Russell Westbrook Is Changing The Definition Of "Normal"

<p>I can do all things through&nbsp;Russell&nbsp;Westbrook.</p>

Friday, December 9th 2016, 5:13 am

By: News 9


I can do all things through Russell Westbrook.

That's what we're in the middle of. A New Testament.

Only 17 times has a baseball player hit for the Triple Crown. Only 12 horses have ran for it.

Nobody in the NBA has ever finished the season with the league lead in scoring, rebounds, and assists. As we all know by now, only once has an NBA player (Oscar Robertson in 1961-62) averaged a triple-double.

More than likely, Russ will not finish with the league lead in rebounds per game and he shouldn't. He's nearly four whole rebounds on average behind the league leader (Hassan Whiteside, 14.7). He's four tenths of a point behind Anthony Davis for the league lead in points per game and only one tenth of a point behind Friday night opponent James Harden for the assists per game lead.

Everybody in the Thunder organization will tell you nobody, especially Russ, cares at all about anything I just wrote, though. Even Steven Adams says this six-game stretch by Russ is just Russ being Russ. It's no big thing. Just another day at the office. How can this be just another day at the office when it's ever only been done once before?

Russell Westbrook is The Great Wave off Kanagawa, engorging everything in front, behind, and to the sides. He's ready to break over and swallow up the basketball, the defense, the rim, the entire arena.

But most everybody is nervous about when he finally runs ashore. Yes, everything must end but that's taking the long view of it. The long season will end at some point and at some point in the long season, Russ will lose energy, separating into molecules on the beach as people scurry around in the sand.

But you got to take it one game at a time. There's a reason that's the most well-known sports cliché. Russ gets to crash into his bed every night (which I'm sure is luxurious with, like, a thousand Egyptian threads) because we do not live in a 500-word metaphor.

Yes, Russ is only human but maybe all he needs is a good night's rest to get ready to go play, whether it's his third game in nine days or part two of a back-to-back. The fact he's playing the way he is right now on regular, short, and long rest is what makes what he's doing seem so much more than human, though.

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