Game Thread: 2020 Preseason Game 1 - Thunder @ Spurs - Dec 12th, 2020 @ 6 PM CT

[GAustex]

Drew gives no s

[Chinook]

The extent to which STers feel justified in taking anything from a PS game where Pop started a lineup that will never see the floor past the first three games is amazing. Even after all these years, it's hard for me to wrap my head around people saying players should be traded or can't start or whatever at this point. Lyles showed he's a perfectly meh starting PF and obviously an NBA player. Basically the only guys who didn't have any sample sizes were Young and Jones, and they both looked good. Once Pop goes back to a sensible unit that doesn't force DMDR to play the two and doesn't have LMA playing the four, the guys will perform better.

In case anyone is wondering, Pop often plays big in pre-season to preserve players' bodies.

[Dejounte]

The extent to which STers feel justified in taking anything from a PS game where Pop started a lineup that will never see the floor past the first three games is amazing. Even after all these years, it's hard for me to wrap my head around people saying players should be traded or can't start or whatever at this point. Lyles showed he's a perfectly meh starting PF and obviously an NBA player. Basically the only guys who didn't have any sample sizes were Young and Jones, and they both looked good. Once Pop goes back to a sensible unit that doesn't force DMDR to play the two and doesn't have LMA playing the four, the guys will perform better.

In case anyone is wondering, Pop often plays big in pre-season to preserve players' bodies.

Who is "Young"?

[The Truth #6]

The extent to which STers feel justified in taking anything from a PS game where Pop started a lineup that will never see the floor past the first three games is amazing. Even after all these years, it's hard for me to wrap my head around people saying players should be traded or can't start or whatever at this point. Lyles showed he's a perfectly meh starting PF and obviously an NBA player. Basically the only guys who didn't have any sample sizes were Young and Jones, and they both looked good. Once Pop goes back to a sensible unit that doesn't force DMDR to play the two and doesn't have LMA playing the four, the guys will perform better.

In case anyone is wondering, Pop often plays big in pre-season to preserve players' bodies.

I hope that’s true. But with so many young players starving for minutes, who is he preserving?

[Seventyniner]

It's no Bruce Lee Bowen on Szczerbiak, but it will do.

[KobesAchilles]

The extent to which STers feel justified in taking anything from a PS game where Pop started a lineup that will never see the floor past the first three games is amazing. Even after all these years, it's hard for me to wrap my head around people saying players should be traded or can't start or whatever at this point. Lyles showed he's a perfectly meh starting PF and obviously an NBA player. Basically the only guys who didn't have any sample sizes were Young and Jones, and they both looked good. Once Pop goes back to a sensible unit that doesn't force DMDR to play the two and doesn't have LMA playing the four, the guys will perform better.

In case anyone is wondering, Pop often plays big in pre-season to preserve players' bodies.

Its PTSD from last year when people were defending Pop saying “well it’s only preseason. He won’t start Bryn in the regular season over Derrick White...” And I said yes he would and then he proceeded to start every ing game. I can totally see a SL of Demar, LMA, Poetl, White and Murray. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he starts ty ass Lyles and keeps Poetl on the bench like he did last year.

[objective]

Its PTSD from last year when people were defending Pop saying “well it’s only preseason. He won’t start Bryn in the regular season over Derrick White...”

basically.

Everyone saw Pop totally botch the Murray-White pairing last year.

In pre-season, it was, "Oh, it's just pre-season. They're definitely going to play together big minutes, it's just pre-season!"

Then for the first 10 games or whatever it was when Murray was on a minutes limit it was, "This is just Pop giving Murray room to breathe and get his body back! Yes, it might look stupid to only play White 24 minutes a game, but Pop isn't crazy! He's going to play them together, just wait until the minutes limit comes off!"

Then it was radio silence as Pop refused to play them together. Totally dumbfounded, some of the worst rotation decisions in the NBA, even Boylan wasn't as bad. Why play White as many minutes as possible when Forbes is there ready to be trash?

After that, I wouldn't be stunned at all if Pop somehow found the worst possible lineups and plugged away with them through the trade deadline. And none of you would be surprised either.

[The Truth #6]

It's no Bruce Lee Bowen on Szczerbiak, but it will do.

At first I didn’t think that was real. Amazing.

[The Truth #6]

Its PTSD from last year when people were defending Pop saying “well it’s only preseason. He won’t start Bryn in the regular season over Derrick White...” And I said yes he would and then he proceeded to start every ing game. I can totally see a SL of Demar, LMA, Poetl, White and Murray. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he starts ty ass Lyles and keeps Poetl on the bench like he did last year.

That’s really true. There’s been so many odd lineups the last few years people expect the worst.

