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It's obvious that JA has struggled getting out of the gate this year. Most think it has been a lack of confidence. I was wondering whether it could possibly be due to the fact that he may not necessarily be 100% healthy?
What I don't understand is how Neal gets a pass on defense. He defense is just completely awful. For as much as he scores he gives up just as many points and how many and 1s have weve seen him give trying to take a charge? Not to mention he can shoot our team out of the game at times. Isn't neals contract ending after this year? I would pay JA over Neal because some team is gonna overpay for Neal anyways. I don't think the spurs will keep both.
It's obvious that JA has struggled getting out of the gate this year. Most think it has been a lack of confidence. I was wondering whether it could possibly be due to the fact that he may not necessarily be 100% healthy?
Green is more than just a hustle player and he will become our best defender along with KL. No way I'm trading Green at this point since he has shown a lot of potential. I would also pick up the option of JA and trade RJ if the the deal provides younger talent and/or a draft pick. RJ is having a pretty good year and if it continues, his trade value should increase.
I think they give him another year, considering the option on him is only $1.5 million and there's no way Tim is going to be pulling down $21 million next season (so no luxury tax problems). Plus his trade value is going to be way too low to move him.
They definitely should pick up his option. As underwhelming as he's been, it wasn't that long ago that he was being built up, from Parker, to Dudley, to reports about how impressed the Spurs were with him, to the point that it made trading Hill somewhat easier. You don't go from that to potentially discarding a player that quickly. I realize not picking up the option doesn't mean they won't necessarily keep him, but it makes no sense to cut him loose. He's a cheap asset. And if they're on the verge of something big next off season and they need a bit more cap space, he'll be easy to move.
But just as they definitely should pick up his option, so too should they package him with Blair and their 1st, in the hopes of landing the type of two-way power forward this team desperately needs. I've been mentioning Davis recently. But another player they should look into is Markieff Morris. He doesn't have the defensive upside of Davis, but he's more polished and well rounded, so he'd be of more use in the short term.
There are 2 other significant factors aside from the entry of the 3 studs (kawhi, Green & Neal) and that is Manu’s emergence as the Spurs best player and RJ’s comeback and reinventing himself as a dependable shooter. Things really don’t look good for James as a 6th wheel among wing players. I say keep the option but look for a decent trade.
Ed Davis or Markieff Morris for a player who can't pass a physical (and, even if the team waives the physical, can't get insured), a player with negative value and a late first round pick? Uh, yeah, no, that's not going to happen
i think the spurs will keep JA because they were really high on him when they traded hill to the pacers.
If you had an ounce of reading comprehension, you'd realize I never said it was going to happen. What I said was, they should offer that around for them and other two-way power forwards.Ed Davis or Markieff Morris for a player who can't pass a physical (and, even if the team waives the physical, can't get insured), a player with negative value and a late first round pick? Uh, yeah, no, that's not going to happen
So the Spurs should go around making ridiculous trade proposals ... for the fun of it?
So those qualify as ridiculous because you said they did? You act as if I proposed a Blair for Howard trade. It's easy to laugh now, but less than a month ago if I'd have proposed that for Morris, I'd have probably been told that that's a vast overpayment by the Spurs.
I think people underestimate the Spurs trade assets. They're not great by any stretch and individually, they wouldn't fetch a whole lot, but together, that's a pretty intriguing package. We all nitpick Blair's many shortcomings, because he's miscast in his role, particularly for a team presumably attempting to contend, but the fact is the guy has a PER over 20 and makes less than $1 million. That's outstanding bang for the buck. Anderson, at worst should be able to become a shooter or a depth scorer off the bench. And a 1st round pick, especially in this draft, will have solid value. That's not as bad as some make it seem.
Dude has potential. He showed it last year and apparently had a good training camp this year. No way you just toss the draft pick away. Give him another year and at worst try and package him into some trade if it comes down to it. Can't believe people just want to cut him loose already. As deep as we are at SG it's gonna take him some time to get enough burn to develop.
Precisely what I was afraid would happen. Now look at the state of the Spurs frontline.
