The lineup to try to tie the game is proof pop is an average x and o guy

[apalisoc_9]

Parker having a decent game..out
Kawhi with crazy shooting gravity out

The alternative was Ginobili-Green-Mills who where all not even playing better today. Its just mind boggling how a guy like pop can be so poor at x and o...

Classic case of overcoaching from pop.

[ElNono]

I don't even know why we were not going to LMA who was killing it the last 2 mins, instead of Mills and Danny bricks...

[ChumpDumper]

lol applesauce

[Mnky]

He didn't care about the win. Seeding ain't changing.

This thread is proof of below average poster.

[apalisoc_9]

I don't even know why we were not going to LMA who was killing it the last 2 mins, instead of Mills and Danny bricks...

This should have been a classi Aldridge game...just look at their bigs. Zeller, kaminsky, jefferson, haws.

I think the strong start with a heavy emphasis on the PnR set the to e of the offense and the team went with it in the 4th.

[ezau]

Should've just let all the bench players play if he's just going to tank.

[GSH]

Four Spurs starters score 19,18,16, and 15. And they can't score 91 points in OT?

They got up by 23 early, and lost focus. Charlotte stepped up the intensity, and the Spurs never matched it. They napped through most of the second half. The game didn't get lost in the last 2 minutes.

[Budkin]

Parker having a decent game..out
Kawhi with crazy shooting gravity out

The alternative was Ginobili-Green-Mills who where all not even playing better today. Its just mind boggling how a guy like pop can be so poor at x and o...

Classic case of overcoaching from pop.

Pop seemed like he wanted the loss or something.

[dabom]

Pop is the worst X's and O's guy in the last minute of the fourth quarter. I never expect a 3 point shot to ever go in. He usually just dumps it to someone to bail him out.

[Baseline21]

Yeah, pop wasn't all their for coaching. He subbed out Kawhi late in the 4th like at the 5 minute mark when he just brought him back in @ 8min mark. I was confused on that part because him and LMA came back in at the 8mins mark at the same time. Kawhi wasn't in any foul trouble, too. I don't know if he noticed he was tired or something but it was weird. Kawhi never gets subbed out after he just got subbed in the 4th. When he and LMA come in the 4th that's the close out time, unless foul trouble. Also I was pissed when they weren't feeding LMA down the stretch. I was pissed at him to pass up a jumper and kick it out to green for a 3 because I want Kawhi or LMA shooting before anyone, even if green is open.

[midnightpulp]

Pop has always been a brilliant Xs and Os guy on the defensive end. The Spurs have a ridiculous number of defensive innovations to their credit: Funnelling penetrators into bigs (this sounds common sensical now, but before Pop, perimeter defenders would just matchup and try to stay in front of their assignment, playground style. You'll never see Scottie Pippen or Joe Dumars direct their matchup to a specific area of the court, like Bowen used to do and now how Kawhi and Danny Green are doing) forcing teams to shoot inefficient midrange 2s (pre-Pop, teams used to scheme to stop the midrange jumper), sacrificing offense rebounds to better defend the fast break, encouraging shot blockers to go straight up rather than leap toward a shooter, etc, etc.

He was just "average" in the first half of the 10s on the offense side. 4 down and not much else. I think he evolved during the height of the SSOL Suns era. Since those '05-'08 Suns were likely to be the Spurs largest Conference obstacle, Pop really went into the tank and retweaked the offense. And we saw the results. Pop beat D'Antoni (a noted brilliant offensive coach) at his own game in 3 straight playoff matchups.

I disagree with Apa, and think Pop is a briiliant Xs and Os guy in every facet, but he often doesn't brilliantly apply it in game, and does head-scratchingly stupid shit at the wrong times (The truth about 6 wasn't Parker's performance, Kawhi or Manu's missed FTs, or even Pop's decision to sit Duncan, which was the right play since Duncan can't close on shooters. It was going with that terrible lineup (he subbed out Kawhi and Duncan for Splitter and Green, who were both having terrible games. Green at that time wasn't as important defensively as he is currently. Kawhi should've never came out of the game as long as James was in) in last minute of the 3rd/start of the 4th when the Spurs were up 12 and Miami was in desperation mode, still playing all of their big guns. Kawhi and Duncan leave. Miami predictably goes on a run.

