Agreed. You could see his energy was inspiring the rest of the team.
Pop earned his reputation playing a certain style of basketball. That style depended (in part) on having a HOF player as a 6TH MAN. That is an important part of the Spurs' system. Going forward I believe he will depend on that style as much as he can. So, I believe Pop will try hard to bring the Juice back to play the Manu role.
I was really impressed with Simmons. I don't think this is a fluke. He isn't a starter in my eyes, but no worse than 10th man for sure. Have to find a way to keep him and Patty.
Hopefully
Guys Patty Mills has made a total of $14 million in his career per bbreference.
To put that in perspective that Eric Gordon made $12m this year and Ryan Anderson $18m (plus another $60m on the books).
I absolutely believe Mills should max out whatever contract he can get because he's en led to it with his play, work ethic, and consummate at ude.
More crazy figures - these guys made more this season than the $14m career earnings for Mills:
$22m Chandler Parsons
$22m Nick Batum
$18m Ryan Anderson
$18m Allen Crabbe
$18m Luol Deng
$17m Tobias Harris
$17m Evan Fournier
$17m B Biyombo
$16m Evan Turner
$16m T Mozgov
$16m Ian Mahinmi
$15m Kent Bazemore
Collectively those guys bring less value to a team like the Spurs than Mills. Would you want any of them on the roster?
Sure he quit - and almost from the opening tip. The big question is Why?
Honestly, I like several of those guys - just not at their respective price tags.
Because he's in the driver's seat in Houston. He weighs the consequences vs reward and decided he wasn't going to work too hard to get this team to a game 7 in San Antonio. Twice they've given SA a battle in the AT&T center, and should have won both (only won the 1st) and yet they lost the home court advantage they had almost immediately. He's a guy who works to party. He has enough money to do that. Look at who's attracted to Khloe Kardashian.. quitters. Lamar quit in Dallas, he only wanted to party and s until he died. James is the same way, just a better player. When the screws tighten on either of them, they fold. You could make a solid living by betting that Odom would always miss one of the two FTs the Lakers needed in late game situations. You can bet the same money that James will go catatonic in tough situations. If he cannot bait the refs and get easy looks from the FT line, he's going to hurl threes with some "look at me" dance up top, covered by a 7 footer. He's going to attack the rim on downhill runs from time to time, but he's going to invariably go placid and just walk the ball up, pass it to the wing and hang around up top until the play is done. On defense he's going to usually stand around looking for a rebound. He learned that in OKC. He learned all of it in OKC. Once Mike had him play big minutes and guard big guys when it mattered, Harden simply quit. He saw his road and decided it was too hard, and he could smell the cannabis and the pussy waiting for him at home, so the soft piece of folded like soft does and he tried to pin it on his team by deferring. It didn't work.
that is what I am thinking too, thanks for clarifying that.
Dedmon is probably gone unless he opts in. He has also fallen so far out of the rotation that he's only playing garbage time right now. I don't think he's viewed as a must keep guy.
Wow, maybe you are right. But if that's so, it seems like (thankfully) a pretty rare and bizarre character for a pro athlete.
Many of those players were signed last season, that was an fluky off season. Not really fair to compare their contracts. Cap jumped $24 million then, projected to only jump $8 million now.
I could see him re-upping for 3 years, $40 million and continuing on as the starting PG for now on.
In fact I think PATFO sees him as a get-rid-of guy.
I doubt that very much but we shall see.
It doesn't make sense for him to take a short deal bc he's going to be 28 and never gotten paid $. His game depends on elite athleticism. IMO he needs to go for the big contract right now. Frankly, there might not be another, considering. It makes no sense whatsoever to give discounts at his age and situation. He needs to get paid right now.
Someone here said he was bipolar. I'd believe it. He seems prone to passive aggressive acts like the one we saw last night. Kobe did the same thing against the Suns. He was forgiven.
I think they will try to keep him too.
We shall see.
I think they want Patty as well.
In fact it looks like a stand pat situation.. team got to the WCF and from here on out, things are gravy. They are not fully healthy and GSW was going to be tough regardless... so I am now more inclined to think Spurs want to keep their most important FA this offseason than go chasing waterfalls... (for better or worse).
It's crazy guys expect them to give discounts. heh.
Patty only a total of $14 million and
Simmons barely what? $1.2 mill or something.
Nah these guys are getting paid. We shall see what happens but I don't expect a discount....
The Spurs will have to make a choice between Simmons and Dedmon before free agency begins. If they want to keep Dedmon it's almost impossible to hold on to Simmons, since he is Early Bird and the Spurs would be limited to offering him $4.8 million or so for the first year. I imagine Simmons could pull $6-$7 million a year starting on the open market. The Spurs can offer about $7.1 million starting if they renounce Dedmon while still being able to re-sign Mills, assuming Lee and Gasol don't opt out. I imagine they'll choose Simmons since they'll desperately need him with Manu's likely retirement.
Is Simmons really a Manu replacement, though? I understand that was the goal when he showed promise in year 1, but his playmaking is very poor and he was extremely inefficient at scoring, all year, despite playing against bench players and scrubs..
The only consistent facet of his game has been his defense, where he's one of the best in the league at his position..
I love me some Simmons but he is not worth the money he's gonna get, tbh.
posted a few months ago that i think patty stays and simmons doesn't...
With ginobili returning I would think we could keep our team. Do we want to though... I'm guessing we do whatever we can to get Chris Paul.
If you let him walk you're probably going to be stuck with old ring chasers on their last legs. You pretty much have to assume Parker misses the season, and the thought of some Jason Terry type being the fourth guard is pretty frightening.
lot of bad front offices out there.
I would rather have a ring chaser that can shoot for the vet minimum than Simmons for the money he's going to get. To fill the athletic young quota draft a couple of wings with a higher celing than Simmons, imho.
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