Why don't you guys just admit that Dirk is a freakish 7'0" talent and an almost impossible cover? There is no guy on the Spurs not named Tim Duncan that has the height/hand/foot skill to guard him one on one with any reasonable effectiveness and frequent fouls will still result. He causes matchup problems for every team in the NBA. Play off of him and he is money on that fallaway jumper which is virtually impossible to block. The scariest part is that under Avery he is expanding his game. Play him tight and he is going to the rack agressively when it is available. Help defense leaves other shooters/slashers open. The tightening of the handcheck rules to include forearm bumping as well benefit Dirks game probably more than any player in the NBA...It gives him space to make the Pass.
All that being said, The Spurs played them dead even for 7 games and a few mental errors made the difference. Pop does not suck. The Spurs do not suck. Spurs under Pop have an excellent track record of building a team to matchup to the current #1 challenger. Now its Dallas. The bullseye is on THEIR back. I am confident that the Spurs can and will make the adjustments in the offseason to get the edge back.
Thank you for making my point even stronger. The Spurs were in every game (except game 2) and were beating the Mavs at THEIR OWN GAME, with players that are older and, arguably, less athletic. The Spurs were less than 30 seconds away from one of the greatest comebacks in history. Likewise, the Mavs were less than 30 seconds way from, what would have been, the biggest choke job in NBA history.
Fact: We were 30 seconds away from winning this series playing the way we did.
Fact: We don't know if we'd win or lose if Rasho or Nazr were playing 20 minutes a night. (although based on game 2, I'm guessing we'd lose in 5).
Question: Knowing that going small would give you a good chance to win the series, would you trade that for a result that is totally unknown?
If you told me that the Spurs would have the lead with 30 seconds to go, and have a chance to win the game in the final possession, I would take that any day, any time.
Dallas won the series BECAUSE of rebounding!!!!! Dallas won because of 2nd chance points, not because of Dirk. TD outplayed Dirk. But Diop, Dirk and Dampier dominated the rebounding, bcause Pop put the team in a position that they were unaccustomed to. Pop has always had the philosophy for the perimeter players to funnel the opponent baseline right into TD and Rasho/Nazr, and what would happen? The opponent would have to make a horrible shot attempt over the shot blocker, and when they missed, the Spurs would have great position to rebound. Am I right???? Our perimeter defenders had to play a totally different defensive scheme against Dallas, and that cost the Spurs.
CC, how many teams have outrebounded the Spurs in a 7 game series?
Why did Pop have to adjust to the Mavs???
Make the Mavs adjust to the Spurs. With our 2 towers in the paint, the Spurs would have out-rebounded the Mavs, and they would have had to adjust to us. Bowen/Finey still could could have guarded Dirk, and Rasho could have been on Dampier/Diop, and TD could easily guarded Howard, as long as Rasho had his back in the paint.
Pop got outcoached by AJ, because AJ knew how to beat the Spurs defense, and that was to make Pop play small.
The Spurs made themselves even with Dallas, when they should have been superior to them.
That therein lies the my problem.
We were killed on the glass, and I can not live with that. Nuff said
Jim, Rebounding was the Spurs achilles heel ALL season, not just against the Mavs. Even when Rasho/Nazr started the other 82 regular season games, more often than not, the other team ended up outrebounding us.
^^ Word!
Besides that, small ball did not stop Dirk, and his teammates meda more points as season average.
Small ball just opened the door for the Mavs.
PS: Let send Pop to Kings and keep PJ
SMALL BALL KILLED US. Stop arguing. When you're the superior en y, you don't try to emulate the inferior en y. They should adjust...not us. We did. They won.
I box. If I'm far superior to the other guy with gloves in the ring, I'm not gonna start boxing and running just because he does, I'm going to keep doing what I do and see if he can handle it. If he can, he can...if he can't his loss.
In the regular season, SA outrebounded Dallas in half the games and the total rebounding was dead even.
In the playoffs, Dallas led in rebs 6 of the 7 games.
Nice try
When you shoot almost 80% in a quarter (Mavs in game 7), rebounds are almost unnecessary. Don't get me wrong, rebounding is HUGE in a game, but it is not THE reason we lost the series.
