I have easy rules for our roster going forward. If you can’t throw an entry pass or a lob pass to a ing 7ft 4 athletic freak, then I don’t want you on the team. If you wave off the wide open franchise player so you can get your own number, then i don’t want you on the team.
Like if a player can’t do these two simple things, then they have no future with our team. It’s that simple. I don’t want to hear about potential or player development or any other like that. If you can’t set up the franchise guy or are looking for your own number instead of his then you have no future with us. Now if only most posters could realize this
I can't even call this a team right now. This is all everyone looking out for themselves instead of making passes to the ing generational talent. It's absolute bull . This is on purpose. When other teams' broadcast guys start mentioning it, you know it's bad.
I've been asking for a thread like this for a while. It's clear that there is disagreement among some of us as to how much Wemby is being overlooked by the offense, especially when he's in the best position to score. A lot of times, the discussion about this only comes from half-remembered instances, and even when they're remembered fully, instances where we would benefit from being able to reference some footage.
I always feel like a little gross in these arguments, because I'm a pretty strong critic of Pop and one of the folks who has pushed the idea that the talent on the roster is far below the value the Spurs have placed on it. So no, I don't think Pop is doing a good job at any aspect of coaching right now, and I think guys like Vassell, Keldon and especially Branham play the way they do because of bad coaching and inappropriate expectations placed on them. I share many of the overarching issues with many of the most vehement posters. Where I differ is that I don't have any particular bias toward watching Wemby. What I mean by that is that it doesn't bother me if Wemby doesn't touch the ball on a given possession, and I think a lot of fans ONLY get enjoyment out of Wemby playing right now. I'm not here to try to make anyone change what they're enjoying, but I think that reality is causing people to interpret things somewhat irrationally.
For example:
There's nothing wrong with this play. Wemby's not open when Sochan has the ball. Like maybe Victor catches that pass cleanly, but he's 10 feet away from the basket with his man already in position to contest his shot. Rationally speaking, no one should want Wemby to get the ball there. Sochan makes a much better pass to Osman, who actually forces the defense to shift, which legit leaves Wemby wide open for a dunk. I want to be charitable and believe that folks' frustration with the offense is causing them to get mad at a good sequence of ball-movement. This play as nothing to do with who likes who or who is smart enough to pass the ball or whatever else. It has everything to do with the importance of penetration and why an offense that can't reliably force defenders to move isn't going to generate consistent looks. Osman doesn't have the talent to guarantee that he'd draw Wemby's man to him every time he drives. That's why driving is the top aspect the team needs to look at in PGs and why they should have no interest in a guy like Quickley.
It would be really nice to have some video context for the pictures in the OP. As the screenshots from the post with that tweet shows, it's not hard to create a misleading image. The images make it seem like Wemby's wide open under the basket with his man sucked in to try to guard Sochan only for Jeremy to just wildly throw the ball around. The video shows Wemby's quite a bit farther from the basket with his man standing next to him and Sochan hitting the wide-open Osman in position where he can either shoot the three or drive.
That first picture definitely does't look like Wemby's open for a lob. Balls don't just teleport from one player to another. Sochan is going to have to stop, pick the ball up and throw it, and that ball will have to fly through the air and get to Wemby. We're talking about a couple of seconds at least, which is plenty of time for Vuc to get back in that play. That's part of why it's important to get open when players are actually in position to get you the ball and to communicate with the ball-handler so that they know you're going to make a cut. Even just looking at that pic, though, you can rule out a lot of angles. Vuc would be able to recover for a lob pass. (Just real quick: A high lob straight at the basket would be goaltending call, a short pass at the rim is going to get contested. A high away from the rim is somewhat open, but Wemby would face a lot of defensive pressure from whichever helper is on the side the pass goes, and he's still going to have Vuc right next to him. There are places to throw a lob where only Wemby can catch it, but those are low-percentage opportunities, which would cause fans to complain that the pass was bad.) A bounce pass would get picked off by White. A bullet pass might work, but that's not an easy pass to make off the dribble.
The second pic looks like transition. Branham looks like he might've called his own number there when he wasn't supposed to. I'd like a bit more context to know how soon Branham got the ball in his hands. If he'd just started driving off the catch, he needed to show more awareness there. If he brought the ball up and is at that moment in the middle of a run down the court, the pass to Wemby is harder than it looks like. You don't typically throw that kind of lob pass from beyond the three-point line. It's one of those 2K moments, where pressing A basically forces the ball to fly out of your teammate's hands and into yours. I don't know how long that lob angle was going to be there. It might not have even been there by the time the pass was ready to be throne.
