Game Thread: Spurs vs. Blazers (GUESTS) — SUN 4/3/2022 — 6:00pm CST

[MultiTroll]

DJ playing? Post ASAP.

Also Primo.

[Leetonidas]

1510325388353884172

Cant find anything from today but Murray is questionable. Hope he plays because i'm going to AT&T tonight and if he aint playing he will have missed both the games i managed to go to this year :lol

[KingKev]

Looks like we may see some Langford today

[exstatic]

1510325388353884172

Cant find anything from today but Murray is questionable. Hope he plays because i'm going to AT&T tonight and if he aint playing he will have missed both the games i managed to go to this year :lol

He was out Friday with an upper respiratory infection, non covid. Probably the same today.

[spurs10]

They can't sleep on this game. It's one they need, as the next four are against teams with winning records. Mavs and GSW will probably be duking it out until the end.

:flag:

[emanueldavidginobili]

1510739730874474511

[lefty20]

1510741262344855560

[Robz4000]

:lmao Spurs

[BatManu20]

Spurs down 15-2 and we’ll still win this by 15+ :lol

[lefty20]

RiP Play-in

[poopbox]

This team just doesn't make any sense. Can't decide if they are trying for the play in or tanking:downspin:

[poopbox]

How the fuck we get a 5 second violation :lol

[DAF86]

This team just doesn't make any sense. Can't decide if they are trying for the play in or tanking:downspin:

They are playing without the only two above average players they have, they aren't tanking, they just suck without Murray and Poeltl.

[Bojo]

I got zero doubt this will still be a blowout. We're not that impressive without Murray and Poeltl, but Portland is a new breed of terrible. Highly suspect they blew their load in the first minutes.

[Dejounte]

Primo comes up with either really good passes or the worst passes in the NBA. He’s gotta stop being obsessed with passing it inside or lead passes when there’s not a hint of daylight there. That’s some really bad basketball IQ on display.

[Robz4000]

Portland looks like they want this game way more.

[boutons_deux]

At introduction primo makes the sign of the cross with his left hand

Then he continues to pass the ball to the other team

[Barfunk]

Jam by Johnson. These aren't your cousin's Spurs!

[poopbox]

Lonnie has been so bad defensively in this game. I won't be sad to see him go

[Ocotillo]

It just occurred to me there was a chance it could have been Becky coaching the Blazers instead of Billups.

[BG_Spurs_Fan]

Blazers keep going at Lonnie and he provides wide open shots for anyone.

[bdictjames]

Just continue to play Spurs' ball, and it will right itself out. No need to make the run for the play-in interesting with a loss here. But then again, we are missing arguably 2 of our 3 best players.

[Dejounte]

Lonnie has been so bad defensively in this game. I won't be sad to see him go

There is no one who hurts the team more when he gives the other team these dumbass easy and-1’s. Kills the momentum and could have been avoided. Why foul when he’s right fucking there? Makes me pull my hair out.

[PhantomDashCam]

Fun fact - Tre Jones has more rebounds than KJ, Primo and Lonnie combined

[MultiTroll]

:lol Pops got his hands full with this Portland lineup.

Can't defend for the final 9 f-ing seconds. :depressed

[Thomas82]

I knew an L today was too good to be true.

[Ocotillo]

With Landale out, wondering if Cacok gets any run?

[MultiTroll]

I knew an L today was too good to be true.
:drunk:pop::drunk not so fast.

[Dejounte]

https://twitter.com/airlessjordan/status/1510779119792967680?s

[heyheymymy]

JR and Lonnie combined 2-11

[poopbox]

Another game where Lonnie is doing a bunch of nothing. Has this dude ever had 2 good games in a row in a spurs jersey ?

[heyheymymy]

before Lonnie went out with the back injury he was playing great

[Thomas82]

:drunk:pop::drunk not so fast.

You said what now?

[jjspur]

Dammit, with Poeltl and Murray out, Portland has a chance to steal a game. Sometime the spurs play well and sometimes they don't. When pop messes with the lineups just for grins (I'm not convinced that Poeltl & Murray are too sick or injured to play) It doesn't always end well. At least the lakers lost already. It would be nice if the spurs pulled one out, just to take the lakers even further back in the standings. Maybe the pelicans lose as well to make it even more interesting a race for the 9th and 10th spot.

