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their a conprender
Golden: Are the Spurs contender or pretender?
Cedric Golden, Commentary
statesman.com
Tony Parker looked like money in a tailored suit with an open-collared look on Wednesday night.
The San Antonio point guard is not unlike any NBA player. He's rich, well dressed, and living a dream lifestyle.
All is well except for one thing: Parker's not playing. Nice suits are supposed to be hanging in the locker room one hour before tip-off. Parker was wearing his threads.
That broken shooting hand is still a couple of weeks away from being game ready and the Spurs are less one All-Star point guard as a result. Who wouldn't miss a guard who is averaging 16.5 points and 5.7 assists per game? Still, the Spurs have held it together without one of the Big 3.
Give them credit for their effort against the Lakers on Wednesday.
The 92-83 loss wasn't unexpected since L.A. is a serious threat to defend its world le — and boy did Kobe Bryant and the Lakers' defense turn it on in the fourth quarter — but it showed that the Spurs aren't about to pack it in down the stretch. Despite the loss, San Antonio is playing great ball. While the Spurs aren't the terror they were five years ago, they will be a tough out in the postseason, assuming coach Gregg Popovich has plenty of WD-40 to keep those old legs fresh.
While the teams behind the Lakers in the West (Dallas and Denver) are no joke, the Spurs would much rather avoid that 1-8 first-round matchup, a series against L.A., and the resulting playoff cameo.
At 43-27, which puts them in seventh place in the West, the Spurs are in position to avoid the Lakers altogether because they're playing free and easy at the right time of the season, even if Tim Duncan scored only six points in a game this team needed.
Assuming they finish in the top seven in the West, here are three reasons the Spurs, despite an obvious lack of depth, can make some noise in the postseason:
George Hill: Popovich constantly reminds the 24-year-old Hill to stay aggressive and not think he has to defer to his more seasoned teammates. And the kid's listening. With Parker expected to return for the last week of the regular season, the former shooting guard has moved over to the point and given the team a much needed offensive boost.
On Wednesday, Hill handed Derek Fisher 20 first-half points, a few days after he lit up the Thunder for 27 that included a goose egg in the assist column. That prompted Duncan to shout, "We already have one point guard who can't pass'' within earshot of San Antonio Express-News columnist Buck Harvey. I hope he was kidding. Hill did fade in the second half against L.A., but his recent solid play can only help when Parker returns.
Manu Ginobili:At this time last year, Ginobili was the walking wounded. It's amazing what a good surgeon and some rest can do for a basketball player.
Now he's playing some of the best ball of his career. Ginobili looks great at the shooting guard and he shows no signs of slowing with the playoffs coming up. Wednesday he took his turn at guarding Kobe Bryant while scoring 24.
With his agent shooting down rumors this week that he will leave San Antonio to play for Real Madrid, the soon-to-be 33-year-old has fresh legs and a first step that can still befuddle defenders.
Tim Duncan: The numbers are down from his career averages of 21.2 points and 11.6 rebounds, but he's healthy. That bulky knee brace he wore in the preseason exhibition against Oklahoma City was just precautionary and getting him to the money games in one piece is Pop's top priority.
With San Antonio's seeding issues, he can't afford to rest Duncan on the second night of back-to-back games, so we'll keep a close eye on Timmy's gas tank. While he is in decline, Duncan will play better with a day's rest between playoff games.
So the Spurs can win 50 games this year and maybe a playoff series that's not against the Lakers, but that doesn't mean they are capable of navigating the turbulent West waters for another NBA Finals appearance.
Their first order of business is to make sure Duncan, Ginobili and Parker are healthy for the postseason. Pop has always been a master of minutes and in the past he's been able to rest his older stars down the stretch, but that strategy will be compromised in the coming weeks because the Spurs have to keep winning to ensure they avoid that No. 8 seed, a first-round meeting with the Lakers, the league's deepest club.
We will soon find out how good the Spurs are because they just began a gauntlet of a schedule that can best be described as bloody. On Friday, soon-to-be MVP LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers will make their lone appearance in San Antonio. As if that were not enough, the Spurs travel to Boston on Sunday to play an aged team that's found its stroke of late. When that's over, they still have road games remaining against the Lakers, Nuggets and Mavericks.
No longer a huge threat to win a le, the Spurs remain a dangerous out.
