RJ and Pop's biggest mistake

[ducks]

jermaine O'Neal committed to the Pacers before they went after kidd.


wrong again.

wrong

[twilo73]

I guess loyalty plays a part of their decision making, but I think their conservative approach to roster decisions is a bigger one i.e. they aren't big risk takers. They like to stick with what works and go with known quan ies rather than gamble on players who may have a bigger payoff.

I think you expressed what I wanted to say in my original post best. Thanks!! They go with what they had the year before without looking to IMPROVE on it. It is hard enought to repeat but doing without improving makes it almost impossible. There is a reason why we haven't won two in a row.... and this is it.

I agree with the above, but the Spurs have done well for themselves. We have won three championships since our first in 1999. The mistakes are obvious now, but back then, some of those didn't seem like mistakes.

We have won all three Championships since 1999 because we made two very good draft choices (Parker and Manu), one very good free agent signing (Bowen), and we have a very good coach, everything else I think has been OK at best.

Look I love Pop and I respect RC, but we hands down haven't made great choices in the free agent market and the draft.

In fact I'll go on the record in saying that it is a miracle or a tribute to Parker, Manu, Duncan, Bowen, and Pop that we have actually won three more Championships since the first one.

And for those who say hind sight is 20/20 I'm sure most of you knew (and I read it here so you can't say no) that we needed to get younger and needed a quality swingman and center even after winning last year... then we go and resign Bonner, Vaughn and Oberto. I remember reading a lot of people's post complaining about these moves... we knew it... RC should have known it too. We just didn't make any move to improve our weaknesses at all.

[timvp]

What does Air Gay have to do with any of this?

[MaNu4Tres]

Jermaine didn't sign any extension prior to free agency. Spurs could have sent out Pop and the crew to recruit him but their sights were on Jason Kidd. That was obvious.

[Mr.Bottomtooth]

What does Air Gay have to do with any of this?

That's sig material right there.

[mrspurs]

except for jackson, cos he of course didnt want to come back..the rest of the players i agree on.....fab has been our biggest waste of time...its hard to make sense of fab, as a fan and player of the sport, its easy to see he is very smart for a big, plays all out every play, but its sad to say he is nothing more then a tall smart choke artist...if any of the other bigs named had as much basketball smarts as he we wouldnt be writing about this thread.....

[The Truth #6]

Many of what now is considered a failure was seen as a success at the time. The Butler signing was seen as a great savvy move at the time. As was the Hedo/Mercer acquisition. Butler ended up sucking but he had great potential at the time. As did Hedo.

Letting Sjax walk was dumb at the time in my opinion but Pop prefers foreigners always and so he went with Hedo. Hedo came on late in the regular season but he, like others, choked in the Lakers series. He became the goat and took off to the beach.

We signed Rasho because Tim didn't want to play center. Pop probably wanted to make Tim happy so he hauled ass over to Slovenia to sign him as soon as possible. I never liked Rasho, but there was some logic behind it. Who was our other choice for center that offspring - Candyman Olowakandi. An even worse loser. Hey, it wasn't a good Summer for centers.

Bonner's last contract was bad. I think the FO wanted to get it done quick and go on vacation. No other way to explain that off-season, especially considering Scola but they thought they had Splitter so at the time there were some who were cool with it. I think it was dumb like the Sjax situation but there was a backup plan. Bad luck with a crumbling US dollar killed that plan. Not exactly Pop's fault. Who knows, maybe Holt should have sold more tractors?

In all, most of these decisions have been the result of a consistent philosophy the FO practices. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

This Summer will be the real test of what the FO can or can't do. If they can't adapt, then our window will close sooner then we'd like.

[Appoggiatura]

Pop summed it up about Rasho when he called him a "cupcake" to the media.

[twilo73]

This Summer will be the real test of what the FO can or can't do. If they can't adapt, then our window will close sooner then we'd like.

Agreed and can we all agree that they have to pull some magic out of their behinds as this team needs at least 4 or 5 new faces to compete next year.

[T Park]

4 or 5?

What the ?

[twilo73]

4 or 5?

What the ?

I'm not saying 4 or 5 stars... 2 good players... one a swingman and the other a post guy.... and the other two or three young guys to infuse some youth into this team for the end of the bench.

[bigdog]

Jermaine O'Neal was a target for the Spurs, and they definitely did go after him.

He had a visit scheduled for San Antonio, but once Indiana found out about it, they offered him a huge contract the day before the visit and he signed it, so the visit was cancelled.

Jax was offered a contract, but he wanted more, and ended up taking less.
Now he is well worth the money he wanted in the first place, which looks bad on the Spurs part, but it's ok that was the past.

[T Park]

I'm not saying 4 or 5 stars... 2 good players... one a swingman and the other a post guy.... and the other two or three young guys to infuse some youth into this team for the end of the bench.

Mahinmi has already filled the post guy one.

What good does Youth do at the end of the bench as opposed to some veterans.

[jcrod]

Jermaine O'Neal was a target for the Spurs, and they definitely did go after him.

He had a visit scheduled for San Antonio, but once Indiana found out about it, they offered him a huge contract the day before the visit and he signed it, so the visit was cancelled.

Jax was offered a contract, but he wanted more, and ended up taking less.
Now he is well worth the money he wanted in the first place, which looks bad on the Spurs part, but it's ok that was the past.

The point was they went after Kidd hard, fast, and first. Do you think JO was flattered he was second? They would've had a chance if they went for him first (no time for IND to stop visit).

Yes they offered him 3 a yr, he wanted 5 a yr, they wouldn't negotiate above 3. Having SJ at 5 a yr would be a steal.

[jcrod]

Mahinmi has already filled the post guy one.

What good does Youth do at the end of the bench as opposed to some veterans.

Young veterans.....happy.