[Dex]

I know the tank is floating right now, but this team is still fun to watch. Love seeing the confidence in guys like Johnson, Walker, Vassell, and Primo

[widowmaker]

Damn this game is getting chippy

[widowmaker]

Dammit, with Poeltl and Murray out, Portland has a chance to steal a game. Sometime the spurs play well and sometimes they don't. When pop messes with the lineups just for grins (I'm not convinced that Poeltl & Murray are too sick or injured to play) It doesn't always end well. At least the lakers lost already. It would be nice if the spurs pulled one out, just to take the lakers even further back in the standings. Maybe the pelicans lose as well to make it even more interesting a race for the 9th and 10th spot.



Portland aint got the sand.

[widowmaker]

Josh richardson is my favorite player right now.

[SPURt]

These Blazers are absolutely hopeless, yikes

[BackHome]

Come on the Blazers just definitely took a dive it was so obvious they not even trying to fake loosing

[widowmaker]

Keldon needs some horice grant goggles

[heyheymymy]

Zollins has a bit of a short fuse

[heyheymymy]

Zollins has that nice mid range

[heyheymymy]

JRich was such a steal been really impressed with what he brings

[Ocotillo]

Richardson has been short all night on his shots

[Dex]

JRich was such a steal been really impressed with what he brings

Not his best night tonight, but I still love the confidence he plays with

[heyheymymy]

lol Jrich's off night here looks like DW regular game tbh

what a steal

[widowmaker]

I hope J Rich sticks around at least 1 more year and see what it is after that.

[widowmaker]

Get vassel a masseuse right after the game work that knot out.

[heyheymymy]

yeah everyone is going unnecessarily hard for garbage time of a tank game

[widowmaker]

Its not going to be good for the spurs that they played a scrub team twice in a row and now going to denver.

[widowmaker]

They should get tre jones in with tony parker to hone in that teardrop shot.

[heyheymymy]

Drewbanks chatting with Poeltl and walker looks very friendly

[PhantomDashCam]

Tre Jones with a really nice game.

[lefty20]

Positive pt differential with a 33-45 record :lol

[heyheymymy]

Tre Jones 3PT shot looking like he's been working on it. I've been enjoying watching Tre get mins and I think he's been getting better with them.

[heyheymymy]

Are we saying Zollins was worth the wait yet?

[MultiTroll]

You said what now?
Spurs come thru as planned and Phoenix phucks me on a parlay. :depressed

[John B]

Zollins with solid 18, 13 and 2 assists in 31 minutes. He also looks bigger.

[John B]

They should get tre jones in with tony parker to hone in that teardrop shot.

I think he got the teardrop. The spin move to the basket would be the thing to learn, plus of course the 3pt shot

[Thomas82]

Spurs come thru as planned and Phoenix phucks me on a parlay. :depressed

Yeah, I knew the Spurs wouldn't lose today. Portland is not even trying to hide their tanking.

[jjspur]

Are we saying Zollins was worth the wait yet?
Yes he was worth the wait. Who knows maybe he makes the starting lineup next year. Its also possible we have better athletic trainers than Portland does, just to keep him healthy. Either way, he improved the team as a backup, something they didn't have last year - a decent young big.

[Ariel]

Yeah, I knew the Spurs wouldn't lose today. Portland is not even trying to hide their tanking.
It's so blatantly obvious they might as well go out to play in flip flops. I don't believe in karma, but I sure as hell wish them the worst of luck in the lottery.

[bdictjames]

Tre is a rare guard these days; a true NBA point guard. Him and his brother Tyus. Reminds me of Jacque Vaughn/Speedy Claxton in the early days. Spurs need to keep this guy.

[BackHome]

Are we saying Zollins was worth the wait yet?

Can't really tell this game was like playing a G League team

[BatManu20]

Are we saying Zollins was worth the wait yet?

You can’t base anything off of playing Portland’s G-League team. You throw away the tape and move on to a real NBA team.

[widowmaker]

They should get tre jones in with tony parker to hone in that teardrop shot.

[Dejounte]

https://youtu.be/jbEHMMhvhz4

man is a sharpshooter. Best shooter on the team and that’s nuts

[SASdynasty!]

They should get tre jones in with tony parker to hone in that teardrop shot.
Indeed

[PhantomDashCam]

Ok so who had the Bizzarro Spurs Bingo at the start of the year:

- Keldon Johnson becoming the team's best shooter
- Lonnie Walker still on the team ahead of Derrick White and Bryn Forbes
- Zach Collins playing this year and contributing meaningful backup minutes
- KBD almost single-handedly shutting down Staples Centre
- Josh Primo playing and starting down the stretch of "must win" games
- Tre Jones hitting multiple three pointers in the one game and leading the team in +/- with a +28

Crazy but true - When you think the Spurs top 2 offensive players were both drafted 29, the fact we have 3 picks higher than that should put a smile on even the most pessimistic Spurs fan.