Pop also plays favorites too much. We've seen it with past-his-prime Michael Finley, Matt Bonner, Keith Bogans, Gary Neal (got way too many minutes in the 2012 OKC series), and post-2011 Tony Parker (I get trusting your PG, but Tony really should've been shutdown for last year's playoffs. He obviously wasn't healthy/in shape).

And his refusal to foul in the closing seconds of a game when up 3 will always drive me bonkers (I don't care what happened when he tried it in that Detroit game. It's the net positive play over trying to "man up" and defend the 3).

[dabom]

I always laugh at Pop calling a timeout to stop the bleeding and stays with shitter. :lmao

[dabom]

Pop is shit in last minute plays off of timeouts too. :lmao

[midnightpulp]

I always laugh at Pop calling a timeout to stop the bleeding and stays with shitter. :lmao

And "resting" Manu in game 1 of a playoff series will always boggle my mind. I'm of course referring to the 2011 Memphis debacle. Manu was ready to play, despite being banged up, but Pop tried to get cute, and it cost us a crucial game at home, which the Spurs never recovered from.

And in '08, he went with Ime Udoka/Corpse of Michael Finley way too fuckin' long in Game 1 of the WCF. And predictably, Kirby went off and basically erased that 20 point lead we had by himself. Bowen was +18 in that game. Finley was -21.

[Spurtacular]

OP should kill himself (metaphorically speaking).

[Thomas82]

Pop has always been a brilliant Xs and Os guy on the defensive end. The Spurs have a ridiculous number of defensive innovations to their credit: Funnelling penetrators into bigs (this sounds common sensical now, but before Pop, perimeter defenders would just matchup and try to stay in front of their assignment, playground style. You'll never see Scottie Pippen or Joe Dumars direct their matchup to a specific area of the court, like Bowen used to do and now how Kawhi and Danny Green are doing) forcing teams to shoot inefficient midrange 2s (pre-Pop, teams used to scheme to stop the midrange jumper), sacrificing offense rebounds to better defend the fast break, encouraging shot blockers to go straight up rather than leap toward a shooter, etc, etc.

He was just "average" in the first half of the 10s on the offense side. 4 down and not much else. I think he evolved during the height of the SSOL Suns era. Since those '05-'08 Suns were likely to be the Spurs largest Conference obstacle, Pop really went into the tank and retweaked the offense. And we saw the results. Pop beat D'Antoni (a noted brilliant offensive coach) at his own game in 3 straight playoff matchups.

I disagree with Apa, and think Pop is a briiliant Xs and Os guy in every facet, but he often doesn't brilliantly apply it in game, and does head-scratchingly stupid shit at the wrong times (The truth about 6 wasn't Parker's performance, Kawhi or Manu's missed FTs, or even Pop's decision to sit Duncan, which was the right play since Duncan can't close on shooters. It was going with that terrible lineup (he subbed out Kawhi and Duncan for Splitter and Green, who were both having terrible games. Green at that time wasn't as important defensively as he is currently. Kawhi should've never came out of the game as long as James was in) in last minute of the 3rd/start of the 4th when the Spurs were up 12 and Miami was in desperation mode, still playing all of their big guns. Kawhi and Duncan leave. Miami predictably goes on a run.

Pop also plays favorites too much. We've seen it with past-his-prime Michael Finley, Matt Bonner, Keith Bogans, Gary Neal (got way too many minutes in the 2012 OKC series), and post-2011 Tony Parker (I get trusting your PG, but Tony really should've been shutdown for last year's playoffs. He obviously wasn't healthy/in shape).

And his refusal to foul in the closing seconds of a game when up 3 will always drive me bonkers (I don't care what happened when he tried it in that Detroit game. It's the net positive play over trying to "man up" and defend the 3).

+1

[BG_Spurs_Fan]

And "resting" Manu in game 1 of a playoff series will always boggle my mind. I'm of course referring to the 2011 Memphis debacle. Manu was ready to play, despite being banged up, but Pop tried to get cute, and it cost us a crucial game at home, which the Spurs never recovered from.


WTF? Manu had a broken elbow/arm from the Suns game, in fact he shouldn't have played at all in this series.

[apalisoc_9]

Not fouling up 3 is my way to go. I 100% support that decision. If you dont foul, the worst thing that could happen is a tie game. If you foul, you put yourself in a position to possible lose the game after a rebound on a second free throw. I just think that with the time available on that game and the free throw shooters they had..some of them very average..its was a legit possibility to see them lose that lead.

