Austin Toros Info

[sasaint]

Thanks for the highlights. So, where was he last summer? He wasn't on our SL team.

[ceperez]

Thanks for the highlights. So, where was he last summer? He wasn't on our SL team.

CIA Pop sent him to the Wizards. Spurs will do what it takes to hide any intention of signing somebody. Simmons as a case in point.

Very rare do the Spurs call up someone who will stick. Jamychal Green was one of those rare callups but Spurs couldn't agree with contract terms.

McCallum is problematic since Spurs owe him a full year. Bonner is easily disposable since he's owed only until January. Lalanne is a problem because he's a Spurs draft pick (in short, Spurs need to be absolutely sure about Lalanne). Spurs will go with 15 players come playoff time, so there's at a minimum one slot open right now and maybe 2 more spots opening later.

[Thunder1]

some good stuff...thanx..

[SAGirl]

Thanks once again. Cady continues to pile up impressive stats. What do you think of Orlando Johnson? He had on off night shooting the ball last night, but he seems like a real prospect, too. LOL, playing with Boban, Austin might stand a good chance against Philly.

I don't know this season, but I watched Orlando Johnson last season and he looked better than Simmons. He had better slashing, better handles, overall seemed like a more skilled player. But he didn't shoot the 3 that well and that is basically a need for SG in the league. Simmons was also a reluctant shooter, but I think he might have slightly be better.

Overall though, I think Simmons' passing skill is ultimately what made Pop fall in love with him.
There are many guys with Simmons' athleticism in the dleague.
Athletic dunking guys are common. Question is can they do anything else?
Regardless of all the areas that Simmons was raw in, Pop gushed about his passing...

[Kawhitstorm]

I don't know this season, but I watched Orlando Johnson last season and he looked better than Simmons. He had better slashing, better handles, overall seemed like a more skilled player. But he didn't shoot the 3 that well and that is basically a need for SG in the league. Simmons was also a reluctant shooter, but I think he might have slightly be better.

Overall though, I think Simmons' passing skill is ultimately what made Pop fall in love with him.
There are many guys with Simmons' athleticism in the dleague.
Athletic dunking guys are common. Question is can they do anything else?
Regardless of all the areas that Simmons was raw in, Pop gushed about his passing...

Orlando Johnson was a polished college player who didn't get drafted in the 1st rd b/c there wasn't anything about his game that stood out besides him being able to score. He went to my alumni (UC-Santa Barbara) & I got to see him play one year when he led the Gauchos to the NCAA tournament. On the other hand, Simmons was a raw talent when he declared for the draft.

[sasaint]

I don't know this season, but I watched Orlando Johnson last season and he looked better than Simmons. He had better slashing, better handles, overall seemed like a more skilled player. But he didn't shoot the 3 that well and that is basically a need for SG in the league. Simmons was also a reluctant shooter, but I think he might have slightly be better.

Overall though, I think Simmons' passing skill is ultimately what made Pop fall in love with him.
There are many guys with Simmons' athleticism in the dleague.
Athletic dunking guys are common. Question is can they do anything else?
Regardless of all the areas that Simmons was raw in, Pop gushed about his passing...

Yeah, the D league is basically a showcase for athletes who want to play basketball. Pop always lists Vision and Playmaking at the top of Simmons' assets. He was the PG in garbage time tonight and pressed too hard - not enough to undermine either the good things he had done earlier or his confidence, but I hated to see it. I think he is going to get it all together sooner rather than later and become the combo guard leader of the second unit after Manu retires. I expect him to become a Spur for life kind of guy.

[sasaint]

Orlando Johnson was a polished college player who didn't get drafted in the 1st rd b/c there wasn't anything about his game that stood out besides him being able to score. He went to my alumni (UC-Santa Barbara) & I got to see him play one year when he led the Gauchos to the NCAA tournament. On the other hand, Simmons was a raw talent when he declared for the draft.

I hope your man, Orlando, develops a 3-ball. It would be cool to see guys regularly develop at the Austin Academy and graduate to Spur U. Somehow, though, I thought he was more of a PG.

[SAGirl]

Orlando Johnson was a polished college player who didn't get drafted in the 1st rd b/c there wasn't anything about his game that stood out besides him being able to score. He went to my alumni (UC-Santa Barbara) & I got to see him play one year when he led the Gauchos to the NCAA tournament. On the other hand, Simmons was a raw talent when he declared for the draft.