How dangerous depends on where they're seeded.
their a conprender
The Spurs are a good team that can make it as far as the WCF if everything comes together(meaning the big 3+ RJ and Hill are all healthy and playing well) and Kenyon Martin stays hurt, but will most likely be out in the 1st round in a tough series if they play anybody but LA..
tony going down with the broken hand was really unfortunate... our potential is pretty up in the air just like its been all year long. hopefully we can figure something out though.
All that text and all he's saying is the spurs can still make noise in the west.
DONE, we are done..... No noise at all coming out of this team.
The Spurs are mediocre. They're in the middle of the pack, as far as NBA teams go. Their record screams this fact loudly. Mediocre teams do not suddenly catch fire and extend their playoff lives. Teams must have momentum (and talent) heading into the playoffs. As such, the Spurs will be one-and-done come playoff time.
The treadmill of mediocrity is the LAST place an organization needs to be. If you're not getting better, you're getting worse.
I was thinking this way for the past month, but it's not going to happen. If Duncan is in this bad of shape now, just think what type of shape he'll be in close to a month from now in the playoffs. Also, the increased minutes he'll be taking on. The front line wasn't good enough with him dominating in the first half of the season.
I don't see how they could win a round because of the inability of their veterans to sustain the requisite energy level needed from game to game in order to do so and because their so-called shooters can't make a ing shot against good teams.
Just look at the majority of the wins against quality opposition this season, it literally took everything the Spurs had to pull them out. I can't imagine them beating one of those teams four times that way and as we all know, they're terrible in close games.
How about Both!!
i think its about time the fans t hat do attend the games wear paperbags to protest against pops coachin
and yet this team has played a total of 2-3 games together as a completely healthy unit....
Even if the squad was healthy, what help is Tim going to get in the paint against the elite frontlines in the league? Our frontcourt consists of an undersized rookie, a stretch 4 that can't do jack besides making open threes against lottery teams, and a washed-up/has-been in Dice. Even worse is that SA is giving 20+ minutes a game to one of the worst players in the league(Bogans) and expecting him to be our defensive stopper.
This is a poorly constructed squad. The blame HAS to fall on Buford and Pop. Doesn't help that Holt probably clamped down on the FO, making it nearly impossible to improve this team through a trade.
were definitely to small in the paint. I believe that also especially against teams like LA,Clev,Orl but saying that doesnt mean we wont be able to make a splash or make it interesting.
This team has really not played but a couple games when everyone is healthy and thats the sad part but at the same time the part that keeps giving everyone some sort of hope.
Dude, what have you been watching all season? This team cannot defend; it goes on inexplicable scoring droughts; they're regularly giving away a -load offensive rebounds; AND they cannot hold leads. They also have a losing record against the NBA's top teams. Regardless of who's been in and out of the lineup, this team is simply mediocre.
There is no quick-fix, lightening-in-a-bottle solution. The Spurs are not going to fare any better once the playoffs start. This is the hand that has been dealt for this season.
i didnt say we were going to win the ing championship..just implying that we might be able to make it out of the first round or something. damn. sorry for being optimistic.
This team cracks under pressure. Gone are the days when the spurs put fear into the opposition. Bonner, Mason, and Bogans have no business being on the court when the game is on the line. They're just paper thin and when it comes time to rest TD and Manu, the players on the floor seem to lose all sense of purpose. People continue to fraternize over the defense as the main culprit, but the offense is just as bad. Outside of Ginobili on certain nights, they really have no goto guy late in the fourth quarter. Players like G. Hill and Blair are too young and inexperienced to deliver in crunch time of big games. Others like Bonner and Bogans really have no business playing crucial minutes in a big game for a team with championship aspirations.
I have been saying this since the beginning of the season and I will continue to repeat this til I'm blue in the face, RJ will NEVER be a factor in a big game because he is NOT a big game player. He will NEVER put this team or any team over the top.
TD has been pushed to his breaking point. The Spurs blew a golden opportunity earlier in the season to push ahead with an easy schedule. This would of afforded them the opportunity to rest Duncan on B2B's, but the Spurs can ill afford to rest him with the season hanging in the balance. Everybody casted stones at the pessimists quoting "Its only December", "Its only January", "Yeah, like championships are won in February". Well, now its March, and the Spurs Championships are dashed because the big three has been reduced to the big one.
