Spurs are no strangers to gifting fringe prospects NBA careers.
Sucks to lose a game like this, but it's a major learning process for the young guards. It's a big boost.
Team badly needs productive bigs. With LMA, this would be a clear victory. Poeltl was scared. Aldridge gobbles up a few of the offensive boards they got, plus scores. Too bad he's basically at the end of his storied career.
Eubanks with a C? I'm not sure. This is a third string center thrown into facing Davis and a near-HOFer (at least) in Marc Gasol and he was more effective than Poeltl.
The way they played last night, they can beat anybody.
Lyles didn't exactly light it up in the preseason...He played 23 MPG, scored 3.6 points and 5.3 boards while shooting 1/12 from three and getting lit up on defense. He shot .200 from the field and .083 from deep.
He's played 10 minutes this season and posted -8 Plus/Minus so far.
That's not going to earn anybody a lot of minutes.
This is starting to become a major concern for Lonnie imo. It's like he has his mind made up what he is going to do the moment he gets the ball, and doesn't take what the defense is actually giving him.Lonnie Walker IV
The good: Walker usually isn’t a player who will dribble through a crowd to get to the rim, however he did that multiple times tonight. His finishing at the rim was better and he was able to make plays when tasked with being a facilitator. The bad: Walker’s rotations weren’t good — when he wasn’t too slow, he was completely lost. His individual D was better but he wasn’t fighting around screens and the Lakers picked up on that. On offense, Walker maddeningly passed up open shots — from wide open three-pointers to point blank layups. He has to take open shots — that’s his number one job as a basketball player.
Grade: C
I know this new offense is predicated on drive-and-kicks generating open looks, but Lonnie has turned down multiple wide open lanes where he could challenge the rim and just tosses the ball back out.
That's great if it leads to a wide open three-pointer, but more often than not it just resets the offense and forces someone else to try to get the same advantage that Lonnie just gave up.
I've said it before, but he plays way too passive for a guy with his abilities.
Fair enough, but let’s not kid ourselves. Eubanks shouldn’t get playing time over Lyles. He shows he hustles, but it amounts to nothing. Lyles has only played once or twice this season that I can remember and sure he didn’t light up the stat sheet, but it’s not a fair opportunity.
It's true that those stats are based on a tiny sample size and preseason isn't a good barometer...but I also don't think giving Eubanks' minutes to Lyles is the answer. It's apples and oranges.
Eubanks is only playing because the Spurs are seriously thin at the center. Aldridge is out injured, Poeltl has trouble staying on the floor, and moving Gay over to center is a risky proposition. Sure, Lyles isn't short at 6'9, but do you think he would seriously be able to hang with Davis or Gasol?
If Lyles is going to steal minutes from anybody, it's going to be Vassell...and I'd rather Pop throw the rookie into the fire before giving those minutes to Trey.
Eubanks should get every minute Lyles could have. Trey Lyles is basically Austin Daye at this point. He was pretty much out of the league, having not been able to cut it at Utah or Denver, squads that value bigs, and he'll be out of the league after his deal is up here. He's just not good.
Eubanks is not great, but he's at least compe ive and has some ceiling. Lyles has no ceiling whatsoever. Either he goes to Europe and figures things out, or his career is over.
Too soon to say but look at Kyle who's finally good in his sixth year. Unlike metu who u mentioned in other thread not sure why u feel we gave up on him too soon hav u checked on him? He can't get a minute on kings roster!
Anderson was already good when he left the Spurs.
nba.com/spurs
Good defense; good role player n play maker but never gave them wat they wanted offensively hence he's gone...he's finally doing wat spurs wanted
There was the thing too about how the team was dissing him by not even offering his jersey in their stores.
He would have stopped them from getting 18 ORBs.
Not arguing Yak's offensive weakness: FT shooting with the precision of "pin the tail on the donkey" is unacceptable, and that he can't bring the ball to the rim with both hands at his size won't do it.
some of the defensive things though are a product of the line-up:
He's asked to guard the opposing PF, who was lingering around the arc most of the time, so there's no way he can do that, and at the same time be the presence under the basket he's supposed to be.
at the same time, the opposing C is guarded by a SF, so what happens on the boards isn't rocket science..
the decision for Yak to guard 1 position down, and the SF 2 up in exchange shows the flaws in the line-up. any other team would put the C on the C, and then put a SF on the PF to compensate AD's mobility. Pop was assuming that Yak was the better option on AD and the mismatch on Gasol worth it, so that gives him some credit on defense. if you let him play on Gasol, then he'll also fight for rebounds, but not from the arc..
He would have also allowed 10 wide open three point attempts by the Lakers.
who would buy a Kyle Anderson jersey
People on this board? Fans? But, literally, his family, who went into the apparel store in the arena. They had bench players for sale and not Anderson, who was a starter. Ridiculous.
