It really was sad to see Minnesota Timberwolves’ Ricky Rubio go down with injury shortly after the All Star Break this season. He was a joy to watch not only for Minnesota fans, but fans of the NBA in general, and he couldn’t be a cooler guy too. Since suffering that season ending injury against the Lakers on March 9th, he’s been to Vail, Colorado for surgeries to repair both his ACL and LCL in his left knee. Yesterday, he spoke to the local media in Minnesota for the first time in just about a month.
Below is some of what Ricky Rubio said yesterday at that press conference according to Joan Niesen of Fox Sports North:
“Seeing the team and feeling that you can’t help them, it’s tough,” Rubio said. “They have a lot of injuries, not only mine. They have (Michael) Beasley, they have J.J.(Barea), Pek (Nikola Pekovic) out. It’s a tough season.”
Right now, the time frame for Rubio’s recovery is vague — anywhere from six to nine months. Rubio isn’t sure whether he’ll stay in the United States or return to Spain, which he said might be better for him mentally, but he knows it’s going to be a while before he’s back on the court. And though that time frame must seem like an eternity for a player whose NBA career was in just its fourth month when he was injured, the rookie is handling the rehabilitation process well.
Perhaps that’s because Rubio is looking at the recovery in terms of something other than time. He doesn’t want to move too quickly and plans to make sure he’s 100 percent by the time he returns, whether that’s for training camp or at some point in the first months of next season. Perhaps it’s because he’s been a pro for so long, or maybe it’s because of this injury, but Rubio seems to lack the false sense of infallibility some young athletes exhibit.
“You always think in your mind about what can happen, especially after the first couple days after surgery when you can’t move your knee,” Rubio said. “You just think about it and think if you’re going to come back, if you can come back.”
“You always have to think about everything, but you just have to keep the right (thoughts),” he added. “Because if not, you can think, ‘I got hurt. I’m going to be out for six, nine months, and maybe I’m not going to be the player that I was before.’ That’s not the right thing. It can be. But it can be that you are better than you were.”
Here’s hoping Rubio can be a better player than he was before after a full recovery from this injury. The NBA world is a better place with a healthy Ricky Rubio in it. He proved a whole lot of people wrong once already heading into this season too, and hopefully he can do the same next year as well.
