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Thanks for the writeup Bruno
What an ugly game. In a preseason, that started with Spurs claiming wanting to be better defensively and less kind, Spurs delivered a soft defenseless performance against a modest Magic team. The Lakers centers farm team won the game 104-100 and Spurs record is now 3-3 for the preseason.
Tim Duncan
After having played 16 minutes against Miami yesterday, Duncan didn't get the night off and played another 12 quality minutes. Duncan made some great offensive moves and was solid defensively. even if he played only a little in both games, it's very encouraging to see Pop playing Tim in a b2b during the preseason.
Tony Parker
There is clearly a conditioning issue around Parker. Almost all his jumpshots were short today, a sign of a lack of legs and he got burned a couple of times on defense by Nelson. Pop and Parker both are working to solve that issue. Pop gave a lot of minutes to Parker today and Tony was really aggressive with multiples drives to the basket. Parker's poor conditioning could be explained by a perturbed summer where he stopped basketball activities twice (before and after the Olympics).
Manu Ginobili
It was Dr Manu and Mister Ginobili today.
Dr Manu plays a very efficient offensive team basketball with a good jumpshot. He was very active defensively.
Mr Ginobili tried awfully complex plays that seemed taken from a HORSE contest and made some wild gamble defensively.
So, a mixed night for Manu Ginobili. He seems to be a good shape and ready for the season but he needs to be more focused.
Kawhi Leonard
Kawhi plays the right way in this game by playing within himself and making some hustle plays. Now the big issue is that he is in a big shooting slump this preseason. His FG% is below 25% with an ugly 10-41 from the field. Kawhi just needs to keep taking good shots and hopefully his slump will end soon.
Danny Green
Speaking of shooting slump, Green has broken his in an impressive fashion for 3 games. He is taking shoots without hesitation like when he was at his best. This confident and efficient Danny Green is the kind of very useful players every team need.
Boris Diaw
Diaw had a quiet game. Offensively, his passing was good and he fits really well with Duncan but he missed seem easy shots. Defensively, he was solid but too passive.
Stephen Jackson
Jackson played a damn fine game. His activity level went way up compared to yesterday. The most impressive was how sounded his game was on both end of the court. He played a mistake free game. It's great how Jack has turned back from a high usage ineffective player to an effective role player when he came back to SA.
Matt Bonner
The Matt Bonner mystery continue. Bonner only played 5 minutes but was the first big from the bench. In these 5 minutes, Bonner was just bad. Poor defense and only an ugly missed put shot offensively.
Bonner preseason games were either not playing or being bad in limited minutes. It's not very encouraging after another choke job he had in the playoffs.
Patty Mills
Mills came back from an ankle sprain and seems to be healthy. He was active and moving well defensively. Offensively, he shoots much. I guess he is feeling he is behind others for the backup PG battle and wanted to catch them up.
Tiago Splitter
A deceiving performance. Defensively, his only move was to raise up his arms while being on his heels. He can be more than a backpedaling tree on that end of the court. Offensively, when he decided to stop being soft and being aggressive, he was fine. The good news is that his free throw shooting looked better than in the playoffs even if there are still work to do in that area.
Derrick Brown
Pop said that the battle for the 15th spot was between Curry and him and after this game, I'm even more convinced Curry should be kept. Brown is an active player but he lacks of skills. He mostly played PF in his meaningful minutes, defensively he was fine on the perimeter but got schooled inside. Offensively, he is still a very limited player even if he hit a couple of jumpshots.
Gary Neal
I don't like the way Neal is playing. His defense is bad, with Red being the beneficiary this time, and his shot selection isn't great. On the plus side for him today, he was aggressive offensively which leads to some good plays.
Josh Powell
Powell was widely inconsistent from play to play and on both end of the court. His game was a succession of good and bad plays. It's hard to see Spurs keeping him when he plays like that.
DeJuan Blair
The rookie from Pittsburg show a nice level of activity but he has still a lot to learn before becoming a NBA player.
Wait...
Someone just told me he has started 150 NBA games...
