Interviewer: Is it always a pleasure for you to crank up the guitar, or do you ever do battle with the instrument?Russell Westbrook isn’t a different type of player than he was a couple of years ago when people wanted him benched for Eric Maynor. Russell Westbrook has just become a better version of what he already was. He’s still hyperaggressive on offense. He still passes way more than people give him credit for. He’s not Chris Paul or Mike Conley. That’s fine. Defenders have different nightmares about Russ.
Kurt Cobain: The battle is the pleasure. I'm the first to admit that I'm no virtuoso. I can't play like Segovia. The flip side of that is that Segovia could probably never have played like me.
My favorite player to watch over the last 5 years or so has been Russell Westbrook and I’ve never been particularly shy about that. I also struggle with objectivity when describing his game/ because I don’t think that an “objective” description of what Russell Westbrook has meant to Oklahoma City has to be a bullet point list of what Russell Westbrook is not. You don’t know how long you’ll get the opportunity to watch a player. Players have off the field issues, they get injured, and they decide to retire early. For every Tim Duncan whose prime lasted for what seemed like an eternity, there’s a long list of players like Gilbert Arenas, Brandon Roy and Greg Oden who had primes that ended early or never really began. I’m not going to waste time being unappreciative of what Westbrook does.
Russell Westbrook began his career with an impressive ironman streak for the Thunder, playing every game from when he was first drafted in 2008 until the 2013 NBA Playoffs when he was injured as a result of an aggressive defensive play by Patrick Beverly. Right before the next season began, Russell Westbrook was had a second setback and a second knee surgery.
The second knee surgery was the first time I was worried about Westbrook’s career. Was that the end of great performances? Russell Westbrook once carried the Thunder to a triple overtime victory in the playoffs against the Grizzlies. During the third overtime, he ran up the court as if the game just started, with seemingly unlimited energy. Did you know that Russell Westbrook has the Thunder’s playoff scoring record? He put up 43 points against the juggernaut Miami Heat in the 2012 NBA Finals.
After the second knee surgery in 2013, he was projected to miss an extended portion of the season. He came back after 2 games. Not only did he come back early, but he was as explosive as he ever was. When I went back home to New York for Christmas, my siblings and I went to Madison Square Garden to watch Russ versus the Knicks. My sister didn’t appreciate me cheering for Russell against an overmatched Knicks team on his way to a triple double. He got the triple double in three quarters. He sat for the 4th quarter because Scott Brooks had mercy on the Knicks.
What I didn’t know was that Westbrook was playing that game on a bum knee that he injured in the game before. 2 days later, Westbrook underwent arthroscopic surgery, his 3rd knee surgery in less than 9 months. Meanwhile, Derrick Rose, who was drafted 3 spots before Westbrook in the 2008 NBA Draft, also had multiple knee surgeries and did not look the same as he did when he was at his prime MVP level. It wasn’t clear whether Westbrook would suffer the same fate.
The answer still isn’t clear, but right now the Thunder don’t have the option to rest Westbrook. Kevin Durant is out with an injury and the Thunder’s success depends almost entirely on Russell Westbrook. The Thunder need everything that Westbrook has to offer, because they are currently the 8th seed in an extremely competitive Western Conference. Westbrook has taken on the challenge. Before this season, Westbrook produced a total of eight career triple doubles. Since the beginning of 2015, War Machine has had ten of them including 4 consecutive triple doubles. Westbrook’s play alternates between benevolent Prometheus bringing fire to mankind and Heath Ledger’s Joker watching the world burn.
People can complain about what Wesbtrook is. Point guards need to pass more. Point guards need to get their teammates involved. Point guards can’t play like Russell Westbrook. Meanwhile, Joker Westbrook is breezing by your team’s defenders while cackling out of the side of a speeding car. This Vine of Russell Westbrook shut down Twitter. People struggled for descriptions of what happened.
Russell had a nice dunk… No, that’s not right.
Russell had a fastbreak dunk?
Russell created a fastbreak?
Then after analyzing the tape like it was the Zapruder film, people started noticing more things. Russell Westbrook, on an inbound pass ran court to court, ran past all 5 Philadelphia players including two of them who were already in the on the other side of the court when the play started. He did it so fast that the entire play was encapsulated in a Vine which can only be six seconds or less. The right handed Westbrook only dribbled 5 times down the length of the court and did it with his left hand. Ish Smith, a player known for his speed, was one of the Sixers who Russell left in his dust. 2 days before this play, Westbrook had facial surgery after having a bone in his cheek accidentally kicked in, leaving a dent in his face. Russ did all of this while dribbling a basketball. The referee also lost the race to the basket. The announcer didn’t even catch on to what happened until it was too late. He jumped from the dotted line. Nine feet later he has an explosive dunk.
All of his intensity doesn’t just benefit Westbrook. Russell Westbrook has been criticized for not passing enough. The criticism is largely meritless. He’s averaged a decent amount of assists for a point guard, despite playing with a ball dominant player in Kevin Durant who also has a high usage rate. Before this season his career high for assists was 16. In 2015, he’s met or exceeded that career high 4 times. This season, Russell Westbrook has been fourth in assists per game. Even Russell Westbrook can be Prometheus, bringing fire to others. To those who would argue that Prometheus didn’t bring fire to humanity, he stole it from the gods, Russell Westbrook is also second in steals per game.
One of the things that has aided Westbrook is the addition of Enes Kanter. Kanter is a flawed player and that’s why he was deemed expendable by the Utah Jazz. However, unlike everyone else on the Thunder he understands his role as a frontcourt player isn’t merely to take jump shots. Big Men have to get to the hoop. Over the last few years a lot of plays have ended with Russell Westbrook slashing to the rim and passing the ball to Serge Ibaka. Serge would shoot an elbow jumper or a three pointer with varying levels of success. Kanter is an old-school offensive center. When Kanter gets the ball 17 feet from the rim, he’s driving to the hoop. Kanter and Westbrook are an amazing offensive combination.
Westbrook has been leaving teams scrambling for answers this month. 17 of 17 free throws against the Hawks. 49 points and 15 rebounds against the Sixers. 43 points and 8 rebounds in a loss against Coach Thibideau’s Bulls on the 5th. Buy more Gasoline. 36 points and 11 rebounds in a 9 point win against the Bulls. 36 points and 5 steals against Boston. The only game where he didn’t score 20 points this month was on Sunday when he had 17 assists against the Heat. He’s led the Thunder to a 7-3 record.
Despite the fact that Russell Westbrook averages more points, assists, steals and rebounds than either James Harden or Stephen Curry, the only MVP award Russell will have in 2015 is the All Star MVP he won in February. That’s fine. He’ll be setting fire to a court near you.
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