People expect Parker to come back and give the Spurs another option after sitting on his laurels for six weeks. It doesnt work like that. Bonner didn't find his stroke for nearly a month after coming back, and Derek Anderson, arriviving for the playoffs, never found his shooting touch as the spurs were ousted by the jazz.
It should be obvious to one and all, they have neither the talent, nor in some cases, the cranial capacity to beat the elite teams in the west. The Spurs will be first round fodder for whoever they face in the first round. Thats just the facts of life.
Richard Jefferson is beyond horrible. How do you leave Kobe wide open beyond the arc with 3 minutes left in the game. is what 30 years old and doesn't understand how to properly rotate on defense. The Spurs are boned.
Doesn't help that Timmy can barely run up and down the court. He was visibly grimacing trying to catch up to Pau when running the floor.
...............
Pretender with Pop giving crucial minutes to the wrong players.
I've been a head against Mason and I stand by it. I hope he .................no thats wrong...I hope he sacrifices himself on the inactive list for the betterment of the team.
Pop doesn't give this team their best chance to win with the product he puts on the floor in certain situations. Til that does happen then you can analyze more proficiently.
1. How Far Can the Spurs Go?
By Tim Legler
ESPN Daily Dime
http://espn.go.com/nba/dailydime/_/p...324/daily-dime
The popular mindset surrounding the chance of the San Antonio Spurs making another run at a le is that Tim Duncan and his cast of veteran mainstays will be a speed bump in someone's path to the NBA Finals.
It is difficult to make a case to the contrary based on the lack of success the Spurs have enjoyed versus the NBA's elite teams this season. After falling to the Lakers, 92-83 on Wednesday night, the Spurs are an anemic 5-15 against the nine NBA teams currently holding a better record. The Lakers used suffocating defense in the second half and just enough scoring from Kobe Bryant (24 points) to rally for their seventh straight victory.
So, the debate that will be settled over the next month and a half is whether we are watching the Spurs play out the end of a decade in which they have set the gold standard for team excellence, or if they can muster one last adrenaline fueled run and make themselves a real factor in the Western Conference playoffs.
Whether they can extend their season beyond one round really depends on where they end up being seeded. As long as they avoid the eight spot and a first-round match-up with the Lakers, they will be compe ive against the Mavericks, Nuggets or Jazz. Now, I understand that my saying they can be merely "compe ive" is hardly a ringing endorsement for a fifth championship parade. However, that's where it gets interesting.
Is there really anyone out there who is so blown away by the championship qualities of Dallas, Denver, or Utah that they are willing to dismiss the chances of the Spurs getting past two of these teams if the pairings play out in that manner?
The word "compe ive" implies that the Spurs will be in every game. Under that scenario, the Spurs will put themselves in a position to allow their money players to dictate the outcomes of critical games with precise decision-making and game changing playmaking under the most intense pressure that NBA players can possibly experience. If they can just get to those moments, Gregg Popovich likes his chances. The Spurs deserve the benefit of the doubt. Their sustained excellence has earned the expectation that this core group, a collection of winners, can make things very interesting for the top seeds in the West.
The Mavericks are more complete. The Nuggets are more explosive and athletic. The Jazz are more relentless. All of those teams have been more consistent, healthier, and deeper than the Spurs all season long. And that may very well carry over to the postseason. If it does, the loud noise you hear will be the window of championship opportunity slamming shut on the Duncan era. This is it.
To be honest, no one knows what to expect. There are more questions than answers. Will Tony Parker be healthy? Can Dejuan Blair and George Hill give them an infusion of energy? Will Richard Jefferson ever find a comfort zone? Will Duncan and Ginobilli have the stamina to get through the grind of a long series or two? Are they simply too old and too slow?
The fun for this team begins April 15th, the day after the season ends. That's when we get answers. That's when the San Antonio Spurs wake up and find themselves preparing for the only time of the year that really matters to them. Perhaps, if we are lucky, the Spurs will give us one more ride. If not, the memories they have created will forever be indelibly etched into our minds. Either way, we all win.
Tim Legler is a regular Daily Dime contributor.
duncan looks fine but he needs rest between games. spurs have had a tough stretch and tonight was the 6th game in 9 nights so you could tell he was tired out there and definitely not himself but good thing there is no b2b in the playoffs.
Welcome to the Nexus! Whatever will be, will be.
The sad part is....
That will never happen.
Let's all just blame Pop in advance.
nice read.
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