[Chinook]

Its PTSD from last year when people were defending Pop saying “well it’s only preseason. He won’t start Bryn in the regular season over Derrick White...” And I said yes he would and then he proceeded to start every ing game. I can totally see a SL of Demar, LMA, Poetl, White and Murray. But it wouldn’t surprise me if he starts ty ass Lyles and keeps Poetl on the bench like he did last year.

So Pop started Forbes and Walker along with Murray, and Bryn actually had a pretty good pre-season after having a decent year before that. A lot of people want to rewrite history to make it seem like Bryn was handed everything, but he played really well for about a year stretch, and it made a ton of sense for Pop to continue starting him and not necessarily prioritize starting Murray and white. If anything, the complaints weren't about Bryn as much as they were about Murray starting over White. Not going to say some folks weren't clamoring for White to start, but most of the talk was about how they almost literally never played DJM and DW together for most of the season. The same people wanting to claim victory about Forbes don't admit that Murray wasn't actually a better starting option either. Bryn already showed he could start on a playoff team. DeJounte, not nearly as much.

Also to note, Pop started Poeltl and Aldridge both of the first two pre-season games before abandoning it for Lyles. The year before that, Pop started LMA/Gasol and LMA/Poeltl to start the pre-season. There's legit precedent for that opening unit not being indicative of the direction of the team.

[R. DeMurre]

At first I didn’t think that was real. Amazing.

Eubanks was -11 in 6 minutes on the floor... not too amazing tbh. Poku went for 14 & 8 in his first game.

[BackHome]

It's no Bruce Lee Bowen on Szczerbiak, but it will do.

Dude that is one bad ass picture definitely going to have to blow that up and put on my wall

[BackHome]

Eubanks was -11 in 6 minutes on the floor... not too amazing tbh. Poku went for 14 & 8 in his first game.

You know what Poku and Keldon and Vassell all have in common- they all have the “ Eye of The Tiger” meaning they want to win at all cost and are willing to work 3 times harder then there team mates to get there.

[Chinook]

basically.

Everyone saw Pop totally botch the Murray-White pairing last year.

In pre-season, it was, "Oh, it's just pre-season. They're definitely going to play together big minutes, it's just pre-season!"

Then for the first 10 games or whatever it was when Murray was on a minutes limit it was, "This is just Pop giving Murray room to breathe and get his body back! Yes, it might look stupid to only play White 24 minutes a game, but Pop isn't crazy! He's going to play them together, just wait until the minutes limit comes off!"

Then it was radio silence as Pop refused to play them together. Totally dumbfounded, some of the worst rotation decisions in the NBA, even Boylan wasn't as bad. Why play White as many minutes as possible when Forbes is there ready to be trash?

After that, I wouldn't be stunned at all if Pop somehow found the worst possible lineups and plugged away with them through the trade deadline. And none of you would be surprised either.

Again, folks say things like that but then ignore that DeJounte was pretty awful. The Murray-White combo wasn't going to save the Spurs. There's a decent chance the White, Forbes, DeRozan, Lyles, Aldridge combo would've worked out better. Even if it didn't, the option of going back to the main SL from the previous season would've still been there.

Murray's regular-season winning percentage as a starter is .500, and that includes his handful of starts in 2016-2017 when the Spurs were a 61-win squad. Take that away, and DJM's percentage drops to .439. Forbes was at .535. The Spurs over the last three years were at .540. Basically the bubble run is the only reason why Forbes' percentage flags behind the team's total. Starting Murray and White doesn't seem to be the answer any more than White/Forbes, and folks trying to pat themselves on the back for saying they knew Pop was wrong all along should be more specific. White should've and should start. Murray or Forbes starting isn't the important part.

[Seventyniner]

Eubanks was -11 in 6 minutes on the floor... not too amazing tbh. Poku went for 14 & 8 in his first game.

I was just reacting to the picture. Eubanks is a third-stringer until proven otherwise.

[Chinook]

Basically, Murray was never that good of a player, but he's a guy that advanced stats likes. He got really overrated in 2017-2018, and folks thought that if you could get his "defense" and White's defense together, the Spurs could be a better team. What's been born out is actually that starting Murray is still an awful idea and that while he and White should've gotten minutes together, Pop's mistake was not keeping DJM on the bench for the year to "work his way back" while he ran with the hot-hand lineup from the previous year. He then could've seen that Murray wasn't a starting-caliber player and then just moved on quietly, or perhaps Murray could've settled in as a bench dynamo and been trade fodder. Then Pop should've had Forbes start while giving Lonnie chances to taking Bryn's spot.