There's an interesting, potentially subtle jab that Pop threw out about Anderson in a recent article about the spurs on nba.com
http://www.nba.com/2012/news/feature...ury/index.html
Spurs may actually benefit from Ginobili's latest injury
Timing, of course, is everything.
So when the Warriors were running, shooting, making and pushing the Spurs toward the cliff, it was only natural that the TV cameras found Manu Ginobili.
He is, after all, the rope, the life preserver, the St. Bernard with a keg of whiskey tied to his collar that is usually there to stop the Spurs from going over the edge.
Except that this time Ginobili was sitting in the row behind the bench, wearing a brown jacket and plaid shirt, hours away from surgery to fix a broken bone in his left hand rather than minutes away from leading one more comeback.
This is how it will be in San Antonio for the next two months as the Spurs play without the straw that stirs their drink. If, as expected, Ginobili is forced to sit out eight weeks of a condensed schedule that's packed tighter than J-Lo's jeans, he would miss 33 games, exactly one-half of the regular season.
Backup point guard T.J. Ford might have to perform like the No. 8 overall draft pick he once was. A vagabond named Danny Green, who had played all of 28 games in his first two NBA seasons, might have to undergo a nightly transformation like the one that had him hustling on defense, hurtling around the court and making key shots down the stretch.
Danu Greenobili?
On one injured hand, it's the last thing a team like the Spurs could seem to afford with a three-man core that has logged almost as many miles as the space shuttle and is also inching toward a place in the retirement hangar.
But on a healed and repaired other hand, there could be a backdoor benefit down the line -- a rested Ginobili.
Timing is everything and what was supposed to be an early showdown tonight between rivals Dallas and San Antonio when the post-lockout schedule came out, now has both teams looking to reset their watches. While the defending champion Mavericks and all of their new faces pin their hopes on the day ahead when they can have a practice that won't require nametags and introductions, the Spurs are already looking to Daylight Savings Time when Ginobili could be firmly back into their rotation.
Just last week in Houston, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich was reflecting on how the Spurs took every necessary step and precaution to monitor the minutes and the health of Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Ginobili through all of last season, only to have Duncan tweak an ankle in the 76th game and Ginobili injure an elbow in the final game.
"Not good injury management, was it?" Popovich said with a wry smile, shaking his head.
It only hurt worse when the No. 1 seed Spurs promptly went out and got themselves knocked off by the No. 8 seed Grizzlies, once more a supposed sign that their days as real championship contenders were in the rear view mirror.
The truth is, since winning the last of their four NBA les in 2007, Ginobili has not entered the playoffs with a healthy body. That's to be expected when you spend the large part of most games hurling your body onto almost every inch of the court, twisting for shots, diving for loose balls and reaching and slapping to make steals, which is exactly how he suffered this break of the fifth metacarpal bone on Monday night in Minnesota.
The instant collective reaction in San Antonio was the kind of gasp that comes from another punch in the gut. After all, Ginobili suffered with a bad ankle all through the 2007-08 season and then had it finally break when he was trying to make a play at the Beijing Olympics. He came back and suffered a stress fracture in the other foot during the 2008-09 season. Then he picked up a broken nose in the first round of the 2010 playoffs and broke a bone in his elbow that severely limited his ability to play in the loss to Memphis last spring. Now this.
"We're going to play a long time without Manu," Parker said.
But maybe it doesn't mean the Spurs' expectations have to take a long fall. Now rookie Kawhi Leonard and second-year man James Anderson will get their chances to step into the gaping hole in the lineup.
"I would be careful to go too far in that direction," Popovich said. "I think this will require veterans like Duncan and Parker and (Richard) Jefferson to step up their games. I wouldn't say you put it all on Kawhi Leonard and...what's the other guy's name?"
With the Western Conference in such a state of flux and no team yet separating itself from the field ala Miami and Chicago in the East, it is not too far-fetched to think the Spurs can remain in the mix without their fire-starter. And if they can't, was it ever realistic to think that Ginobili was going to carry them all the way to The Finals anyway?
The Spurs beat Golden State for the 27th consecutive time at home on Wednesday night not just because they managed just enough pop in the absence of their firecracker.
