Who Does Ricky Rubio Think He Is?

Not much in sports makes me cringe these days, but describing Ricky Rubio as the next Pistol Pete Maravich -- legend and cult hero forevermore -- certainly is hard on the frown lines. So the Mane from Spain has flowing locks and a flair for the flashy, sexy pass. Does that make him remotely equipped to wage battle in a league loaded with elite point guards, from Chris Paul to Deron Williams to Jason Kidd to Derrick Rose to Rajon Rondo?

Pistol Pete was a one-and-only, never to be replicated in any era, a prolific scorer and exquisite passer whose showmanship would have thrived in a time when entertainment and SportsCenter hits seem to trump winning championships. Rubio? He's 18. I have no idea how much he'll improve his shaky jumper and adapt to the raw physicality of NBA ball. He very easily could be a Eurobust who has brainwashed us with YouTube reels that conveniently ignore his turnovers and no-look flips with no-chance recipients.

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"I don't see Rubio being that dynamic player now," said Danny Ainge, general manager of the Boston Celtics. "I think he's got a lot of potential. He's a flashy player. I don't see him -- just physically, and because he doesn't shoot the ball very well -- I don't see him having an impact as a rookie."

Yet they insist he's Maravich. And he's jazzy. And he's major box-office. Oh, and did they mention that his skin is white? Shame on anyone who projects Rubio as a superstar based on wishful thinking, stereotyping and nostalgia.

And shame on Rubio for exploiting this premature, unjustified man-love by acting like a brat. Only minutes after he was selected by the Timberwolves with the No. 5 choice in the draft, there was Rubio, threatening not to play in Minnesota because most winter nights in Minneapolis are considerably colder than his dog's nose.

"It's too cold," he said, a day after announcing that his mother also thinks the city is too cold. "I have to think about that ... I'm going to talk with my agent about that and we are going to see."

Later, he told a Spanish newspaper, "I wouldn't rule out at all returning to Spain.''

With those words, any enthusiasm mustered by the team's new general manager, David Kahn, fizzled away. The public-relations mess worsened Thursday night, when Rubio's father, Esteve, was quoted on the Spanish sports site Marca.com as saying his son might play in Spain the next few years and blow off the Wolves. Word is, the Rubio camp wants Ricky to play in a larger market, regardless of climate. "Ahora mismo, es muy probable que Ricky se quede uno o dos años en Europa," the elder Rubio said. "Tenemos que hablar con la gente de Minnesota ... y ver lo que pasa, porque, a estas horas, podemos estar en Minnesota o en otra parte, declaraba."

Meaning, Ricky might play a season or two longer in Europe, with the Rubios intending to chat with the Minnesota front office about a tenuous future there. How fascinating that Europe has caught on to what I call John Elway/Eli Manning syndrome -- punky demands by athletes who want to circumvent the draft system and refuse to play for a certain team. The thing about Elway and Manning was, we had an idea of their track record and assumed they could play. Who in the hell is Ricky Rubio? At the Olympics in Beijing, I watched him first-hand and thought he handled himself well at times, while also wondering why he struggled to dribble past halfcourt under pressure from the U.S. Redeem Team of NBA superstars. There is more than a wee element of overhype here, as suggested strongly by Brandon Jennings, who went to the Milwaukee Bucks with the No. 10 pick after jumping to Europe straight out of high school and facing Rubio, among others.

"The only thing I've seen him do sometimes is when he has a home run pass or something like that. I think the dude is just all hype," Jennings said recently before backtracking last week, maybe under mandate from the league. "I can't even front. I'm just going to be real with you guys."

I do like how Rubio responded when asked about the shots. "I don't think about what they say about me," he said. "I only think about my objective. I have my own dreams, and I don't listen to people who say you're going to be in the top or you're going to be all hype. I don't care. We're going to see what they can do on the court. I talk on the court."

Where will that be? As expected, the Knicks already have made inquiries, with New York seemingly a more desirable destination for Rubio and his big-city dreams. Kahn is a disciple of Knicks GM Donnie Walsh, who was as befuddled as anyone Thursday night when the Timberwolves took Rubio at No. 5 -- then followed at No. 6 by selecting another point guard, Jonny Flynn. Later, Kahn took two more point guards, trading Ty Lawson to Denver but keeping Nick Calathes. Suddenly, Minnesota was the land of 10,000 point guards.

"It's surprising that, aside from me, they chose another point guard at number six, but let's see what they want,'' Rubio said.

This is what happens when you let a former sportswriter and NBC executive run an NBA team. Chaos ensues. Kahn once wrote about the Trail Blazers and the league for a newspaper in Portland, which I suppose makes him as qualified as two other former sports scribes -- Ned Colletti of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Marty Hurney of the Carolina Panthers -- who have fared well as GMs. But Kahn has lost me. First he dumped franchise icon Kevin McHale as coach, even though the team's two young stars, Al Jefferson and Kevin Love, like playing for him. Then he traded the team's top scoring guard, Randy Foye, and veteran shooter Mike Miller to Washington for the No. 5 choice, which he used on Rubio when he had every intention of also taking Flynn. Huh?

