Pop: "it was men and boys out there"

[SAGirl]

THAT is a head-scratcher. There is always a flip side to the coin, though. Manu is obviously a very experienced veteran who has been in blowouts before (thankfully, not many!). He can handle it in the psychological sense. The alternative was to play our young guns (Simmons) even more minutes, immersing them (him) in the embarrassment even more deeply, perhaps damaging a less resilient psyche than Manu's. Possibly? That's the only reason you leave one of our old guys out there in this embarrassment that I can think of...

I am guessing, benching Kawhi was to save some things from the postseason video. Kawhi was very efficient in his post ups scoring for himself and passing out of double teams. My guess is that since we needed defense to make a comeback run and we were not going to get it in this game, he saved Kawhi so as to not reveal more CIA POP. The strategy could also have been to bring him out to play the entire 4th Q pretty much if Manu's attempt to make a run to close the gap was successful. That is the more likely scenario.

Obviously Pop was enthused by Simmons and rewarded him with a lengthy run in this game, but I thought Kyle, despite less highlight worthy, also played with a lot of fire and also needs to develop. These guys need mental toughness. They are already being coddled enough by not being exposed to the results of their mistakes playing in a veteran team. They are lucky their garbage time is victory cigar time. Many other young rookies and guys in the league, their garbage time is a terrible defeat, and they end up playing 40 mins of it (Devin Booker in the Suns, and guy was a little pest and tough). I think Pop was just expecting Manu to make a run, but honestly Boban/Kyle/Simmons could have handled it while also getting better.

Edited to add: Add Butler to those 3, maybe Ray. Let them attempt their run and get experience... also see much more of Butler with them.

[sasaint]

That was the best lineup. Butler was owning Iggy in the 2nd even blocked one of his shots I believe.

Replace Danny in the first unit with Rasual. Play him at the 3 and Kawhi at the 2. Put Danny with the scrubs where he played most of his minutes last night.

[SpursforSix]

dissapointed in LAM he looked like a deer in headlites

several of them did. So many turnovers just trying to dribble the damn ball.

[wildbill2u]

Simple truth is that GSW outplayed us on both ends of the court. Period. We were so bamfooled by their defense that we had ususally sure handed players letting the ball slip out of their hands on passes or get away from them on the dribble for TOs.

WE did not look like a veteran team out there. Move on.