Ugly loss but

[kbrury]

Free throws and TOs lost us the game. Perimeter shooting also had a hand in it(oh and some officiating). As ST has a meltdown I liked some things in this game even though the loss makes me sick to my stomach.

Defense was good it didn't look like it in the first half but they put it together at the end of the game.

Jefferson, Ive been defending him but I honestly think coming off the bench would be so much better. Im frustrated but I think its the best thing for the team. His D was good against Pierce though

Blair, Just start him it doesn't look good on paper with Duncan but lets just see how it goes. Mcdyess lost some of that magic we saw earlier and he might better off the bench as well. At least more minutes if he can't start.

Duncan, TOs were bad but he's amazing, I'd like to see more jumpers and less post offense.

Parker, saw flashes of his old self but still looks like hes not fully there. I think he is getting there though.

Ginobili, I don't what happend to him at the end of the game but he was terrible at one point and good at another. Still getting in shape I guess.

All in all defense is getting there, we have seen this season what the offense can do just have to learn how to do it conisistenly. Lets get a win against Denver!

[Budkin]

Seriously... we hit a few more free throws we probably win. Considering that most of the team played pretty badly I take that as a good sign. All you quitters that are ready to leave need to GTFO now.

[Quiet Strength]

I agree about starting blair. They have energy coming off the bench but they dont have energy to start games... Blair can take care of that.

[kbrury]

Seriously... we hit a few more free throws we probably win. Considering that most of the team played pretty badly I take that as a good sign. All you quitters that are ready to leave need to GTFO now.

Yeah this Boston has been playing really well as of late like, and we held them way below thier scoring average and had a chance to win at the end of the game. Spurs are still a work in progress and we saw some potential that could end up very well.

[HarlemHeat37]

moral victories don't count in the standings..

[robert1886]

Agree some good positives out of this game..I liked our defense. Just too many missed oppurtunities.

[SanAntonioSpurs23]

Why the Spurs didn't play Ratliff at all I will never know. He could guard KG better than Bonner for spot minutes.

[kbrury]

I agree about starting blair. They have energy coming off the bench but they dont have energy to start games... Blair can take care of that.

Yeah best trait that Blair gives is energy, starting 5 really need it. Not that good of a comparison but when Vince Young started in Ten he gave the team energy(Alongside more carries for CJ) but still we need a spark, and Blair seems to be that.

[Mugen]

Why the Spurs didn't play Ratliff at all I will never know. He could guard KG better than Bonner for spot minutes.

meh defense wasnt the problem.

[Quiet Strength]

Why the Spurs didn't play Ratliff at all I will never know. He could guard KG better than Bonner for spot minutes.

A blind kid on a wheelchair could guard kg better than bonner but yeah ratliff should have played.

[androck]

2-16 from 3PT lost us the game. We could overcome the refs, turnovers (though they were abysmal), and poor FT shooting if we made just one more 3 (or if Finley didn't step out of bounds).

[kbrury]

moral victories don't count in the standings..

They do for a team, well I hope for the Spurs they do at least.

[EricB]

Leave the starting 5 alone.

[Budkin]

moral victories don't count in the standings..

They do for the overall progress of the team though over the course of the season.

[kbrury]

Leave the starting 5 alone.

Yeah I don't mind just give Blair more minutes, either way just need more energy is the main thing.

[easy7]

Turnovers are killing the Spurs. They can't expect to beat the elite teams of the league having 14+ turnovers in a game. Denver will rape the Spurs if the same rate of turnovers happen against them. :depressed

[mexicanjunior]

Yeah, I'm sure this game was a real confidence builder...

[kbrury]

Turnovers are killing the Spurs. They can't expect to beat the elite teams of the league having 14+ turn overs in a game. Denver will rape the Spurs if the same rate of turn overs happen against them. :depressed

Actually Spurs are one of the best at not turning it over, tonight was an aberration especially when Duncan has 6.

[024]

i'm actually surprised this wasn't a blowout lost as i expected. spurs put up a fight near the end but couldn't completely turn the momentum that was against them for three quarters. these slow starts are getting pretty annoying though. good showing by blair to pick up the scoring load but either jefferson or ginobili needs to score over 15 points for spurs to meaningfully compete. today neither did and the spurs lost despite some good defense.

it's too early to start mcdyess. wait until near the playoffs to do that. and ratliff's shotblocking isn't as important since the celtics don't have speedy guards that drive in for layups. blair starting at center may be a good experiment to run this early in the season. it would give him a boost in confidence and determine if he can contribute in the playoffs. bonner melted under the pressure as expected and i think the celtics dared bonner to beat them. popovich should also be forcing the spurs to shoot 500 free throws a day if that's what it takes to win.