There also is the tricky matter of Rubio's buyout with his Spanish team, DKV Joventut. An NBA team is allowed to pay only a small percentage of a player's buyout elsewhere, requiring Rubio to ante up most of the $6.6 million. So it's possible he'll stay in Spain just to let the buyout wind down or expire. "Yes, it's a big problem," he said. So why would Kahn, with empty seats and suites to fill in a market that lost interest after Kevin Garnett was traded, draft a player speculatively when he could have taken a deadeye shooter such as Stephen Curry or an active big man like Jordan Hill? Is this the way to start a job in the Twin Cities, by drafting a player who doesn't want to be in the Twin Cities and didn't show up at the team's introductory post-draft press conference Friday? Even Love was a critic, asking on his Twitter page during the draft, "What are we doing????? We better trade. I don't even know."

Kahn says he will wait up to two years for Rubio, if necessary.

Is he insane? He also said Rubio will be the starting point guard if and when he does arrive, which could upset team chemistry if Flynn is an instant hit. Would you like to explain yourself, old sportswriting friend?

"I told the agent we would be willing to wait if it made it easier for them," Kahn said at a post-draft news conference attended by Flynn and the team's other first-round pick, Wayne Ellington. "We want to be supportive and helpful on that front because I do believe the contractual issue is a little thorny. To the extent that if it means we have to wait a year, we wait a year. If it means two years, two years. He's 18. If we had to wait, God forbid, two years, he'd be 20 when he got here. That's pretty young."

But isn't it bad form for Rubio to blow off his first official team function? Again, Kahn coddles and gushes, letting an 18-year-old control his world. "We will put no pressure whatsoever on Ricky or his family or his agent during this process," Kahn said. "Again, it's something that starts with a threshold issue. It's a contractual issue that he will have to resolve. To the extent that we can be helpful, I said we will. We won't be banging our fists on the table or saying things intended to make things more difficult."

Chances are, Rubio eventually will be dealt because he'll force Kahn's hand. The Timberwolves, an aching franchise, aren't in position to wait two years for anyone, much less a raw project. "I haven't spoken to Minnesota. I will," Walsh said Friday. "I don't know what's going on there. (Kahn) took a lot of point guards, and I want to ask
him, 'Why did you do that?' '' For now, Kahn clings to the bizarre dream of playing Rubio and Flynn together at some point. Wouldn't Foye and Flynn make more sense as a tandem? Wouldn't anything not involving Rubio make more sense? "I'm neither confident nor nonconfident. I don't know enough at this point. It's too early to worry,'' Kahn said of Rubio staying in Spain. "I truly believe these kids can play together. Great players like playing with other great players."

The more he talks, the more he sounds like someone trying to convince himself that an incongruity makes sense. "With the sixth pick, we selected Jonny Flynn. I truly believe that Jonny is as much a scorer as a playmaker and will thrive playing off of Ricky," Kahn said in a letter to Timberwolves' season-ticket holders. "I also believe that, together, we will have one of the most dynamic defensive backcourts in the NBA over time. You will love Jonny Flynn. He, too, will be special.

"And I also believe that there is a tendency in the NBA for all of us (myself included) to become too formulaic in our thinking. If you think of the Detroit Pistons backcourt during their championship run, with Isiah Thomas, Joe Dumars and Vinnie Johnson, or the Celtics with their backcourt of Danny Ainge and Dennis Johnson (and before Ainge there was Gerald Henderson), or the Lakers with Jerry West and Gail Goodrich, or the Knicks with Walt Frazier and Earl Monroe, there are many instances of championship success that is not so paint-by-the-numbers. It can and will work."

Said Flynn, a good soldier: "I think we can really do this. To be able to have two good decision-makers out there who can facilitate from anywhere on the court, that's just lethal. I'd love to get him here and really try to work this thing out."

As any good sportswriter realizes, Kahn should have done his homework before drafting Rubio. Did he know Minnesota doesn't fit Mrs. Rubio's weather standards? Did he know Ricky likes the big cities? If he's using Rubio as a drafting asset, OK, Kahn is savvier than we thought. Still, this isn't the next Magic Johnson or -- cringe! -- the next Pete Maravich. This is an adventure into the unknown. No one is giving David Kahn the house for a teenaged point guard who might be another Darko Milicic.

"It will be an interesting ride," Kahn said. "If any team can afford to be patient, it's us."

Yeah? I doubt he'll be so presumptuous when fans are avoiding the Target Center, having been dismissed as rubes by a hoops boob named Rubio.