Is there a pin function to pin this thread? This would go up to 100+ pages once the season ended.
Wouldn't say SA has any big bargaining power either. The only players that had no choice to play in SA are the thru the draft.
Actually with that clip, Victor is actually open because of his height. We've seen him dunk from that exact point where he would've received the ball. He's right outside of the circle, even with a defender in front of him, Victor is long enough to shoot or dunk over him in that situation. For other players, you're correct, you don't make that pass. But those other players aren't 7'4 with an 8ft reach. That's the part you seem to want to overlook. That's an easy floater, if not, dunk for Vic.
Or a foul at worst, where then he goes to the line. Yes the pass to Osman was good because he was "open" and drove to the basket with a pass off to Vic for a dunk but still, I'll take my chances with Sochan give him that pass close to the basket before that cross court pass while he's in the air. Victor is a magnet down there, even if he couldn't get that shot off, he's showed that he's a good and willing enough passer to get his teammates even better shots because of it. There's no case where Vic shouldn't be touching the ball every offensive possession, if not to score, then to open up shots for others.
At this point EVERYONE is seeing it. Even Trae Young commented on it.
It's ample time "somebody" deals with that issue. We could've won that game in Chicago.
That right there is the issue... Pop acts humble, but deep down he wants to prove that he didn't just win because of Duncan and he wants to be looked at as a coaching genius... That's why he does stuff against conventional wisdom, because doing the obviously right thing will be like "duh... Any coach would do that"... So he does the out of the way thing and hopes it works so he looks like a savant... But when it doesn't work, his ego won't let him do the thing that everyone has been saying he should do because it would make him look bad... So he doubles down... But he can't be fired or talked to by anyone because of his standing... It's really the worst case scenario for Wemby's career... He went to the worst organization he could go to in order to develop/become a superstar...
Don't let pop hear that... He may play Wemby 10 minutes next game
ing truth bomb dropped on Poop and the ters on this team
We can spend the day trying to figure out if Sochan misses him or not, most of the time you will see arguments on both side but bottom line, it is not ok that your franchise player had only 8 FGAs even in 22 mn most of them far from the basket. Sochan may have taken the right decision on that play but it is close, in doubts Victor MUST be the first option period.
I don't believe teammates are freezing him out on purpose, all have individual metrics to achieve but assist is part of it too. The thing is the roster is weak and don't have a great court vision (Vassel is awful at it, Sochan is meh, Keldon is also meh to put it ligthly etc...) To solve dat everybody needs to work together and it is also Victor responsability.
There is a nice interview of Thierry Henry talking about the fact he was complaining all the time to Wenger that team mates were missing him all the time, Wenger pointed it out that he had to understand players preferences, vision, limitations to do the correct runs to ease the work for them.
Victor needs to start be more vocal (there is progress in that regard), he has to impose himself as THE guy but he also needs to pick his spot in function of the ball handler and adapt his runs / screens... Pop needs obviously to back him up and draw more specific plays for him then the team mates really need to step up. They have also to understand that putting numbers on a bad team is not increasing their ing value, they are all role players at best, they are ruining their reputation, they are seen as ing losers not capable to play for the future of a franchise.
A good coach would be lighting his team up for this nonsense.
A good coach would never let this happen
A good coach is something that we don't have.
Not intentional. We’re just young, inexperienced, and don’t have a PG alongside Wemby. Court vision is lower on priority for these guys, they’re just trying not to turn the ball over with their heads down.
This is painful but I’m glad it’s finally out there. Sean made a great point - these guys should treat Vic like a ing bazooka that’s going to give them much easier shots in turn.
Pop should be ashamed of the product he puts on the floor. He should get over himself and step down!
They can get rid of everyone on this team not named Wemby and Vassell tbh
I really do hope Wemby leaves after his contract is up and plays for a team that doesn't hate his guts.
Co sign.
As defenses study Wama, this is going to be a play that happens 60K times in the next 5 years.
Timmy Dunkar got the ball out on the wing and was covered, technically. I mean he was, right? But Duncan scored over the coverage, often with his banker.
Likewise Wemby will score over the defense even if they do front him at the mini circle.
