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This city's been incredibly spoiled by the Duncan era
Hardly any teams from the East on that chartI know the West was the more dominant conference but still crazy to see the disparity.
From bballreference..
There are a lot of attributes that I've looked into as the hallmarks of great teams, including dominant wins, ideal usage allocations, and superior playoff point differentials. But here's another characteristic to throw onto that heap -- season-long performance vs. playoff teams.
Since the playoffs only feature the league's best teams -- a.k.a. those through which the path to a championship runs -- you could argue that we should judge a good team's ability by its performance vs. fellow postseason participants. Or at least that's the premise here: for every season since 2000, I whittled down the NBA schedule (regular-season and playoffs) to just include games between 2 playoff teams. Then I ran the Simple Rating System formula on those games, adjusting for a home-court advantage of 3.3 PPG and setting the results relative to the overall league average of 0.0 (to keep things on the familiar SRS scale).
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It's scary to think how good this team would have been had Timmy stayed healthy IMO..he was still in his prime, Manu had blossomed, TP was good enough to be a legit #3 option on a le team, Bruce was the best perimeter defender in the NBA, good shooters and defenders to surround them, Pop at the top of his game..
The fact that they beat 2 dominant teams in the Pistons and Suns, when they both had contrasting styles, makes it even better..it sucks that they don't get the credit they deserve..
This city's been incredibly spoiled by the Duncan era
Hardly any teams from the East on that chart
2003 without a doubt. Manu coming off the bench, Jack starting, the perfect bigman rotation, and violating the Lakers at home.
The trio of Manu,Tony and Duncan was definitely the best in 05. The 03 team definitely had better depth but if any of our le teams were to meet each other, I would take our 05 team against anyone. Barry and Horry were so clutch and solid and Nazr was the most legitimate big man we had since Robinson departed. Of course Duncan was a little hobbled by that ankle and it showed at times that playoff but he was still a beast.
The 2005 Spurs were my favorite of all the Spurs championship teams (though I appreciate and enjoyed them all). That season they held teams to 88.4 PPG (best in the league). Bowen finished runner up in DPOY to Big Ben, Duncan was always one of the best post-defenders, and Ginobili in 3rd in the league in steals-%. We were the only team in the league to finish with 4 players in the top-20 of defensive win shares. We held the best offensive team at the time (Suns, 110.4 PPG, 62 wins) to 104 points a game, and in Game 1 of the NBA Finals we held the Pistons to 69 points the lowest score for a first game since 1953-1954. Our defense, perennially, was top of the league, but something about that season was just really dominant. We guarded the three-point line better than any team in the league, I remember the team shutting down Ray Allen for like 2 quarters straight in one of the last games of the Spurs-Sonics series, and Mohammed provided a good presence in the paint for a role player.
some of their best regular season games....
- held the Hornets to 67 points
- held the Rockets to 70 points
- held the Warriors to 71 points
- held the Seventy-sixers to 72 points
- held the Timberwolves to 73 points
- held the Kings to 73 points
- held the Nets to 74 points
- held the Wizards to 74 points
Manu was such a beast on that '05 team. As badass as Duncan was, if Manu hadn't had that deep thigh bruise that took him out of his rhythm in the middle games of the finals he would have been finals MVP.
Even before reading this, this theory is the one I abide by when trying to gauge our teams le hopes. Wins vs quality teams. Just beating up on weak teams is not good enough. Just having a winning record is not good enough.
You can always tell a true contender by their record against +.500 teams, even more by their record against the elite.
Why isn't here a Laker fan saying how the 2010 Lakers would destroy the 2005 Spurs yet?
You can't mention the 2005 Spurs without me thinking about the back to back double overtime victories against the Clippers and Warriors without Tim, Manu or Rasho. That team had heart, but it never seemed comfortable or dominant. They just slugged it our all season. And then, that Pistons series. Jeesh, what a battle.
Greatest Spurs Team Of All Time.
You can argue if Timmy didn't sprain his ankle towards the end of the year and once again in the Sonics series that he would've dominated the playoffs even more so and easily would've earned that MVP.
13 2004 SAS 8.17 32 22 0.593
19 2004 DET 7.47 41 25 0.621
27 2004 LAL 6.57 40 26 0.606
30 2004 MIN 6.27 40 22 0.645
Damn you, Derek Fischer.
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