[heyheymymy]

That's fair, it's pretty hard to extrapolate against blazers embarrassing display but I've been liking Zollins progress up to this point and that's beyond just these blazers games. Nothing crazy or anything and really basically still just Zollins getting into game shape and learning sets mostly but if I'm not reading too much into it I really like the potential and am watching closely going forward hoping for the best.

[emanueldavidginobili]

Yeah Keldon shot is legit, I am shocked low key. His shot looks smooth as hell, kid has taken a huge jump this year. He will flourish if we get a legit PF and he can play the SF at all times. Also the energy he brings is amazing he was screaming all damn game :lol

[Dejounte]

Keldon stands to improve the most if the Spurs get past the play-in and end up playing a seven game series tbh

it likely will be his breakthrough moment

[Dejounte]

Ok so who had the Bizzarro Spurs Bingo at the start of the year:

- Keldon Johnson becoming the team's best shooter
- Lonnie Walker still on the team ahead of Derrick White and Bryn Forbes
- Zach Collins playing this year and contributing meaningful backup minutes
- KBD almost single-handedly shutting down Staples Centre
- Josh Primo playing and starting down the stretch of "must win" games
- Tre Jones hitting multiple three pointers in the one game and leading the team in +/- with a +28

Crazy but true - When you think the Spurs top 2 offensive players were both drafted 29, the fact we have 3 picks higher than that should put a smile on even the most pessimistic Spurs fan.

The joke about Primo not playing major minutes until his third year was a joke that didn’t last long

in fact, people who keep insisting that’s true for all incoming rookies probably need to wake up and look at Primo or even Vassell. Hell, Keldon was another dude who played big minutes towards the end of his first season.

[Dejounte]

That's fair, it's pretty hard to extrapolate against blazers embarrassing display but I've been liking Zollins progress up to this point and that's beyond just these blazers games. Nothing crazy or anything and really basically still just Zollins getting into game shape and learning sets mostly but if I'm not reading too much into it I really like the potential and am watching closely going forward hoping for the best.

Zach is at the very minimum an average backup big and at best a player who plays OK enough as a starter to make Poeltl expendable. That’s pretty remarkable given the comments about him at the start of the season saying he wasnt really all that impressive as a Blazer or that his injury would make him a shell of himself.

Anything that makes Poeltl expendable is a huge plus as it is a big boost to the Spurs’ assets if they want to make a splash. And they did it by signing a low risk, high reward player in Zach using just their cap room last year. If that doesn’t make Wright savvy, I don’t know what does.

[Dex]

The joke about Primo not playing major minutes until his third year was a joke that didn’t last long

in fact, people who keep insisting that’s true for all incoming rookies probably need to wake up and look at Primo or even Vassell. Hell, Keldon was another dude who played big minutes towards the end of his first season.

Heck, even Tre Jones is a second-round pick and has played in 65 games his second season and started 8.

I don't think we can assume that the "rookie treatment" thing is going to be the same now that we now don't have 3 HoFers and a team fulls of vets.

[boutons_deux]

Richardson has been short all night on his shots

A bad shooting night for Jay Rich because on average he's 40% plus on field goals and 3 g's one of the best shooters on on the team. I think Spurs should keep him

[heyheymymy]

Lost in mention was the brief stint by Langford last night. Was happy to see him though I figure it was simply all hands on deck due to who was avail to play. Was the second preview for him in a Spurs jersey. I know he's dealt with the hamstring tightness iirc so that factors in I suppose but I wonder if that's just to buy him time to learn the system before throwing him in the lion's den? Maybe Spurs just don't see him in their long-term plans?

Seems like they want him trying shots from range, he attempted a corner 3 last night in the 5 mins he rec'd and tried a 3 in the other game he saw playing time against LAL a while back. Wonder if they want him as a 3&D wing instead, not more of an oversized 2 with limited offensive skills? Not sure how he best slots positionally here if he's in the Spurs plans going forward? If you're keeping Primo and Walker at the 2 (provided Walker is retained), and if you resolve the hole at the 4 this offseason, then you have Dev playing the 2 and 3 and KJ sliding down to the 3 mostly with spot small 4 mins situationally, with MCD able to toggle 4/3 (or jettisoned?), tough to see where Lang fits in other than 3rd string depth but that's a lot of moving parts since this offseason has multiple possible paths personnel/acquisition wise.

Def over analyzing what the Spurs might view as a freebee project low priority that may be at best viewed internally as trade ballast or throw away back burner focus.

