quite anger, either, or bitterness, or melancholy. It's deflation in orange shorts, deflation underneath a mop of black hair and stubble, deflation in human form – that is, if you're still considering Ricky Rubio to be human, a matter that's up for debate in the state of Minnesota.
The point guard is a cartoon character, a superhero, a caricature of all that is good and right in basketball. On a team that's gone just 6-23 since Kevin Love's Jan. 3 hand injury, he's the lone bright spot, healthy and fighting, as visibly frustrated with losing as he is doggedly determined to win.
The past week has been a video montage of Ricky Rubio, folk hero, and to understand why the Timberwolves keep fighting rather than collapsing in upon themselves is to see what the point guard has wrought. The story begins in a blowout loss in Los Angeles Feb. 28, when Rubio was caught on TNT serving as Alexey Shved's personal shrink.
"Change this face," Rubio said to Shved as the two walked onto the court during a break in the game, one sullenly Russian, the other basketball's closest thing to a living, breathing Muppet. "Be happy. Enjoy."
Oh, Ricky, the state of Minnesota sighs as it collectively attempts to reach through its televisions and hug the player who is suddenly finding his way in his recovery from ACL surgery.
The following Monday, the Timberwolves returned home to play the Heat, a daunting task for a team that knew it probably couldn't beat LeBron James and friends. The game was closer than anyone might have expected, with the Timberwolves actually retaining a fighting shot at a win until halfway through the fourth quarter, but it was frustrating nonetheless. As time expired in the first half, Rubio missed an easy layup, going on to punch the stanchion of his team's basket in abject frustration before jogging into the locker room.
Ricky Rubio, punching things. Call it the conflict, the mess, the tipping point. He'll call it passion.
"I mean, even if we're losing, we have to show everybody that we want to win," Rubio said after the loss. "It's not something that we can do with the injuries and all that stuff. There's no excuses about that. It's just like, we have to get through it. We have to learn and come in every day thinking that we're going to win."
Against the Wizards Wednesday, the Timberwolves finally got that win, snapping a six-game losing streak dating back to Feb. 20. It was Rubio's win, one could say; the point guard finished the night three rebounds short of a triple-double, another four steals shy of a quadruple-double, for that matter. Lately, it's Rubio's steals that have dominated the conversation; he finished the game with six, and in the past month, he's logged 47, 13 more than any other player in the league over that time span. (Rubio's 3.6 steals per game also lead the NBA over the past month, and he's averaging nearly a full steal per game more than the player with the second-most, Monta Ellis, who's averaging 2.8.)
They're magic hands as much for their passing as their ability to snare the ball, and Rubio's almost fanatical ability to corral opponents' passes and pick their pockets has coincided with his team's toughest, most injury-plagued stretch of the year. It's as if with every hurt player, every loss, every mental error and physical lapse, Rubio feels more and more compelled to simply plop his eight active teammates on his back and muscle them through games.
On Wednesday, Rubio capped his night with a sixth steal, diving for a loose ball that he eventually snatched from John Wall and pushed toward J.J. Barea, who barreled down the court for an easy layup that put the Timberwolves up, 85-82, and secured the game.
In the locker room afterward, there was some debate as to the nature of that final steal. The gods of the NBA box score credited it to Rubio, who certainly did his part in diving after it, but Barea laid claim to the stat. It was his steal, he insisted, and Rubio didn't do much to dispel his claim. Five steals, six steals – it didn't seem to matter one bit to the Spaniard, who also didn't seem to have put much thought into Barea's argument. Give him one, Rubio shrugged. It's not like he doesn't have a few to spare, and he'll add one caveat to that generosity: "It's a team effort, you know?"
That, in a sentence, is why Rubio isn't so much impressed with this month of steals as he is disappointed that it generated 10 losses. "We didn't win … games," he said, "so that doesn't matter." What does anything matter if they're losing, you get the sense he thinks, and to see Rubio as dejected as he's been is to cease to believe in joy.
