The Extra Pass: The Spurs and Time

[Trimble87]

Was linked to this by a friend. Pretty nice Spurs article:

You don’t have to scrounge for reasons for why the San Antonio Spurs have such great success. A quick point of the finger to Tim Duncan works just fine; an additional point to Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili works even better. There probably can’t be enough praise heaped on head coach Gregg Popovich, and attributing credit to the top of the organization won’t warrant many complaints. The Spurs are a world-class organization with all-world players. It can be that simple.

http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports.c...purs-and-time/

[Seventyniner]

Good find!

I didn't realize that the defensive rating of the starting lineup was so low (87.1). The offensive rating is given in that article as 106.9. If those are the same ratings that basketball-reference.com uses, the offense is slightly below the team average of 109.8, but obviously the defense is elite. The best part of that lineup (and the closing version with Manu instead of Green) is that there isn't a single weak defender to prey upon. The worst you can do is run Green through lots of screens, but since Green starts and a guy like Kevin Martin doesn't, that crossmatch won't happen too often.

[racm]

Considering that the starting 5 + Manu will be the top 6 guys in the playoffs (Diaw rounds out the top 7), that's great news.