[VBM]

Moral victories...that's Clipper-fan talk

[crc21209]

Turnovers, turnovers, and turnovers. That's the Spurs main problem right now. Turnovers are fucking killing them. If they only turn the ball over about 5-8 times tonight they win the game....

[kbrury]

Moral victories...that's Clipper-fan talk

I actually never said moral victories I just thought there were some things that worked well and things that we could tweak. Im pretty sure everyone agrees with me that Blair needs to at least get some more min so we can see what he gives us.

[spursnatic]

Still after this game, seeing how close it was makes you feel good moving forward?....Boston is one of the best teams in the league....And if wee would've hit a few shots in the end, it could've went a totally different way...No reason for anyone to start threads; trade Manu, trade Duncan, trade Jefferson.......

[sabar]

Another sloppy game with a massive amount of turnovers.

If we showed up for the first quarter we would have had a great chance at winning.

[SenorSpur]

Turnovers, turnovers, and turnovers. That's the Spurs main problem right now. Turnovers are fucking killing them. If they only turn the ball over about 5-8 times tonight they win the game....

And it's not necessarily the reserves, but the starters killed the team with 4 straight turnovers in the first quarter. Tony, Duncan, RJ, Bogans - all of them got into the act.

Besides the careless turnovers, the Celtics are team with active hands. Rondo is a downright thief. Those guys do a good job of slapping away at the ball, coming up your blind side or laying back looking to swipe lazy passes.

The Spurs just played right into their hands with their carelessness.

[ulosturedge]

We played sloppy basketball and still gave ourselves a chance to win at the end. It is one game shrug it off.

[SpurCharger]

Take Dejuan Blair Free Points and we hit a few free throws its a win.... Our Stars Played with no Urgency, No Hype...... Our bench such as Blair, Hill, And Yes Bonner came in with some energy...

[ClingingMars]

Leave the starting 5 alone.

Fuck that, Bonner can't do shit on defense, and it ain't his fault either. He just wasn't gifted with the athletic ability to play post D. Start Blair.

[024]

to add to this, i like how the spurs rebounded well, a 55-32 advantage when going against a frontcourt of garnett, perkins, and wallace. a number of factors contributed to the loss but the spurs needed to fix either their free point shooting, 3pt shooting, or turnovers against elite teams. that should be doable in the next few months. defense was adequate and rebounding was excellent. hopefully spurs go nowhere but up now.

[Quiet Strength]

Fuck that, Bonner can't do shit on defense, and it ain't his fault either. He just wasn't gifted with the athletic ability to play post D. Start Blair.

Isn't bonner coming off the bench?

[kbrury]

Fuck that, Bonner can't do shit on defense, and it ain't his fault either. He just wasn't gifted with the athletic ability to play post D. Start Blair.

Actually Dice started but he didn't contribute much either.

[pjjrfan]

Leave the starting 5 alone.
I agree, I think McDyess will eventually gain his consistency, and I don't want Jefferson anywhere near the 2nd unit. I think Manu, Hill, Blair and Bonner bring in energy, scoring, and some hardnosed defense and rebounding. If anything, I'm for bringing back Finley or Mason for Jefferson. And I really have advocated having Finley as the 12th man but maybe that would suit the highly paid Jefferson better, at least it will keep him off the floor.

[mexicanjunior]

Fuck that, Bonner can't do shit on defense, and it ain't his fault either. He just wasn't gifted with the athletic ability to play post D. Start Blair.

Bonner doesn't start...it wasn't his fault that they lost tonight either but his horrendous defense and poor shooting didn't help.

[Ditty]

for some reason we cant make free throws for crap playing at home against the celtics last year we blew the game cuz we missed like 6 free throws in a row im really proud of our effort and the future looks bright the rest of them month lets go get denver

[kbrury]

My main point in this thread is Energy, Blair had 10 times more energy then anyone on the team. Just need to somehow provide a spark.

[crc21209]

And it's not necessarily the reserves, but the starters killed the team with 4 straight turnovers in the first quarter. Tony, Duncan, RJ, Bogans - all of them got into the act.

Besides the careless turnovers, the Celtics are team with active hands. Rondo is a downright thief. Those guys do a good job of slapping away at the ball, coming up your blind side or laying back looking to swipe lazy passes.