Very few people want Murray to continue to start. Many want something like,

White, Mills
Walker/Johnson/Vassell, Murray
DeRozan, Johnson/Walker/Vassell
Lyles/Gay
Aldridge/Poeltl

In other words, very few people want to see the White/Murray duo start now since we saw it didn't work. Yet they want to act like Pop should regret not prioritizing that combo last year.

[KobesAchilles]

So Pop started Forbes and Walker along with Murray, and Bryn actually had a pretty good pre-season after having a decent year before that. A lot of people want to rewrite history to make it seem like Bryn was handed everything, but he played really well for about a year stretch, and it made a ton of sense for Pop to continue starting him and not necessarily prioritize starting Murray and white. If anything, the complaints weren't about Bryn as much as they were about Murray starting over White. Not going to say some folks weren't clamoring for White to start, but most of the talk was about how they almost literally never played DJM and DW together for most of the season. The same people wanting to claim victory about Forbes don't admit that Murray wasn't actually a better starting option either. Bryn already showed he could start on a playoff team. DeJounte, not nearly as much.

Also to note, Pop started Poeltl and Aldridge both of the first two pre-season games before abandoning it for Lyles. The year before that, Pop started LMA/Gasol and LMA/Poeltl to start the pre-season. There's legit precedent for that opening unit not being indicative of the direction of the team.

Pop chose White to make the Team USA. He did not choose Bryn. You are the one who is rewriting . Bryn didn’t have a good season last year and White STILL never started over him. Nobody (and the Rock means NOBODY) thought that Bryn should have been a starter last year. And he never EVEEEER played really well in his entire career. Unless the bar for really well has been lowered to really ty in which case I agree.

[rankingtear]

White played the Manu role last year, questions if he can play 30 minutes per game with his foot issues we can't really answer without access to his medicals. I think White has more responsibilities last year than Forbes as he was the primary in the second unit and was the secondary ballhandler in the closing lineups. I think the key to playing White and Murray together is the 3 point volume and their relative health, which was the case in the bubble where White put up 8 attempts per game.

[rankingtear]

Pop chose White to make the Team USA. He did not choose Bryn. You are the one who is rewriting . Bryn didn’t have a good season last year and White STILL never started over him. Nobody (and the Rock means NOBODY) thought that Bryn should have been a starter last year. And he never EVEEEER played really well in his entire career. Unless the bar for really well has been lowered to really ty in which case I agree.

I would think the Manu role is more significant than the starting shooting guard spot. Look at the past players who held that position for the Spurs.

[KobesAchilles]

I would think the Manu role is more significant than the starting shooting guard spot. Look at the past players who held that position for the Spurs.

Manu role only works when you have a Tony Parker. Guarantee had we had DJ and Forbes as the main guards Ginobili in his prime would be starting. Only reason Pop benched Manu was bc him and Tony needed the ball. Seeing as our starting point guard was coming off a major injury, Forbes was the worst defender in the entire NBA, and White wasn’t getting the Manu treatment anyways seeing as he never finished games, there really was no excuse not to start Derrick. Keep reaching though

[rankingtear]

Manu role only works when you have a Tony Parker. Guarantee had we had DJ and Forbes as the main guards Ginobili in his prime would be starting. Only reason Pop benched Manu was bc him and Tony needed the ball. Seeing as our starting point guard was coming off a major injury, Forbes was the worst defender in the entire NBA, and White wasn’t getting the Manu treatment anyways seeing as he never finished games, there really was no excuse not to start Derrick. Keep reaching though

Didn't he finish games? Almost all games I watched White was finishing games. Dejounte was subbed out by the 6-5 minutes left. Can anyone confirm who actually finishes more games? Haven't watched all games but the pattern i always see is Murray playing early 4th then subbed out for White.

Derrick is third on the team on 4th quarter clutch minutes 5 minutes or less behind Derozan and Aldridge. Also third on 4th quarter minutes. Do you even watch games?

https://www.nba.com/stats/players/cl...E*SAS&Period=4

[objective]

Again, folks say things like that but then ignore that DeJounte was pretty awful. The Murray-White combo wasn't going to save the Spurs. There's a decent chance the White, Forbes, DeRozan, Lyles, Aldridge combo would've worked out better. Even if it didn't, the option of going back to the main SL from the previous season would've still been there.

Murray's regular-season winning percentage as a starter is .500, and that includes his handful of starts in 2016-2017 when the Spurs were a 61-win squad. Take that away, and DJM's percentage drops to .439. Forbes was at .535. The Spurs over the last three years were at .540. Basically the bubble run is the only reason why Forbes' percentage flags behind the team's total. Starting Murray and White doesn't seem to be the answer any more than White/Forbes, and folks trying to pat themselves on the back for saying they knew Pop was wrong all along should be more specific. White should've and should start. Murray or Forbes starting isn't the important part.

there's nothing I've ignored.

