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Manu and Blair work really well together off the bench. They have great chemistry on the screen/pick and roll. Manu is a great passer and Blair is learning that if he keeps his eyes open Manu will get him the ball.
Dont break up this duo.
Copter, which guys weren't ready to play in Phoenix? I didn't see the game and would be interested to hear your opinion. Thanks.
Manu and Blair work really well together off the bench. They have great chemistry on the screen/pick and roll. Manu is a great passer and Blair is learning that if he keeps his eyes open Manu will get him the ball.
Dont break up this duo.
The biggest frustration so far is inconsistency. One day we destroy Boston at the rebounds, the other day we have been killed by the bulls then TOs then 3s then Defense then Offense the RJ then TP then Manu then the passing etc etc... but the day we put all together we will be a strong team. This is the positive thing about this team there is not a single recurrent weakness.
Everyone not named Duncan in the starting 5 came out really flat. What folks watching on TV didn't see was Pop blowing up on these guys when he pulled them out. I have to hand it to Mason, Hill, Bonner and Blair because they came in and played with purpose. Parker's -28 and Jefferson's -22 were no coincidence in that game...they were horrible. Parker passed on a couple of opportunities to go after loose balls which really got under my (and Pop's) skin. McDyess didn't look like he belonged on the court at all.
Effort was lacking from the starters. And I saw nothing from Bogans that made me think he's a capable starter for a championship caliber team.
The sad part is that, man for man, the Spurs have much better players than the Suns, some of the guys just weren't putting forth the effort.
People can spin it all they want, but what I saw, and what I could tell that Pop saw from the chewing he gave several of the guys, was that they didn't want it very badly. He wasn't tearing into them because they were the worse team. The Spurs can play 10X better than they did that night.
I, like most of you, appreciate the hustle and intensity of Blair. Is anyone concerned @ his height, as a 6-foot-7 center is unheard of. He obviously brings fire to the game all the time and does play especially well with Manu off the bench.
the main drawback of blair starting is that he's a rookie, and as we saw against PHX he gets no love from the refs and is apt to pick up fouls early. having him in the fourth quarter has been even more important in some ways.
Guys have to start with what you can control best first. You can control your defensive rotations, you can try to control your effort on the glass, you can put emphasis on trying not to turn the ball over. Three-point shooting might come and go.
I agree that this team has a lot of potential, and we haven't been this deep for a long time. I just hope that by, say, mid-January, the Spurs will have been moving along on the path to being a possible WC-Finals candidate.
Bingo. We have a winnner.
+1
Screw the height differential argument. Consider that Houston was forced to downsize from 7'6" Yao Ming to 6'6" Chuck Hayes.
I watched Wes Unseld dominate the Spurs on the glass in the Eastern Conference Finals after being down 3-1.
There is a place in the NBA for Wide Bodied Glass Eaters. If the Spurs start him, it wouldn't be any worse than starting Bonner IMHO. The refs would learn him a little better and since he's starting, I think the possibility exists that they'd grant him some levity early.
If Pop can get the Blair who played heads up with KG & Perkins...heads will roll.
It's not like Manu wouldn't play with him at all. It's the finishing team that will close out games and having Blair out there doing o/d switches with McDyess could work.
That is the point that is most interesting to me. Blair always seems to be open when rolling to the hoop off screens and such. Outside of Manu, no one else bothers to look his way. It's frustrating to watch this big man roll to hoop, sometimes standing there with both arms outstretched, and his teammates don't get him the ball.
Roger Mason also finds Blair very well.
I agree with this. Aside from manu (who almost always finds blair under the basket), mason also has a knack for finding blair rolling in the middle. In the suns game, i have seen blair waving his hands near the basket, but tp or hill could not give him the ball. I don't know why- is it lack of trust for the blair's ability?
I would say Parker and Hill cannot find Blair as easily as Manu and Mason not because of poor court vision but because the opponents do not respect their 3-point shot. Players guarding Parker and Hill can take a step further away from them to deny dribbling penetration, whereas you have to respect Mason and Manu's 3 point shooting ability. A step further away from Hill and Parker would mean they would be closer to Blair after the pick and roll because they will go under the screen to prevent the drive, thus able to deny Blair the ball until the big man recovers.
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