The Spurs just played right into their hands with their carelessness.

Exactly. But the Spurs should know that from the get go....they should know that the Celtics are a very active team on the defensive end with their hands. The Spurs should know this and not throw such lazy passes or put the ball on the floor with 2 or 3 Celtics around them all the time...

[HarlemHeat37]

energy players always make a huge difference..that's why I've wanted a Blair-Hill-Hairston bench rotation since I saw them play together in SL and preseason..it makes a big difference when your guys are everywhere on the floor, driving to the basket, playing tough inside, hustling..

it's better than guys that only do one thing floor and don't have the balls to get dirty..sadly our team has 5 or 6 of those guys in the rotation at this moment..

[kbrury]

Did I mention this loss made me sick to my stomach lol, Im expecting another tough game from Denver.

[ffadicted]

moral victories don't count in the standings..

Regular season championships don't count there Phoenix

[Austin_Toros]

Note: Bogans had a +/- of -16

[Stringer_Bell]

I have no idea why everyone starts threads that do nothing but bitch when a loss such as this isn't nearly the collapse everyone is making it seem. There's always things to learn from every game.

The Spurs don't give up, they keep fighting and Pop still draws up great plays out of timeouts that we hit the majority of the time.

Defense was good, turnovers were OUTRAGEOUS, and yet we hung in there.

The problem is the same as last season, scoring droughts. Someone tell us how to fix that (other than trading RJ)!

[ducks]

turnovers killed the spurs
not scoring droughts

[Quiet Strength]

turnovers killed the spurs
not scoring droughts

Missed free throws killed the spurs too

[Sean Cagney]

2-16 from 3PT lost us the game. We could overcome the refs, turnovers (though they were abysmal), and poor FT shooting if we made just one more 3 (or if Finley didn't step out of bounds).

We can't just rely on the threes falling to win games, thats not going to lose it or win it, it's the TO's and missed FT's that lost this game. The first Q energy too got us, if we don't fall behind ten or so early we win these games, they continue to do that though on TV.

[Sean Cagney]

Take Dejuan Blair Free Points and we hit a few free throws its a win.... Our Stars Played with no Urgency, No Hype...... Our bench such as Blair, Hill, And Yes Bonner came in with some energy...

Bonner was bad on D but he had some good boards and did try hard, his shot not falling but he was not the reason we lost tonight! Getting down early like they do and missed FT's and TO's lost it, period.

[kbrury]

We can't just rely on the threes falling to win games, thats not going to lose it or win it, it's the TO's and missed FT's that lost this game. The first Q energy too got us, if we don't fall behind ten or so early we win these games, they continue to do that though on TV.

Agreed, first quarter got us into a bad position for the rest of the game.

[Avitus1]

Why no one likes to lose I think it was a good loss... we'll get em in Boston.

[LOL@MavsFan]

Dont make excuses. The better team won. Fuck that "officiating sucked" bullshit. Spurs lost, the Celtics didnt...they are the better team...RIGHT NOW...I look at the positive. I wish I could say RJ made me think eventually things would be ok...it wasn't him...wasnt Hill...wasn't McGhost...it was Blair...Pop should have played this dude the whole game. He was on the whole night and brought the team back on the 1st half with his hustle. Parker wont always play horrible....neither will the rest of the big 3. I am pissed about the loss, but you know what I am excited about our young players. GO SPURS GO!

[LOL@MavsFan]

Why no one likes to lose I think it was a good loss... we'll get em in Boston.

I hate the "good loss" cliche, but you know what I actually agree.

[Höfner]

did I just see the Beast freeze McDyess' ass to the bench?

[siraulo23]

is it just me, or has blair been solid for the past 3 or so games defensively on the post
his pick and roll d is not there yet, but ive been really impressed with his post defense

[HarlemHeat37]

His D has kept improving since the beginning of the season..definitely a good sign..

[SpursNextRomanEmpire]

I do agree about starting Blair, he has so much passion. Did you see the way he smiled as he ran up the court after making shots? It looked just like when he was at Pitt. And I also agree that Parker did show some good signs.

[murpjf88]

Seriously... we hit a few more free throws we probably win. Considering that most of the team played pretty badly I take that as a good sign. All you quitters that are ready to leave need to GTFO now.
I hope you don't look as stupid as you sound. The spurs SUCK at the free throw line. The spurs can't let it come down to free throws because they will lose the game every time. Another reason to be worried.