Lamarcus has been averaging 3 less rebounds a game than Jak in 5 more minutes per game this year
He's been least interested in boxing out and fighting for rebounds out of all of our bigs and it's so plainly obvious watching the games it makes me wonder if someone saying he would keep LA off the boards is actually paying attention or just going off his reputation from 4 years ago. Also- it is 2021, we don't need to be calling post ups for our Centers when all the evidence statistically and anecdotally around the league says its the least efficient form of offense. Even Jokic creates most of his offense from the arc, choosing to face up and get position down low or taking open shots. I know there's a lot of people who miss 4 down being the only thing you had to run but it's not the game anymore, and especially not the game when your bigs are Jakob and old man Aldridge.
Rebounding was definitely a problem, but when you have Keldon and Demar responsible for keeping one of Gasol or Davis off the glass it's gonna be trouble no matter who is playing center.
I just don't think there was any one problem that resulted in the loss. Patty missed a bunny, Drew missed a couple of bunnies, Jak missed 4 free throws, the team missed a total of 8 free throws. We had 16 less shot attempts than the lakers. They were able to create offense and find quality shots in the 4th while we stagnated and resorted to long 2s and lazy offense. The Lebron post up on Dwhite. Lakers getting away with murder on screens grabbing everyone and getting open shot after open shot.
Abso- ing-lutely. This is a win with Aldridge. Controlling the boards primarily, but being able to cover Davis, sure. Poeltl was extremely scared and dubious all game.
With every game that Keldon Johnson plays, it shows that we made the right (lucky) decision in drafting him and the bad decision the spurs made in drafting Luka Saminc, a big which we really could have used in yesterdays game. I know that the spurs like to develop their talent but Semanic is taking quite a while, and now Vassell is a young player that will take overall minutes away from one of the spurs players.
Poetl was also switching onto their wings and guards. You think he can do that as well as Poetl?
It sucks when we depend on our PG to secure rebounds for this team but that’s where we are at. I didn’t really have a plan for this year tbh so I’m not going to on everything the FO did and act like I had a better solution than they did... but I still am going to on them.
Who were we competing with about Poetl? Why did they think he was worth $9 million a year? He has zero offensive game which is very necessary in today’s all about offense league. Pop (rightly might I add) was never going to play him starter minutes so the question then becomes why pay that much for a back up. Bc that’s what Poetl is. That is his ceiling. He is a back up. After 5 years he still goes up soft, still has no jumper, and still can’t shoot free throws- he isn’t going to just randomly improve on year 6.
Can we trade Rudy Gay already please. Or Patty. I know they have the gunner role but we can’t have TWO gunners off the bench when supposedly we are playing our new $73 million dollar man off the bench as well. It doesn’t mesh and they will end up freezing out White. Like if Rudy and Patty finish the year with more shot attempts than Derrick I will lose my .
Trade LMA while we are at it but if (and I have no effing clue) Portland really did offer us a 1st and a big last year, we should’ve taken it and ran. The dude is done. It does make me feel better though that we tried to trade him during the off season.
Keldon was/is amazing. future star of the team.
Lonnie needs to just shoot the ball. If we could put Patty Mills mindset in Lonnies body then we would be golden. Seriously he would be an all star. As is I think next year will be the last we will see of Lonnie if he doesn’t get his head out of his ass.
DJ I like what I’m seeing. He still has glaring flaws at running the point but I see know real issue with it for the future bc all of vets will be gone anyways so who really cares if he can’t set up LMA. I would just have him focus more on drive and kick. And pic n roll. That’s it. White will set up the plays when we need it
DDR is really really good at going to the line. And we are still 25th in free throws. Says more about our lack of respect. I have no complaints about his play this year.
Pop has been good for me. I love the fire is back. We don’t have the horses but we are compe ive and the youth are playing with fire and heart.
Poeltl's big problem was his timidity. He was playing in no-space, stranding himself and failing to be assertive in any way. He was clearly cowed by the Lakers, which LMA would not be.
Poeltl is like Kyle Anderson. If you don't pay and keep him, you have absolutely jack .
No one wants Patty Mills and people like you need to also understand that what he contributes to the culture of the team is absolutely vital. Maybe you play a ton of PlayStation, but that's not how things work nor how this franchise views its players.
Rudy Gay is second to Mills in that regard, but also important at this point to team culture. He's also not someone you can trade for better players, not at this point.
I'm still unsure whether LMA can be traded. The team's floor drops considerably this year if he's traded, and I don't know what the market is, but they should look around.
Clearly the problem going forward is young front court talent. I don't know how to solve the problem at this point.
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