Grades: Spurs vs. Clippers - Nov. 22, 2023

[timvp]

https://www.spurstalk.com/2023-spurs-clippers-grades-15/

[ducks]

A d for pop was to nice
A big fat f would be better for fat overrated farty foolish fool failure idiot

[scott]

The bad: Sochan’s court vision was really poor at times. He was also guilty of overdribbling and forcing a few shots. His ball-handling was iffy enough that it slowed down the pace for the Spurs.

Seems like this alone would be enough to not give your starting PG an "above average" grade (that is still what B's mean, right?).

[Joseph Kony]

McNugget, Branham, Bassey, and Pop should all be Fs

[z0sa]

Sochan is the PG. The play where Wemby was literally wide open without another player within his 8 foot wingspan, Sochan somehow missed him. That, to me, exemplified all of the failures of Pop and the Sochan PG experiment this season - and why Sochan does not deserve the grade awarded.

Pop absolutely deserves an F, for obvious reasons.

Victor needed WAY more shots. Other than Vassell, no other Spur should be equal or higher. The fact others did get as many shots is bad news in a lot of ways, IMHO. It does not bode well for Wemby's growth at all. Someone has GOT to take the reins and ensure Wemby gets more looks, man. We're on the cusp of crushing a generational talent's confidence with this bullshit.

[MannyIsGod]

Sochan also had a 2v1 with Wemby and threw such a terrible pass Wemby couldn't do shit with it and they got bailed out with a foul call.

Sochan has potential to be a good forward in this league, but for fucks sake its long passed time to give up no this bullshit experiment. The dude is not a point guard.

[freetiago]

Sochan didn’t supercharge the offense. He padded hard when the game was out of reach and they stopped playing defense. Similar to KJ game before. His rotations were also horrific. The 14-0 run was when he put in an extremely small bench lineup in with no rim protection. Harden/Theis pick and roll tore it up and they couldn’t get a rebound over Theis in that period. It forced Pop to bring in Victor earlier than his usual and still dumb set minutes on Victor.

[TheGreatYacht]

Sochan didn’t supercharge the offense. He padded hard when the game was out of reach and they stopped playing defense. Similar to KJ game before. His rotations were also horrific. The 14-0 run was when he put in an extremely small bench lineup in with no rim protection. Harden/Theis pick and roll tore it up and they couldn’t get a rebound over Theis in that period. It forced Pop to bring in Victor earlier than his usual and still dumb set minutes on Victor.
Ykb. That lineup with Barlow at Center was a joke, but not as big as the senile old man is for once again not calling a timeout to stop that 14-0 run. If only it was a nationally televised game, he would’ve done his little cute shit for the cameras and called a timeout 20 seconds into a quarter

[TekXX]

Oh come on now, let's start handing out the F's. They are failing.

[TimmehC]

The starters (the actual starters, including Vassell but not Malaki) were all somewhere between decent and very good. The lack of depth has become very troubling as nobody outside the starting 5 looks like an NBA player.

[Chinook]

Barely a whiff of sniff in these grades. Timvp's fall to the dark side is one of the more fascinating Spurs stories to follow.

[tbdog]

We shouldn't be this bad.

[Vince Carter's ankle]

We shouldn't be this bad.
this team only won 22 games last year
it’s logical that they will play poorly this season too

[RC_Drunkford]

Branham: 21 min 0 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist. I guess F's don't exist

[Fireball]

also last year no opponent cared for the Spurs ... this year they are looking forward to play against Wemby and I think his weaknesses are already very present in the scouting reports

[Raven]

i was pleased with sochan in quarters 2 and 4, but he was meh in the first and horrible in the third. Aside from the obvious missed lobs which should be our go-to play, he is clearly growing leaps and bounds. Still VERY young though.

[Brazil]

After a couple of disappointing games, I'm happy to see Victor with a very solid performance, I liked in particular the rebounding effort and the fact his shot selection was much better. I'd like to see him attempt 3 / 4 healthy balanced 3 pts per game.

[poopbox]

Timvp giving pop a D then pretty much calling him a senile old man. Come on timvp. Come over to the non sniff side. Go ahead and give him that F. What exactly would Pop have to do to get an F :rollin

[exstatic]

McNugget, Branham, Bassey, and Pop should all be Fs

Bassey should be an F-

[RC_Drunkford]

Timvp giving pop a D then pretty much calling him a senile old man. Come on timvp. Come over to the non sniff side. Go ahead and give him that F. What exactly would Pop have to do to get an F :rollin

Pop could take a dump in the middle of the court and people would still think he's a genius

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

End the Sochan experiment. He doesn't have the court vision to be a PG and you can't teach that. You either have vision or you don't.

And come on LJ, time to start giving Pop those Fs.

[onechance87]

End the Sochan experiment. He doesn't have the court vision to be a PG and you can't teach that. You either have vision or you don't.

And come on LJ, time to start giving Pop those Fs.

and replace him with who tre jones or branham....did u even watch the game yesterday.....they one of
the main reasons why we lost yesterday

[CGD]

Team was a lot better last night energy wise. Random musings:

- Wish Wemby would stop bringing the ball down so much in the post, especially when a simple jump hook would go a long way. It’s like he’s too tall to take advantage of any speed advantage he may have the moment he dribbles in the post. That said his passing is quite good, and my hope is that once he makes better passing reads in the post, teams will stop swarming him.