His teammates could slump back and wonder why fate slapped them again now. Or stand up and get ready for when Ginobili's fresh legs return in time for the playoffs to a league that is tired and worn out from the crushing schedule.
Better injury management?
Nobody, of course, knows like the Spurs that timing is everything.
==============================================
"...what's the other guy's name?" Really? Is this Pop's way of indirectly saying he's been disappointed with a largely unproductive/invisible Anderson this season?
Could be. Would have to see the context.
Hmmmm. Very interesting comment from our smart-alecky coach. Sending a subtle message to JA perhaps?
Just give him time.
Who considered Leonard a shooter? I don't remember that from any scouting reports.
Not sure how subtle the jab was. The article is from just after the Warrior game where Anderson got the start in Manu's absence.
Now check out his game log and look what happened to his minutes after that game:
http://www.basketball-reference.com/.../gamelog/2012/
That sounds bad but the quote was back from the morning of Jan. 4th. At that point, JA hadn't really begun to suck yet and was still in the rotation. I think Pop just forgot his name, tbh.But maybe it doesn't mean the Spurs' expectations have to take a long fall. Now rookie Kawhi Leonard and second-year man James Anderson will get their chances to step into the gaping hole in the lineup.
"I would be careful to go too far in that direction," Popovich said. "I think this will require veterans like Duncan and Parker and (Richard) Jefferson to step up their games. I wouldn't say you put it all on Kawhi Leonard and...what's the other guy's name?"
IIRC, the quote was from before the Warriors game. Let me see if I can find it . . .
My bad. I meant to write he wasn't considered to be a shooter coming out of college. Thank you for picking up on that so I could explain. It made no sense.
Could be. I made an assumption based on the first paragraph of the article which referenced the Warrior game.
The quote could very well have been from the day prior or from shootaround the day of.
In considering what role James Anderson will/should play for the Spurs going forward, we should look at the outlook for the team.
In the Spurs system we really don't have a deliniation between SG and SF but just "wing" players. Essentially, all wings have the same basic duties and are expected to be able to hit the 3 on occasion at least.
The players that are currently on the roster are the same ones that should be on the roster next season.
Manu Ginobili (1 more season)
Kawhi Leonard (3 more seasons, restricted)
Richard Jefferson (2 more seasons)
Danny Green (Restricted Free Agent)
Gary Neal (1 more season, restricted?)
James Anderson (2 more seasons, restricted)
Looking at this list I'd say that it's probably a safe assumption that we can simply delete Richard Jefferson next offseason. RJ looks to be a sure fire amnesty casualty made possible mostly by Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green's emergence. Oh, and I don't think it'll be too hard to retain Danny either.
With 96 rotation minutes available per game, I could easily see the minutes pan out like this:
Ginobili - 28
Leonard - 30
Green - 19
Neal - 19
Anderson - 0
Honestly, Leonard might command more than just 30 minutes (and he may steal some extra minutes as a small ball 4) but in order to get other game changers in he'll have to play a more reasonable number of minutes. Likewise, Ginobili could easily command more minutes, but hes always been at his best playing just south of 30. This will be good for him going forward, and if the minutes need to be reduced even further, Green and Neal could easily add 5-10 more each.
If history is any indication though, I would guess that Manu will probably spend several weeks in a suit next year as he always seems to get beat up throughout the process of the year. With him on the bench the Spurs could look to either ramp up the playing time of the other wings (Leonard, Neal, Green) or they could bring Anderson into the rotation. This would really be Anderson's best shot at playing consistent minutes next season since, without a serious decline in one of the other players or a mind-numbing improvement on his part, I don't see him leaping over any of them.
So does Anderson warrant a roster spot as an injury reserve? Surely the Spurs would sign a 5th wing if Anderson were traded away. But a bargain bin veteran, signed for the minimum, would actually cost slightly less than James.
I think the plan of resigning Green and trading Anderson probably makes more sense. Sign a veteran SG and roll into next season with this as your wing rotation:
Ginobili
Leonard
Green
Neal
Veteran Minimum Depth
Provided Anderson isn't damage goods because of his foot, the wise move is to pick his option. The main reason to do it is because it isn't a lot of money. When a team can keep a promising young player for little money, they must do it. That's just some basic good management.
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