Even in 18-19, during regular season games, EVVVVERRRYOONNNNE even marginally following the Spurs was saying things like, "wow, White can play defense! Can't wait to see him and Murray play together!" From people on this forum, to reddit, to twitter, to Sean on the broadcasts many many times and I think I remember national guys saying it too. "Just wait until next year!"

And what happened?

Pop refused to play them together, basically the entire pre-bubble season except for brief, way too late moments.

And I don't give a damn about starts between Murray and White. "Bu-bu-but Forbes earned his starting spot!"

Forbes didn't earn jack, he was gifted minutes because 18-19 started with Murray AND White AND Walker out with injury. AND Pondexter was clearly toast, AND Cunningham was cooked. So he was the defacto starter who just became the default. And he had a good statistical game 7 against Denver with a dunk.

Again, I don't care about the starts as much as the line-up. It could have been Lonnie starting over Forbes, it doesn't change the disaster rotation decisions with White. I remember people excusing Pop's bizarre antics with not starting White and Murray together as, "It's not who starts, it's who finishes, and as long as White and Murray close, like Manu and Parker, that's what counts!"

Well they didn't close together.

And if anyone has any "White & Murray don't go well together!!!!" talk, it is just sad. It is the carbon copy of people who knew better still excusing Pop benching Splitter his whole rookie year. Because supposedly Duncan and Splitter could NEVER EVER play together, and Pop's screwball comedy routine of desperately turning to Splitter in game 4 against Memphis was then used by those same people as PROOF that they could NEVER EVER EVER play together. Because their chemistry wasn't instantly great when thrown together in the playoffs when Splitter has lost peak game conditioning because he hadn't played real minutes in weeks.

And Pop refused to try White and Murray together.

Pop limiting White to only 24 minutes a game and ONLY when Murray was off the floor was the masterpiece of terrible rotation decisions for any coach. He was only one of the best players on the team. He had only functionally been responsible for multiple playoff wins. He was the one creating events on defense, he was the one dominating the league in pick-and-roll production.

Limiting White limited the team. Period. If a coach wants to lose, not playing your best players the most minutes is a good way to try.

So any coach who could ride bizarre decisions into the lottery could easily find a bad combination and go with that. Starting, finishing, either way would be right in line with current Pop.

That's why I'm not getting my hopes up of ever seeing a lineup of Vassell-Johnson-White together at the same time.

[duncan2k5]

Our young guys aren't good because Pop has successfully neutered them and eliminated their confidence... Other teams actually play their draft picks... Even teams better than us... Yet soon as ours make the slightest mistake, they're taken out for several games on end... Lonnie Walker would have already been a starter on a other team .. Murray would have already been one of the better young point guards... White would have been at least as good as Brogdon... Matter if fact Brogdon was a 2nd round pick... If he was drafted by the Spurs, he would have never seen the light of day... And in his spot minutes we would have been bashing him for being an inconsistent, ty player

[KobesAchilles]

Didn't he finish games? Almost all games I watched White was finishing games. Dejounte was subbed out by the 6-5 minutes left. Can anyone confirm who actually finishes more games? Haven't watched all games but the pattern i always see is Murray playing early 4th then subbed out for White.

Derrick is third on the team on 4th quarter clutch minutes 5 minutes or less behind Derozan and Aldridge. Also third on 4th quarter minutes. Do you even watch games?

https://www.nba.com/stats/players/cl...E*SAS&Period=4

See Objectives post above. He didn’t close with Derrick to start the season. It wasn’t til like January or something he started to.

[Chinook]

Pop chose White to make the Team USA. He did not choose Bryn. You are the one who is rewriting . Bryn didn’t have a good season last year and White STILL never started over him. Nobody (and the Rock means NOBODY) thought that Bryn should have been a starter last year. And he never EVEEEER played really well in his entire career. Unless the bar for really well has been lowered to really ty in which case I agree.

Yeah, this is totally trying to rewrite history. The attempt to swap out Murray for White in what I was saying is attempt to rewrite the present too. Some people did argue Murray deserved to start over White last year (including Pop for some reason). Some of those people might've also thought White should've started over Forbes, but trying to make it out like White and Forbes were in direct compe ion feeds into my exact point. Guaranteeing Murray his spot was the bad thing. White/Forbes already showed they could make the playoffs as a starting duo. Murray starting has not historically been a good thing for the Spurs. Murray/Forbes was a bad lineup; we all agree on that. But Murray/White wasn't the solution either, and that's what the retrospectors want to ignore.