But on Wednesday night, it was Rubio himself who suspended belief. Timberwolves coach Rick Adelman, a man of few words and fewer compliments, said it best: "He was unbelievable." His plus-minus of plus-15 was the best of any player in the game, and as it has been for the past month, his presence was contagious.
"He's playing extremely hard, and sometimes it's great," Adelman said. "Sometimes it's not so great. But that energy just feeds the rest of the guys. Hopefully everybody sees that, that that's how we have to be right now with the group that we have."
Sure, there are mistakes. There's that subpar shooting; despite scoring 15 points Wednesday, he was 4-of-15, and he's shooting just 34.3 percent on the season, as much as the entire state of Minnesota would prefer to ignore that blemish. His accuracy will have to improve, and Rubio will need to learn that fine art of rationing his game rather than resorting to the kind of basketball gluttony that such a shorthanded, struggling team necessitates. One must also hope he can keep his turnovers down; in that same month in which he's leading the league in steals, he's also tied for the third-most turnovers per game. The catch there, though, is that he's tied with Stephen Curry, and the only players with more turnovers per game over the period are Kobe Bryant and John Wall. It isn't the worst kind of company, and that's part of the inherent risk of Rubio: to commit to him is to gamble.
Right now, that's fine for the Timberwolves, Adelman says. They're so shorthanded that the only success they'll have is through gambling, through taking the types of risks that are a patented part of Rubio's game. When to make eye contact with your target is a mortal sin, to pass simply is taboo, to thread the ball through your legs or someone else's is a mandate – well, it's a high-risk, high-reward investment and, right now, it's galvanizing Rubio's team.
Sometimes Adelman worries Rubio is trying too hard, but how does a coach chastise a player for such a thing? Instead, Adelman is working to be conscious of Rubio's minutes because with that kind of absurdly rabid effort, "his 36 is not somebody else's 36," the coach says. And so Adelman worries, but there's little he can do. Rubio is his weapon, his maniacal, play-'til-I'm-dead weapon, and he's a bit of a guilty pleasure, at that.
Ricky Rubio isn't perfect, but the rawness of his game goes hand-in-hand with its beauty. Ricky Rubio isn't perfect, but he certainly wouldn't mind if his team were.
"I miss winning so bad," he said Wednesday. "I just want to win every night. I know it's hard. You can't do it. Even Miami can't do it every night. But I miss that feeling so bad."
He misses that feeling to the tune of a near-triple-double almost every night these days. He misses it when he steals the ball, when he lobs a no-look pass, when he trades acrobatics and theatrics for the downright desperation that's marked his game in recent weeks. Now, after games, Rubio's teammates are checking their box scores for that first triple-double. It's coming. They know it. He was there on Feb. 13, for a moment, before the official scorer docked him a rebound and left him one short. Since then, there have been four more high-alert games, where he's fallen short by a collective eight rebounds and one assist, and the triple-double is coming. In fact, Derrick Williams isn't even ruling out a quadruple-double for the point guard, not when he's stealing the ball the way he is. Since 1986-87, not a single player has recorded a points-rebounds-assists-steals quadruple-double, but Williams, a friend of hyperbole but in this case at least somewhat realistic, is just waiting for Rubio's.
If last Thursday were the opening scene of the Odyssey of Ricky Rubio, then Wednesday was the finale. There was the buildup, the character introduction – change your face – and then the conflict when he bashed his hand into the pads. Any good story needs some conflict, after all, a few scenes of the demoralized hero pondering his fate and batting his eyelashes. Minnesota has those in spades, and there will be more to come. But in some ways, Wednesday marked a clean denouement.
With nine seconds remaining, Martell Webster missed a 3-point jumper and Williams snared the rebound. It was over, with the Timberwolves in possession and up by five. All they needed to do was kill time, and the win was theirs, snapping a six-game skid. Rubio got the ball and dribbled it out toward midcourt, and when time expired, he slammed it down onto the court.
The applause drowned out what had to be a gratifying thump of ball hits hardwood and ricochets toward rafters, and that was that. Some lucky fans a few rows back intercepted the ball as it fell back down, Rubio's act of temporary catharsis another man's mantelpiece memorabilia.
And, scene.
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