He looked much better than Simms in the dleague. Like you say, he can score, he seemed like a more skilled player. Simmons was cringeworthy at times in the dleague, he did play out of control at times, and he had very, very high TO games and they weren't games of Manu's over-ambitious passing kind, they were TO of the ugly ballhandling kind like you saw in preseason x2 or x3.
Orlando never had games of that horrible magnitude.
Simmons' passing is what Pop saw. Getting him to play under control has helped many of his cringeworthy decisions. I believe that is what Pop meant when he said he wanted J.Simms to be "solid."

[SAGirl]

I hope your man, Orlando, develops a 3-ball. It would be cool to see guys regularly develop at the Austin Academy and graduate to Spur U. Somehow, though, I thought he was more of a PG.

He's not a PG, but when Cotton got called last season, both Simmons and Johnson took turns at PG.
Perhaps Simmons was the better passer, but Johnson was more reliable with the ball.
Simmons tended to play out of control and turn the ball over whenever he was pressured.
If anyone wonders why nobody picked him up from the dleague?
Aside from athleticism (and that is common in the dleague) he didn't have anything special and was raw in many areas.

Pop saw his courtvision and passing and thought there was something there to develop (maybe something others don't value as much as Pop does)... so basically you can say, Simmons is a perfect system player for us.

Orlando didn't strike me as selfish either, Austin promotes passing a whole lot, but his strength, his real skill is getting buckets.

[PhoenixSpursFan]

Slowmo........

[PhoenixSpursFan]

Slowmo is next magic johnson

[Kawhitstorm]

I hope your man, Orlando, develops a 3-ball. It would be cool to see guys regularly develop at the Austin Academy and graduate to Spur U. Somehow, though, I thought he was more of a PG.

PG?; Orlando was a post-up wing-player in college & his closest NBA approximation is a poorman's Shabazz Muhammad.

[Kawhitstorm]

Slowmo is next magic johnson

Slowmo is Shaun Livingston if he never recovered from his knee injury

[Kawhitstorm]

He looked much better than Simms in the dleague. Like you say, he can score, he seemed like a more skilled player.

Orlando was the best mid-major scorer when he was at UCSB, his issue is that he doesn't have a quick first step to beat average wing defenders in the NBA & he can't play bully ball against grown men.

[ceperez]

I hope your man, Orlando, develops a 3-ball. It would be cool to see guys regularly develop at the Austin Academy and graduate to Spur U. Somehow, though, I thought he was more of a PG.

That pass from Boban, the receiver was Orlando and he knocked down that corner 3. He seems to be developing that shot.

My take is that he could be a serviceable guard that can defend much better than Ray McCallum. McCallum has issues that he can never fix, too short, too short arms and low basketball IQ.

I don't know enough about Orlando to be able to tell if he has some basketball IQ, but he certainly is taller and with more length than McCallum.

[ace3g]

Spurs playing Rio Grande tonight

http://dleague.nba.com/games/20151218/RGVAUS/

[SAGirl]

Spurs playing Rio Grande tonight

http://dleague.nba.com/games/20151218/RGVAUS/

Ray 20 point 8 assist game but 6 TO.
I am going to watch some of it.
Even though we won, the Clippers game was a bit infuriating. Going to see how Ray did. If anyone wants a review or opinion, I'll post it after.
cheers.

[loveforthegame]

Would love to see a review.

I'll be interested in McCallum and LaLane.

[SAGirl]

I watched a good part of Ray's/Cady's minutes in one of the game. Some observations:

Cady Lalanne looking much improved offensively in comparison to Summer League. He's shooting the 3 really well, his jumpshot looks better, with nice follow through. He has also been able to catch the ball in motion out of a PnR, acting as the roller, something he struggled with in Summer League. He's been able to finish at the basket with either hand but it is hard to say how that will translate to the NBA if we get him next season since centers in the dleague are undersized and lacking in quality. This Vipers team didn't have anyone on assignment that was NBA caliber. They had Joshua Smith who is a heavy guy in the Big Baby Davis mold (but less skilled obviously and quite slow). He has a lot of work still to do on the defensive end though, awareness and rebounding/both grabbing position and boxing out.