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

Hopefully Landale isn't too badly hurt. We are a much stronger second unit when he can pair with Collins. Gives us a lot of size inside and his 3-point shooting helps a lot. I'd give us a good shot against NO if he and the rest of the team is healthy.

[heyheymymy]

anyone catch the bizzaro lineup last night

JRich
Walker
Keldon
KBD
Zollins

lol again prob more a result of limited avail bodies but was interesting to see this attempt. JR was pretty capable bringing the ball up and at least initiating the offense, but seemed to get smoked on the other end when asked to defensively cover an athletic fast 1 guard so I think that dream is over already lol outside of specific matchups.

Just love seeing KJ slid down to the 3 mostly where he seems obvs better suited and love seeing trad big 4s and 5s lineups. Pop has been running Collins/Jock and Collins/KBD recently, would love to see a return to adequate rebounding size lol and makes me think they are targeting size in the offseason (obvs) and are already running lineups that simulate that to see how other players would fit around bigger bigs next season.

[KingKev]

anyone catch the bizzaro lineup last night

JRich
Walker
Keldon
KBD
Zollins

lol again prob more a result of limited avail bodies but was interesting to see this attempt. JR was pretty capable bringing the ball up and at least initiating the offense, but seemed to get smoked on the other end when asked to defensively cover an athletic fast 1 guard so I think that dream is over already lol outside of specific matchups.

Just love seeing KJ slid down to the 3 mostly where he seems obvs better suited and love seeing trad big 4s and 5s lineups. Pop has been running Collins/Jock and Collins/KBD recently, would love to see a return to adequate rebounding size lol and makes me think they are targeting size in the offseason (obvs) and are already running lineups that simulate that to see how other players would fit around bigger bigs next season.

With DJ out it’s either J Rich or Primo playing some point. J Rich is nowhere near a PG but still more capable than Primo.

[heyheymymy]

Yeah if Primo was going to be viewed as an orchestrator last night would've forced him into those mins and it didn't really happen. Say a lot about where we are at right now and that makes sense with how young he is. Tons of time to develop into these things as time goes by and getting good rookie mins like Primo has esp in this latter part of the season is a tremendous help towards that development.

Primo can already facilitate somewhat once in the half court set, he def has a little natural vision there and that could steadily improve over repetitions, but I still see a lot of Primo's bigger outlet passes up court getting picked off.

[Sugus]

Man, I keep waiting for Keldon's shooting to regress or "come back down to Earth" and it simply isn't happening. Is it really the real deal? His form and poise sure look like it... Insane. He's exceeded all of my expectations regarding his shooting ability, and I've been watching his shot since the G-League! His growth has been tremendous. I concur that he's one of the players who'd benefit the most from a play-in or playoff experience, alongside DJ. He needs "a stage" sooner than later.

Great to see the Spurs playing well the last few games.

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

Heck, even Tre Jones is a second-round pick and has played in 65 games his second season and started 8.

I don't think we can assume that the "rookie treatment" thing is going to be the same now that we now don't have 3 HoFers and a team fulls of vets.

Agreed. This current group has to assess talent much quicker. For years we either drafted a prospect at the end of the first round, or did the draft and stash with first rounders. A much different strategy. Now we need to know pretty quickly if we have a potential future contributor or not.

[KingKev]

Agreed. This current group has to assess talent much quicker. For years we either drafted a prospect at the end of the first round, or did the draft and stash with first rounders. A much different strategy. Now we need to know pretty quickly if we have a potential future contributor or not.

With all these upcoming draft picks the timeline for guys to show something probably gets shorter. Primo, Walker and Vassell are going to need to really beat out this freshmen class of FRPs we potentially have coming in to be safe.

[XDT76]

anyone catch the bizzaro lineup last night

JRich
Walker
Keldon
KBD
Zollins

lol again prob more a result of limited avail bodies but was interesting to see this attempt. JR was pretty capable bringing the ball up and at least initiating the offense, but seemed to get smoked on the other end when asked to defensively cover an athletic fast 1 guard so I think that dream is over already lol outside of specific matchups.

Just love seeing KJ slid down to the 3 mostly where he seems obvs better suited and love seeing trad big 4s and 5s lineups. Pop has been running Collins/Jock and Collins/KBD recently, would love to see a return to adequate rebounding size lol and makes me think they are targeting size in the offseason (obvs) and are already running lineups that simulate that to see how other players would fit around bigger bigs next season.

Maybe we can do a trade and sign with Indy for J Smith and McD?

[Thomas82]

It's so blatantly obvious they might as well go out to play in flip flops. I don't believe in karma, but I sure as hell wish them the worst of luck in the lottery.

You and me both.