Offensive Woes, & The PnR Defense

[Roger Freemason Jr.]

It's no secret that the Spurs are struggling to find a reliable source of offense early in this season. Parker and Duncan can still get hot, and carry the team, but for the most part, the ball isn't moving well out there, and there is plenty of indecision. A small sample is five games of course, but what would you attribute the Spurs' early season offensive woes to? Rust? Line-ups? NBA teams revamping their defenses?

Also, this may be personal opinion, but I've seen some pretty bad PnR defense from the Spurs so far. I know you live with jump shots for the most part, but teams have been lighting the Spurs up off of the PnR.

I just wanted to read about what you guys think about these two things in particular.

[BillMc]

On the offensive side, I think Pop is trying new things with Leonard, Green, Diaw, Patty and Marco. We know what we can do with Duncan and Parker, but he's using the early season to try to new sets and new line-ups and see what works.

The weak PnR defense worries me a little more.

[Chinook]

Duncan will only become a worse PnR defender as he ages. Teams will continue to exploit that. The Spurs will just have to live with it. At least Splitter is tremendous in that regard and Diaw AMD Ayers are both capable there.

[DPG21920]

Ayers looks terrible all around IMO.

[playblair]

cojo deserves the back up pg spot ................... cojo initiates the offense ...............................

[HI-FI]

cojo deserves the back up pg spot ................... cojo initiates the offense ...............................

now that is a sig.

[benstanfield]

Kawhi is still getting back into form. Remember, he took a bunch of time off during the offseason to get that knee fully healed. 12 and 6 is what he gave us last year and he's picked up right there. Now he has all season to improve.

I will say that his decision making and the plays that have been called for him are confusing. The pump-fake from 3 dribble pull-up for a long 2 is one of the stupidest shots I've seen a Spur consistently take and not be corrected. Who knows, they probably are correcting him. But it's just baaad basketball. Also his post-up possessions have been really strange to me in that they only seem to be called against the worst possible match-ups. IIRC Denver had Andre Miller on Kawhi for at least a few stretches and we never seemed to acknowledge and exploit it. But then it seemed like we posted up Kawhi at least semi-consistently against guys like Wes Johnson and Batum.

I think developing a post game will be important for Kawhi to become a dominant player, but for him just to be an All-Star I would say hitting open threes will be more important. It really doesn't look like he is confident in his jumper now, but I never seem to recall Kawhi shying away from open threes when the arc on his shot was flat as a table. I think they are just tinkering with his game perhaps.

[Obstructed_View]

Don't really care, tbh. This isn't the time of year where it's critical that the Spurs be playing their best basketball. I'll take a .800 winning percentage while they try to figure themselves out.

[Johnny RIngo]

Ayers looks terrible all around IMO.

I'm still not sure what this guy did to deserve 2 mil/year. Horrid basketball player.

[sananspursfan21]

Don't really care, tbh. This isn't the time of year where it's critical that the Spurs be playing their best basketball. I'll take a .800 winning percentage while they try to figure themselves out.

Even against that level of competition? That's what concerns me a little.

[spurraider21]

i couldn't care less how bad Timmy's PnR defense get, because once he leaves, the spurs aren't going to be relevant anymore

[cd021]

cojo deserves the back up pg spot ................... cojo initiates the offense ...............................

I do believe, I'm in love with your signature.

[racm]

The offense isn't clicking as usual because it isn't just the Big 3 doing their thing while everyone else just catches and shoots. They're using up a fair number of possessions on having Kawhi try and create his own shot, and Diaw isn't deferring as much. At least Manu is playing much better though.

On defense... The Spurs haven't played their lockdown tandem of TD and Splitter as much as they should, mainly because 3 of their last 5 opponents are small-ball advocates.

[tenbeersbold]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wofh-VHhz28
now that is a sig.

Sum more from the Spider-Man body painter...enjoy

[HI-FI]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wofh-VHhz28

Sum more from the Spider-Man body painter...enjoy

:tu

[Roger Freemason Jr.]

My thread veered towards that painted ass, and I'm more than okay with that.

:tu

[Obstructed_View]

Even against that level of competition? That's what concerns me a little.

We've seen it in the past that the close losses are the ones you think about when a tie-breaker situation comes up. At this stage in the season, all I care about is that they're winning, not really how they do it. If they're a bad team, they won't make the playoffs. If they're playing great basketball right now, it doesn't really matter if they struggle in the postseason. If you're the Spurs, you have to figure out how to go into the postseason with some extra home games playing your best ball and being healthy. For now, getting Ws is all that matters. Nobody's going to ask how they did it six months from now.