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Of course getting a legitimate #2 big would benefit this team. And if you're talking solely improvement and just giving the team a better chance at a longer more respectable playoff-run, I'd have no argument. But when you're talking Championship, there's just too many issues for them to be shored up with one player (they've just got a bit of an ill-fitted team to go about business as usual).
They just don't have the intelligence, grit and savvy in their supporting cast/role players to make the heady play, rotation or exhibit the proper discipline to carry out a game plan on both ends (when Pop alludes to effort not being a problem, it can be one of two things: They're having mental breakdowns (which can be lack of discipline or intelligence) or they're not physically capable.
While discipline can theoretically be corrected, I'm afraid it's not an either or; the perimeter D lacks size and/or experience in their best defenders and the interior D is obviously lacking. RJ and Tony playing heavy minutes won't help with your defense, either (for different reasons, as RJ is prone to the mental error and lacks the lateral quickness and Tony's just never been more than passable, really, when healthy; which he's not completely)
My argument has never been to say this team was crap; they're not. It's just been my belief from Day-1 that they were a flawed team that was in need of a move, possibly two, to get to a Championship level. Sadly, I had given them the benefit of a doubt because of past greatness, and past accomplishments.
Following this team so closely for so long, I became accustomed to thinking that it was all about them and what they did (it really used to be). But that time has gone. You can't simply say that if all goes to plan, they'll be where they want to be; they're just not that team anymore. They know it, the opposition knows it and now the fans are slowly starting to acknowledge it. All you have to do is look how these middle-of-the-pack teams play the Spurs nowadays; there's no fear-factor or mental-edge preventing them from dropping the Spurs.
The Spurs need more than just a tangible piece, imo; it's the intangibles they've lost that have brought them back to the pack.
