So, what happened tonight?

[EVAY]

Sorry, it was my fault. I have this Duncan jersey and every time I wore it during the Mavs season we lost. So I stopped wearing it before game 7 and after the 3 games of ripping the Blazers I thought it was safe to wear again. I guess not.

Well, there you are then. At least we have figured it out.

[TheRemix]

Sorry, it was my fault. I have this Duncan jersey and every time I wore it during the Mavs season we lost. So I stopped wearing it before game 7 and after the 3 games of ripping the Blazers I thought it was safe to wear again. I guess not.

Wtf man? Stop wearing it then. I bet you wore it on game 6 last yer

[hater]

Belli came to close these ers out but the rest of his team the bed tbh

[Sean Cagney]

Dude, and I am not being a conspiracy theorist, you can tell from the 1st quarter the Spurs weren't going to win. Not b/c the Blazers were out playing them but b/c they were basically going to throw this game. WHY?????

I believe Pop didn't want a sweep. That would be potentially a week off without playing. Pop IMO wanted the Spurs to lose this one b/c he didn't want to rust factor to set between the next series. Next Series could start either Sunday or Monday.

Pop look disinterested pretty much the entire game. Parker looked disinterested. He only attack the basket like twice the whole game. Pop played the benched the majority of the minutes and they are the ones that kept the Spurs in the game. Not taking anything away from Portland but I felt a vibe from the 1st quarter that the Spurs didn't really want to win this game.

I said to a few at the beginning of the game that the way the game looked and body language out there that they were not going to win the game. I got the old have faith and so on crap but you can kind of tell the way a game is going early! I just did not have the feeling they were going to win last night.

[Sean Cagney]

I just finished watching the game. For all I know it was a private training session for Duncan to practice his jump shot from the top of the key. All the players (and Pop) looked so uninterested. They didn't even react when they got 2 FTs or an and-1. Everybody was listless. I don't know if it was just fatigue or mental breakdown, but that was the reality of it.

If anything I think this game was even worse for the Blazers: despite playing with intensity they were only up 2 at the half, and it took all of Manu's might to airball a 3 while wiiiiiiide open then foul Batum for a 4-point play to spark the Blazers decisive run. Based on this, it's pretty clear to me the Blazers are ed. It was their best shot, and they still sucked most of the time.

That airball three and the 4 point play right after was the ballgame, period.

[Horry Hipcheck]

There is absolutely no way on earth Pop or any player wanted to lose last night. There is no sense in risking another entire game, not only from a fatigue, injury and momentum standpoint, but also in allowing an opponent to get a shot of confidence. You can bet your life savings that the Spurs by no means set out to lose last night. They got their asses beat by the Blazers, hands down. The good news is that as poorly as the Spurs played, they were in the ballgame up until close to midway through the 3rd. Credit to the Blazers.

Poor lineup choices. No timeouts. No screaming. Splitter played 22 minutes. No Parker in the 4th. Pop cared about winning for all of around 24 minutes. Credit to Portland for finally making shots, but the Spurs gave up on this one at halftime.

The risk of injury in an "extra game" like Game 5 is the same as it is in any upcoming game in the WCF. The scheduling wasn't going to give the Spurs a lot more time to rest if they'd finished in 4 than if they do in 5. Trade that for reminding this team that they can lose and can lose badly going into what's sure to be a murderous affair with OKC. Nobody wants to lose, but Pop very clearly saw the loss coming and decided to let it happen.

Fact remains that the Spurs are going to the WCF. No team has ever rebounded from 0-3, and the first team to do it is NOT going to be a team coached by Terry Stotts consisting of five starters and a injury-saddled Mo Williams and LITERALLY NOBODY ELSE. 6 men are not going to win four straight games after the s acking the Spurs dished out in Games 1-3. If the Spurs merely shot to their average from three point range on Monday they'd have won. Bad defense, lucky shooting from Portland, and a bad night from the FT line aside, if the Spurs made just four more three pointers than the 3 they managed to sink, the series is over. Period.

So no, they didn't show up planning to lose. But when it was evident they weren't going to waltz to a 20 point win, Pop obviously pulled the plug. Let the loss sink in for a couple of days, finish them in 5, keep that focus for what's coming. CIA Pop, nothing more. Blazers were done a long time ago.