DeJuan Blair was heartbreaking in that game. You might think that after 3 years in the NBA where he played a lot, he would have some kind of fundamentals but no. He made rookie mistake after rookie mistake. He is for sure in a good shape and motivated but that's not enough. He seems too to be on his way out of the rotation by only playing at the end of games.
Coach Pop
Pop didn't care about this game and didn't even try to do some coaching so there is nothing to say.
Jacque Vaughn
Magic were playing the right way by sharing the ball offensively and by playing some defense. You could see the Spurs touch there. Saying that, Magic really lack of talent and it will be a long season for them.
Last edited by Bruno; 10-21-2012 at 09:19 PM.
Thanks for the writeup Bruno
More Timvp please
I kid I kid
Thanks Bruno
And off Blair
Pop not giving a damn about the game to boost up Vaughn's spirits? Typical Pop, tbh.
As usual Timmy's the best player.
Who's Ganny Green?
Bonner playing only five minutes and being invisible... in the preseason!
Thanks bruno, I appreciate you taking time to do these since timvp is MIA. Do you have any sort of idea or perception heading into the start of the season?
Good job bruno, nice for you to step up!
looks like its going to be that kind of season....offensively average and defensively inconsistent
yes, coming off a historic offense season and where our team was above average defensively, they are going to be "average" on offenseits a ing preseason game, what the is wrong with you
Clearly the Spurs were experimenting with the defense. It appeared to be a disaster, but they likely learnt something. Might want to factor that in to analysis.
So Bonner's still stuck in his playoff funk. Somebody needs to tell him it's the regular season again or maybe not. If Neal can't guard slower guards like Derek Fisher's and JJ Red s who can he guard? If the Spurs want to improve defensively I think he may need to be only a situational or 3rd string guard.
Neal might have to go to a Steve Kerr type of role because of his lack of defense.
I don't recall if Leonard ever hit the rookie wall, if such a thing exists.
Although extremely late, maybe he's going through that crash, a little bit, during preseason. I guess we'll get more of an indication when the season starts.
Or, like you said, he's just going through a shooting slump.
Bruno and Timvp's writups confirm one thing....Even the most knowledgable outside the Spurs FO seem to have no fuking clue what the is happening this pre-season outside of the core rotation...deep bench seems all over the shop, defense is the focus but its failing, the games are looking like a disinterested shootaround for those that are confirmed rotation players as they are for the coaches. I really wonder how this can be converted into the solid team working for and with each other that we saw up until finals last season.
Is the plan to run just a core 8-9 players rather than utilising the depth like last season? I certainly have zero idea of the direction and its pissing me off.
Maybe they should tell him to go somewhere, way the fu*ck away from here........ How about ship him to LA?
How well did Patty Mills play? I saw a bit of the second quarter, and Tony Parker played like crap.
Thanks Bruno.
I missed the game but Kawhi's shooting slump is unfortunate. At least he has a lot of time to modify his play before the playoffs arrive.
Kawhi's shooting slump is him trying to do too much, perhaps.
Patty - Not good, not bad, shot poorly with some wide open looks.
If TD keeps playing like he is, and IMO he looks even better than he did last year, I'll have to start calling him Benjamin Button.Pop not giving a damn about the game to boost up Vaughn's spirits? Typical Pop, tbh.
As usual Timmy's the best player.
Millsy
I get the feeling that he has been thinking hard about improving his defence. He's shooting a bit but as Bruno said may feel he has to play catch up. He's a 6 foot baller regardless how you look at it, he not A.I. but for a million bucks he's a steal, smart and young.
How does he compare to De Colo and Joseph when they play 15+ minutes. I guess it's his first game in awhile, so it'd make sense that his shooting was a bit rusty (like Parker, he'll get his shot back as he plays more).
De Colo is a superior passer, Joseph is a better defender, Patrick is a better shooter than both.
None of the PGs are creating any separation from either other and it is very frustrating.
While Neal is an offensive machine who plays zero defense.
What do the Spurs do from here?
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