[houston spurs fan]

Bandwagon trolling per par. Nothing to see here...

[houston spurs fan]

Pop has always been a brilliant Xs and Os guy on the defensive end. The Spurs have a ridiculous number of defensive innovations to their credit: Funnelling penetrators into bigs (this sounds common sensical now, but before Pop, perimeter defenders would just matchup and try to stay in front of their assignment, playground style. You'll never see Scottie Pippen or Joe Dumars direct their matchup to a specific area of the court, like Bowen used to do and now how Kawhi and Danny Green are doing) forcing teams to shoot inefficient midrange 2s (pre-Pop, teams used to scheme to stop the midrange jumper), sacrificing offense rebounds to better defend the fast break, encouraging shot blockers to go straight up rather than leap toward a shooter, etc, etc.

He was just "average" in the first half of the 10s on the offense side. 4 down and not much else. I think he evolved during the height of the SSOL Suns era. Since those '05-'08 Suns were likely to be the Spurs largest Conference obstacle, Pop really went into the tank and retweaked the offense. And we saw the results. Pop beat D'Antoni (a noted brilliant offensive coach) at his own game in 3 straight playoff matchups.

I disagree with Apa, and think Pop is a briiliant Xs and Os guy in every facet, but he often doesn't brilliantly apply it in game, and does head-scratchingly stupid shit at the wrong times (The truth about 6 wasn't Parker's performance, Kawhi or Manu's missed FTs, or even Pop's decision to sit Duncan, which was the right play since Duncan can't close on shooters. It was going with that terrible lineup (he subbed out Kawhi and Duncan for Splitter and Green, who were both having terrible games. Green at that time wasn't as important defensively as he is currently. Kawhi should've never came out of the game as long as James was in) in last minute of the 3rd/start of the 4th when the Spurs were up 12 and Miami was in desperation mode, still playing all of their big guns. Kawhi and Duncan leave. Miami predictably goes on a run.

Pop also plays favorites too much. We've seen it with past-his-prime Michael Finley, Matt Bonner, Keith Bogans, Gary Neal (got way too many minutes in the 2012 OKC series), and post-2011 Tony Parker (I get trusting your PG, but Tony really should've been shutdown for last year's playoffs. He obviously wasn't healthy/in shape).

And his refusal to foul in the closing seconds of a game when up 3 will always drive me bonkers (I don't care what happened when he tried it in that Detroit game. It's the net positive play over trying to "man up" and defend the 3).
Great take Mid. OP obviously trolling but some of these other guys have no clue. Look at the full body of work....

[J_Paco]

I don't even know why we were not going to LMA who was killing it the last 2 mins, instead of Mills and Danny bricks...

Questionable play calling and rotation choices down the stretch by Pop, but every coach makes these sort of mistakes. This thread proves how idiotic the OP is and that even with 5 championships Popovich is still not fully appreciated. He's also never been nor will become infallible.

Duh........

[GSH]

I don't know how Pop keeps his job. Now that Holt isn't there to protect him, he's a fucking goner.

[midnightpulp]

WTF? Manu had a broken elbow/arm from the Suns game, in fact he shouldn't have played at all in this series.

I know that, but Manu stated he was good to go, and proved it by scoring 33 in game 2 and having a strong overall series.

[K...]

Who is a good x and o coach?

This is more a case of pop not caring to run plays. Not that he's a master, but I think he'd rather not run our best plays weeks away from the playoffs.

[YGWHI]

Who is a good x and o coach?

This is more a case of pop not caring to run plays. Not that he's a master, but I think he'd rather not run our best plays weeks away from the playoffs.

Not caring? Doesn't want to show his cards? Nah.

Pop's late games decisions have been very awful, he has been terrible in close games this and last seasons

[cd98]

LOL. Doesn't the five championships prove that Pop is an X and O guy?

[J_Paco]

LOL. Doesn't the five championships prove that Pop is an X and O guy?

Apparently, not.......

LMAO

Best offensive and defensive system in the NBA, yet not a "X's and O's" coach........

LOLOLOLOL

[cd98]

Apparently, not.......

LMAO

Best offensive and defensive system in the NBA, yet not a "X's and O's" coach........

LOLOLOLOL

Yes, but some here are certain to squash his legacy over narrowly losing a meaningless regular season game.