- Sochans shot looks much improved, though, still work to do there. Didn’t mind him calling his own number at the end. I think if this whole experiment leads to the Spurs having a reliable secondary ball handler/creator in the future, that’s not a bad outcome. God knows Vassell and Keldon can’t do that to save their lives…

- The Vassell-Wemby two man game looks good, just a shame they run it twice a game. Obviously having bad shooters doesn’t help the spacing, but it’s also frustrating that Devin hasn’t made better improvements on the playmaking side.

- Tre looks off this season. Not sure what it is. Unless he takes a leap with his 3 ball, this is probably the close to finished product. Wonder if he’s the one that has been mentally hurt the most by the Sochan experiment.

- Keldon giveth and Keldon taketh. He’s one of my favorite players, but it’s frustrating how he still to gets very lost of D at this stage of his career. It’s like he doesn’t have a full “feel” for the game still. He really tops out at super sub on a playoff team.

- Malaki needs to slow down, build confidence. Has been a rough few games for him.

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

and replace him with who tre jones or branham....did u even watch the game yesterday.....they one of
the main reasons why we lost yesterday

Let branham learn. He's got a better chance to do so than Sochan. But there's no easy fix on this roster, and that fault lies with Pop and Wright.

[itzsoweezee]

this team only won 22 games last year
it’s logical that they will play poorly this season too

They are worse than last season, with a better roster and more experience. This is a coaching failure

[Mugen]

"D-"

https://media1.giphy.com/media/KDVswimTNahWzcd7sV/giphy.gif

[Mugen]

this team only won 22 games last year
it’s logical that they will play poorly this season too

https://media3.giphy.com/media/1yMvhR4M47Okw4n8tt/giphy.gif

[CGD]

Let branham learn. He's got a better chance to do so than Sochan. But there's no easy fix on this roster, and that fault lies with Pop and Wright.

Why is everyone trying to assign fault?

Did you honestly think this was a playoff team?

[Vince Carter's ankle]

They are worse than last season, with a better roster and more experience. This is a coaching failure
now there is Victor, but the roster was better stocked before the deadline when Jacob and JRich were on the team

[Drom John]

While Collins did foul out, the last two fouls were intentional stop the clock hope the Clipper misses a FT fouls.

[tbdog]

this team only won 22 games last year
it’s logical that they will play poorly this season too

We are 29th in offence and 28th in defence. We should see bigger improvements in these areas. We also not rebounding well despite playing big.

[Raven]

Timvp giving pop a D then pretty much calling him a senile old man. Come on timvp. Come over to the non sniff side. Go ahead and give him that F. What exactly would Pop have to do to get an F :rollin

i'd say if he started crying after hearing the louder boos, that would have done it

[dbestpro]

This is a poorly coached team and the coach that Pop used to be is gone. If he cared about the players at all he should retire and let someone else who can keep up take over. His time has come.

[Vince Carter's ankle]

We are 29th in offence and 28th in defence. We should see bigger improvements in these areas. We also not rebounding well despite playing big.
and it was expected

[John B]

Totally agree with the grades. I would’ve given Bassey an F, and very much deserving to be pulled for those lazy passes. Also happy to see Champagnie not playing. That hopefully gives him reason to work on his game so whenever opportunity arises, he can take better advantage of.

I like this game much better. It seems the players-only meeting charged up the guys to compete better. I think we will see them competing better. Wemby tallying 15 rebounds should be a nightly thing for him. I’m glad he’s more aggressive in the paint. Two TO’s is still one too many, but it’s better than 5 or so. He needs to avoid putting the ball down for opponents to reach. Just keep them high kid.

I really like Sochan’s aggresiveness in the 4th quarter. This playing PG somewhat makes him too unselfish. Last night in the 4th quarter, he decided to call his own number. I like that.

I like Barlow getting some minutes. He is long and athletic and plenty of motor to contend. Spurs need his energy out there. And that should pit a little competition on Bassey to stay hungry.

All in all, I like last night’s game. I’m really hoping it’s a start of these guys playing better and more aggressive

[Chomag]

Pop: F for taunting the crowd.

[lefty]

kawhi : A+

[TimDunkem]

Pop could take a dump in the middle of the court and people would still think he's a genius
"Wow! Look at Pop getting pulling down his pants, taking a fat dump on the Spurs logo! CIA Pop at it again! Getting into the head's of the opposing team, and delaying the game to get Wemby extra rest for the playoff run! What a master! In PATFO we trust! :toast" - Sniffers, probably.

[The Truth #6]

I love how Jeremy played in the 4th quarter. He stopped trying to be a point guard. Just tried to be a threat on offense and for a second there he looked like himself from last year. He needs to play like that instead of just dribbling up and handing the ball off and feeling lost.

[ambchang]

Those boos towards nephew wasn’t even that bad. It’s not like somebody threw a chair on the court.

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

I agree with Timvp’s comments on Pop’s chat with the fans. It was an odd move. If fans are belligerent, sure, call them out, but fans can boo. Pop usually has zero fan acknowledgement. If he was ever actively engaged with the fans I’d of probably been a little more ok with his behavior.

I keep thinking that this team has double its win total, and a much improved +\- with a decent (top 15) NBA point guard. The weakest link is obvious, even when Sochan is playing as well as he did last night.