Ray McCallum was played on and off the ball next to Keifer Sykes.. so it could be revealing concerning the Spurs plans with him, to play him next to another PG. He played a whole lot off the ball, and when he had the ball his task was to call a set and get it started. His play was nothing like Cory or even Anderson for that matter. He was mostly just getting guys in spots when acting as the PG and then quickly giving the ball up.

This Austin Spurs offense looks much different from last season, where I watched a lot of games with B.Cotton/J.Simmons/J.Eddie/O.Johnson/K.Anderson/E.Murphy. The offense went through all 4 of Cotton, Simmons, Johnson or Anderson at different times, it was fast paced, with shooters spread out, since 3 of those guys are pure shooters (Cotton/Eddie/Murphy) and the others were ballhandlers, but also working on their 3 pt shot, therefore all were a threat to shoot the 3. It looked really different. The only frequent post player in that group was Anderson who they played as a 3 or 4 and O.Johnson who is a stocky, strong guard. Simmons/Johnson slashed and handled the ball, but Anderson created a lot of offense for them from passing to cutters, and throwing lobs, and Cotton was a relatively good distributor as well.

Anderson was free to bring the ball up and push the offense going with whoever he saw open and they didn't call sets a lot of the time. It was a lot less structured, more free flowing and guys cut, used drive and dish a lot or found something out of simple motion or screening for each other. If they were stuck, a few of those guys could get their own shot. The coach called a lot of plays for Anderson posting up. It was something he was clearly working on. It looked similar to SL (for those who watched summer league), except Anderson had the role to distribute much more than we saw in SL, and probably more freedom to freelance. In Summer League they depended on him to score a whole lot and ran sets for him, but it appeared to have been because they needed his scoring to a degree. Also, there was a lot more PnR called for J.Simmons in Summer league, than there was in Austin, but you could see his thunderous dunks in transitions as well as him slashing or catching lobs from Anderson.

This Austin offense is different, a lot of action involves the guards playing off the ball involved in hand offs with the big men or cuts. It seems a lot less guard centric, runs a lot of actions out of horns and the post, and therefore, you see Ray giving the ball up quickly after calling up a set and playing off the ball a whole lot. Both Sykes and O.Johnson played on the ball more.

It could be that however you slice it, if Ray is to stay with the team, he will probably play off the ball a whole lot, since there are a lot better passers in the team and other guys who will create much better.
I will report if I catch something else, since I didn't watch the 2nd game. (They played 12/17 and 12/18)

[SAGirl]

A piece on Cady. I thought I would put it in his personal thread, but this one is keeping track of the Toros.

Still relatively new to basketball, Lalanne said his progress has improved exponentially since he was drafted by the Spurs and joined their Summer League team.One area of Lalanne’s development that Spurs director of scouting Brian Pauga noted is outside shooting. He was never asked to take long-range shots in college while playing primarily inside, but Lalanne said he hopes to be more of a stretch forward in the pros.
He’s attempted 40 3-pointers in 12 games with Austin, almost as many as the 47 he attempted in four seasons of college basketball. Lalanne has made 40 percent of his 3-pointers.
“Chip Engelland, San Antonio, and Austin coaches have reworked my whole shooting process,” Lalanne said. “Before, I wasn’t using my legs much. Now, I’m bending my knees, holding my follow-through and using all the right mechanics. I’m feeling more confident every day.”
Lalanne is averaging 11.8 points and 6.5 rebounds in his rookie season as the Austin Spurs are off to a 10-2 start.

http://www.nba.com/spurs/cadys-journey

[sasaint]

I really appreciate your taking the time to write up your observations and post you scouting reports. Thank you.

[ceperez]

A piece on Cady. I thought I would put it in his personal thread, but this one is keeping track of the Toros.


http://www.nba.com/spurs/cadys-journey

Another guy who likely is over himself. Hope he improves enough to be signed by SA.

[ace3g]

Spurs beat OKC tonight

http://dleague.nba.com/games/20151220/AUSOKL/

[BackHome]

I really appreciate your taking the time to write up your observations and post you scouting reports. Thank you.

+1

[ace3g]

Shams Charania
@ShamsCharania


The Washington Wizards plan to sign sharpshooter Jarell Eddie of the Austin Spurs, waiving center Ryan Hollins, league sources tell Yahoo.