All I want for Christmas....

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Originally Posted by TDMVPDPOY

lol pop better lock him up in a extention or else some team comes knockin.....

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We have him for 3 years buddy. Pop already locked him up for peanuts!

As for that picture MiG, freakin classic.

Spurs fans blowing up on Twitter.

Gary Neal!

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Originally Posted by MannyIsGod

RMJ once had big nuts too



PLEASE LET NEAL BE THE TRUTH

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Neal has already surpassed RMJ. Dude was never as clutch as Neal.

NEAL >>>>> mason

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RMJ always let 'em fly. People forget that he and Hill carried the Spurs scoring when Tony went out early in 08. It's more about mental toughness than no-conscience shooting.

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Agree. But he had his up and downs with his confidence during his spurs days.

My thoughts:

1) Neal's release is higher and better pure form than Mason's low-arcing forward leaning shot.

2) Neal is a better athlete than Mason. His first step after a 3 pump fake is much quicker.

3) Neal has better moves at the rim than Mason. Not only better, but faster. Mason's layups took longer than Bonner's. Neal has shown an ability to move the ball quickly, and even dish it for a quick assist or two. Last two games he's even shown better ability to get to the foul line than Mason ever did.

4) I still believe a large part of Mason's struggles was Pop trying to wedge a square peg into a round hole, forcing Mason to do a lion's share of ball-handling duties towards the end of his first season here. We won't make Neal do that.


I want to believe Neal is the truth as much as you, Manny, but these observations also give me some optimism going forward.

He got handles and he can drive. He's also an underrated passer. The more I look at his game, the farthest away it's from the unidimensional Mason. Plus he tries to compete on D even though he's still making a bunch of mistakes here and there. Mason rarely tried.

The only question to me is if he's going to implode when the playoffs come around. It's a different atmosphere and the pressure really adds up. Although if Mason is the measuring stick, I feel pretty confident be can play better than that.

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Originally Posted by ShoogarBear

Neal has much better shooting mechanics than Mason. Even when RMJ was hitting, his release could make you cringe. With Neal, you're almost surprised when they don't go in.

And like timvp said, once somebody closed on Mason, the best you could hope for was that he didn't turn it over on the dribble.

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this :toast

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Originally Posted by cheguevara

http://img268.imageshack.us/img268/9176/neal.png

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:nope

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Originally Posted by ElNono

He got handles and he can drive. He's also an underrated passer. The more I look at his game, the farthest away it's from the unidimensional Mason. Plus he tries to compete on D even though he's still making a bunch of mistakes here and there. Mason rarely tried.

The only question to me is if he's going to implode when the playoffs come around. It's a different atmosphere and the pressure really adds up. Although if Mason is the measuring stick, I feel pretty confident be can play better than that.

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this:toast

Oh santa can you hear us? We have been so good this year

Hopefully Gary Neal makes love to pressure.

even if the pressure doesn't want it

If he just was able to hold hands with it it would be a step up.