A Ricky Rubio return would be enticing, but Cavs can’t bank on encore
By Dan Gilinsky
Rubio exceeded expectations with Cleveland, so that’s part of the rationale for a potential return
Rubio, as we alluded to, was better than anybody could’ve anticipated in his time with Cleveland this season. Now, maybe part of it was the Cavaliers looking to give him more of a green light as a shooter than in other situations, I’m not totally sure on that, but he did provide more of a scoring lift than one could’ve expected.
The red-hot three-point shooting from Rubio came back down to earth as there were was a larger sample as time went on prior to his season-ending injury, in fairness.
He started out hitting 37.1 percent of his three-point attempts in his first 17 appearances of the season, and then in his 17 appearances, that clip was just 29.9 percent. His scoring went from 15.0 to 11.2, as a result.
For the nearly-half-season he played with Cleveland, his three-point shooting clip was then 33.9 percent.
On the plus side, Rubio’s playmaking in his minutes, his defensive work, particularly off-ball, and his floor generalship and leadership, seemingly both on and off the floor, were invaluable to the Cavaliers. Rubio had 1.4 steals per contest with Cleveland, and has had 1.8 per game for his career, and still 1.5 over the past nearly 3.5 seasons with the Utah Jazz, Phoenix Suns, Wolves and Cavs.
He’s a decent rebounding guard, too, and as we highlighted, his leadership was huge for the Wine and Gold in his time with them, and him being around assuredly made a difference for Garland as a leader. Rubio’s chemistry with Kevin Love dating back to their Minnesota days helped as a boost for the bench, too.
With those things in mind, I get why there’s been rumors of a potential Rubio return.
All of that being said, as I mentioned, the Cavs can’t be banking on an encore from Rubio, in terms of the overall on-floor impact. The main reasoning for that is the injury, clearly, and the Cavaliers would need to make other accommodations prior to his return.