In each of the Spurs championship seasons, there has been at least ONE player from the bench who was on fire from the perimeter.
In 1999, it was Jaren Jackson.
In 2003, it was Stephen Jackson, Steve Kerr.
In 2005, it was Robert Horry.
Our bench was almost nonexistent in this series.
Another brilliant post!
And anothet thing, TD was hurt all year, that is the only reason why the Spurs rebounding was not as good. He was finally healthy in playoffs, and the Spurs should have dominated Dallas on the boards, if not just stay even with them. Had the just gotten 3 more O rebs the series would have been won by SA in 6 games.
YOU CAN'T REBOUND WHAT GOES IN!!!
And if TD can't guard Dirk without getting into foul trouble, how in the m@#*@$f@&@&*% do you expect him to guard Howard???
Deal with it, Jim. The game plan as executed was the best of a set of bad choices.
They shot 80% because there was no fear in penetrating the paint. That made the Spurs' guards play 3 ft away from the Dallas guards and that made the jump shots almost too easy.
It is all related to one thing, no paint presence, which made the Spurs the Phoenix Suns.
YOU CAN'T REBOUND WHAT GOES IN!!!
And if TD can't guard Dirk without getting into foul trouble, how in the m@#*@$f@&@&*% do you expect him to guard Howard???
Deal with it, Jim. The game plan as executed was the best of a set of bad choices.
They did not shoot 80% the whole time.
The Spurs lost 2 games because of their inability to get a DEFENSIVE rebound when Dallas missed in last 2 mins of Games 3 and 4.
Had we gotten those rebounds, the series would have been oover on Friday.
Answer my question, Jim.
The Spurs are NOT the Phoenix Suns with TD being Amare Stoudimire!!!!
Why try to be the Suns, the Spurs beat the Suns?
3 championships were won because of DEFENSE and REBOUNDING!!!!!!
TD could guard Howard, the way Rose guarded Shaq...it is called HELP DEFENSE.
YOU FUNNEL THE PLAYER BASELINE INTO THE SHOT BLOCKERS!!!!!!!
No Shot Blockers?????
No Win!!!!!
Jim.
If you put Nazr or Rasho in the game, you have to take a player out. Who do you take out? Ok, you take out Finley or Barry. Who's going to guard GoatBoy (Nowitzki)? Who is this "big" going to guard? Diop or Dampier, right? That leaves Timmy to guard Dirk. Tim is not quick enough to guard Dirk. And, with the new rules, Tim would be in major foul trouble, early on in the game. Besides, Dirk seems to be bothered more by smaller defenders. Also, if Tim guarded Dirk, he would probably pull Tim away from the paint, leaving poor Rasho and Nazr to get torched by their speedy guards. This was just a ty matchup for the Spurs.
The Spurs always made the other team adjust to them, that is how Chicago won, that is how Houston won and that is how Detroit won.
YOU do not win by letting the other team make you adjust to them and not play your game, the game that won you 3 championships!!!!!
One thing that will be interesting is to see Dallas vs. either Detroit or Miami.
I bet neither of them goes small ball against the Mavs.
And I bet they do fine.
Jim, I don't get it...who would you have proposed guarded Dirk? Duncan would have been put into foul trouble...as I am sure Rasho and Nazr would have as well. So, in essence they wouldn't have been able to play that many minutes anyways.
I, too, had ini ally thought small ball, lack of inside depth/rebounding was what killed the Spurs. However, after re-watching the last game, I realize that it wasn't as bad as it seemed. Think about it: Dallas shot 80% in Game 7, Spurs still managed to come back from 20 down with their small lineup to almost win the game and series. Games 5 and 6, despite getting outrebounded, Spurs still managed to win the game. My point is, that despite poor rebounding and lack of inside presence, Spurs were still close enough to win it.
Small Ball didn't cost the team, lack of bench production did. Horry, Barry, NVE were non-existent almost in this series. Meanwhile, Stackhouse, KVH, and Diop were giving the Mavs quality minutes/points.
Read my post
Bowen on Dirk, then Finley on Dirk and sometimes TD on Dirk.
Ben Wallace/Rasheed Wallace>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Nazr/Rasho
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