Or when they start to double him he will find the open man.
Ironically he is by far the best passer and playmaker on the team.
There are other players in the NBA who are 7-3, and none of them are dominant scorers. It's not being that height makes you a bad scorer or anything, and I do think Wemby will be a good scorer. But if being that tall meant you were always open and always able to score if you were within 10 feet of the rim, those guys would be better scorers than they are.
Victor was at the elbow, not the charge circle. He's shooting 32 percent from that area of the court (5-9 feet from the basket, according to NBA.com) this year. He's not an automatic bucket from that range, which is annoying because he looked like he was going to be in pre-season. I think when Wemby is in rhythm that you take those risks. But shooting the way he's normally shooting, that's a bad play that people wouldn't want the team to make if it weren't their favorite player in that position.
People should want the Spurs offense to actually create looks for Wemby rather than trying to pretend like Wemby is in his prime and expecting him to be this productive focal point. It's okay for him to be more of a traditional big in terms of his touches so that he builds a foundation of reliable offense that can actually start bending defenses. Wemby's not an efficient scorer unless he's open at the rim. So him free-styling isn't going to bend the defense most of the time. Early in the season when teams didn't have any idea how to guard him, it did cause that much panic. But the initial scouting report has come out, and the Spurs have to start doing other things to counter that. It shouldn't be up to Victor to have to learn to how to free-style past scouting reports. A structured offense should punish teams guarding Wemby too heavily. But that would require better coaching than the Spurs are getting righ tnow.
I feel like most posters have said this already. I know I have, many times.
There’s no disagreement. Ita clear to everyone except for you bro
We can nitpick one or two possessions in one game, or argue how many shots Wemby should get, but it's a fact he's consistently missed on very obvious, wide open opportunities every game, multiple times a game.
i'm a loyal spurs fan and hate to advocate for player turnover just for the sake of it but i assume that the plan for this year was to figure out the pieces that will eventually fit around victor. this current roster might have one other starter in devin but that would be with him as the third or fourth option on the floor. everyone else is either bench material or trade bait.
Chinook in the play you are breaking down, i think you are looking at the pass too late. As soon as wemby slips the screen, a high entry pass should be made toward the backboard. I think you are breaking it down as though the hypothetical pass to wemby comes around the same moment Sochan ends up making the pass to cedi. It wouldn’t be easy to loft in an arching pass with that little space but that’s the advantage of a tall passer like Sochan and it’s why bigs generally have an easy time making high-low passes.
and anyway, still think the later pass to wemby would have been just fine in that spot. Sure, the eventual dunk was a good outcome but you can’t guarantee a magical second opening will happen. Think it would have been good enough position for him even in the muddied paint to just rise up. Wemby struggles to hold position down low, so he rarely gets the ball in those spots. Gotta take those opportunities
Last edited by spurraider21; 12-22-2023 at 11:01 AM.
This misses the mark. Victor is the 1st overall draft pick on a team who's most recent one was Tim Duncan. Are you suggesting that, if it was David Robinson, you'd think the same? You develop your 1st overall pick, especially that one, by hitting him any chance you get. You cannot compare him to others his size, and vs the team he's with he's absolutely the best option especially as open as he is in early to mid transition many times. If he was a terrible FT shooter, that's slightly different, but he's a good FT shooter so it's likely he either scores or gets to the line. You cannot really look at his % yet from the field since his teammates and seemingly his coach don't know how to get him the ball in his spots.
You seem to think "open at the rim" means no one else is in the building. He's not going to bend the defense just by running around flailing his arms while they brick 3s. He needs the ball to generate that.People should want the Spurs offense to actually create looks for Wemby rather than trying to pretend like Wemby is in his prime and expecting him to be this productive focal point. It's okay for him to be more of a traditional big in terms of his touches so that he builds a foundation of reliable offense that can actually start bending defenses. Wemby's not an efficient scorer unless he's open at the rim. So him free-styling isn't going to bend the defense most of the time. Early in the season when teams didn't have any idea how to guard him, it did cause that much panic. But the initial scouting report has come out, and the Spurs have to start doing other things to counter that. It shouldn't be up to Victor to have to learn to how to free-style past scouting reports. A structured offense should punish teams guarding Wemby too heavily. But that would require better coaching than the Spurs are getting righ tnow.
Honestly, I am not sure you're watching the same games.
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