I've said it for the last 12 months......Danny Green, Kawhi Leanord, & Gary Neal.

[dmon35]

Were the reasons why we lost in the WCF last year. They completely disappeared. That and Tiago Splitter's free throw shooting. Grant it, it was only they're first year as starters but fast forward to today. Both Green and Leonards PPG went up. Green has been shooting lights out all season. Have deep playoff experience. Spurs future is bright.

[Chinook]

In before COK posters pretend that Leonard was great against the Thunder.

[capek]

OP, what do you say when you look up to check the color of the sky? I'm dying to know!

[rasuo214]

In before COK posters pretend that Leonard was great against the Thunder.

Not saying Kawhi was great during the series but his numbers were on par with his regular/post season numbers. Not sure how that is considered disappearing.

[Baam]

I think matchups also have quite a bit to do with it, GS this year was like a light version of OKC last year and they gave us all we could handle.

[will_spurs]

I think matchups also have quite a bit to do with it, GS this year was like a light version of OKC last year and they gave us all we could handle.

The Pistons gave us all we could handle back in 03. The GSW were nowhere near that. First of all it only went to game 6, second they were bound to regress to the mean in terms of shooting, unless you consider shooting 60% from the field sustainable. All in all if we play this series 100 times, the Spurs win 95 times.

Second, OKC is also a watered down version of last year's OKC, even with Westbrook at full health, because the loss of Harden was huge. It's quite clear now that Harden was actually the 2nd best player on that squad, and that Ibaka is a one-trick pony. Also, their roleplayers caught fire against us in the same way ours are catching fire against Miami. We got a really bad version of Green and Neal last year (and an average version of Kawhi) and so far we're getting great versions of them in the Finals. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.

In short, both Miami and OKC peaked last year.

[BillMc]

The Pistons gave us all we could handle back in 03. The GSW were nowhere near that. First of all it only went to game 6, second they were bound to regress to the mean in terms of shooting, unless you consider shooting 60% from the field sustainable. All in all if we play this series 100 times, the Spurs win 95 times.

Second, OKC is also a watered down version of last year's OKC, even with Westbrook at full health, because the loss of Harden was huge. It's quite clear now that Harden was actually the 2nd best player on that squad, and that Ibaka is a one-trick pony. Also, their roleplayers caught fire against us in the same way ours are catching fire against Miami. We got a really bad version of Green and Neal last year (and an average version of Kawhi) and so far we're getting great versions of them in the Finals. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.

In short, both Miami and OKC peaked last year.

Agree with you (though I think you mean the Pistons in 05).

[chapnis]

Not saying Kawhi was great during the series but his numbers were on par with his regular/post season numbers. Not sure how that is considered disappearing.

The no. 15 draft pick rookie should have been shooting 60% and dropping 20 and 15 that series, he let the team down big time