Regular season you can micro manage minutes and bring in fresh guys to win the fatigue game, and coach your way to victories. Playoffs, opponent has too much time to scout your role players and make adjustments. Physical play also hurts Spurs passing game more than anyone else.
This Spurs team is the least talented top seed in god knows how long. I think Parker only made all-star as an injury filler? In the post season, a balanced attack has much lower margin of error than if you have a LeBron/Durant/Griffin/Alridge who can draw so much attention all by themselves. Role players can perform in the regular season because nobody spend much time prepare for them, in a long series once adjustments are made, once defense is custom tailored against each player, if you don't have the best player on the court it is very very tough.
If you go by the regular season stats Dirk/Ellis are simply stronger than Duncan/Parker as a 1-2 punch. Per 36 minutes means very little because Duncan/Parker's strength diminishes tremendously once the minutes are up, especially if they have to take over a quarter or two earlier in the game (Parker today is a classic example).
Historically Spurs always lacked the talents to three-peat. The margin of error is too low when you don't have a Shaq/Kobe, MJ/Pippen, or LeBron/Wade (they will three-peat easily this year coasting through the east playoff's and take on a very fatigued opponent). We keep bringing up the 0.4, the foul, and game 6, without realizing these opponents simply had far more talents. It has nothing to do with mental weakness, the Spurs simply don't have the talents because Parker/Ginobili are both tier 3 stars (with the exception of their peak 1-2 years in which they jump to tier 2). And now Duncan is no longer tier 1.
I really hope the fans lower their expectations and enjoy what is left of GDP, it has been an amazing journey, anything they do is a bonus for me.
Last edited by hitmantb; 04-26-2014 at 09:03 PM.
Pop's 1-2 punch is better than Memphis, Golden State and every team in the East outside of Miami, tbh..maybe Dallas and Houston, too..
Regardless, losing to an 8th seeded team that doesn't have much talent is embarrassing and he's getting severely outcoached, tbh..
Really our main problem in this series is turnovers. A lot, today were unforced. That is unacceptable if you expect to win a series in the playoffs.
I would argue Conley/Randolph are no worse than Duncan/Parker, both stats wise and looking at their performance against OKC. Can you even imagine Duncan/Parker beating OKC in OT playing 40+ minutes a piece?
They are much closer to their primes and can simply play more effective minutes without holding back.
Same with Golden State, offensively Curry/Thompson are ahead of Duncan/Parker, main difference is inside/outside is a much better combo than PG/SG.
East is a joke, Miami gets an easy three-peat this year barring injuries, coasting through the playoffs saving full energy for a very beat up opponent out of the west.
Turnovers will continue to be a problem against athletic aggressive teams because the spurs rely so much on so many passes to get a good look and shot and less on one on one beat your man athletic play. They are not built with superior athletes that can get their own shots and all the over passing which works in the regular season doesn't work so well in the playoffs with added defensive pressure to disrupt the passing game.
The Mavs aren't athletic, nor are they aggressive..
Pop has zero excuse if he loses this series tbh. He's been scotty brooks/Marck Jackson bad so far this series.
Dirk hasn't done anything in this series, too, so I don't know what the 1-2 punch has to do with anything
All the regular season stats point to the Spurs underachieving. The key off course is the playoffs is more about matchups and coaching strategies. That's where coaches really earn their money.
His excuse is the Mavs have the coaching advantage.
The Mavs are more athletic than the spurs.
We would be winning this series if we still had Coach Bud. I truly believe he was a big part of our success. The replacement assistants are not impressive.
Each team only has limited defensive resource. If Spurs chooses to focus on Dirk, other players will get open.
Besides, in game 1 Spurs won because Duncan/Parker outplayed Dirk/Ellis badly, Spurs won.
Game 2 Spurs lost because Duncan/Parker were non-factors.
Game 3 Spurs lost because Duncan/Dirk was a wash and Ellis outperformed Parker.
1-2 punch matters a lot. Everyone else help your 1-2 punch save energy and take over stretches where the team needs most help (i.e. 4th quarter), but the strength of your 1-2 punch is ultimately how far you can go. There are exceptions like the Pistons where they have four 8 of 10 players but 90% of the times the performance of the 1-2 punch will decide it.
Last edited by hitmantb; 04-26-2014 at 09:47 PM.
Exactly yet they are running all over the spurs, you would think they had a team of young talented players who have been fastbreaking teams all season long. They haven't, but they obviously saw something and exploiting it, and so far the coaching staff just can't get a grip on the Mavs guards.
You think portland's lillard and Aldridge is better? Just curious
LeBron with whoever is the best 1-2 punch in the playoffs,,,,just fact.
Seconded.
bron is miles ahead of duracne.
Duncan is still one of the best players in the league, just can't bring it game in and game out anymore.
Sure he could,,,,problem is Popovich has conditioned him to believe he is as delicate as a porcelain doll over the last 5-7 years.
The coaching staff is comprised of a drunk has-been that choked away the le last year, the fat from Indiana that brought Ayres to SA, Udoka, and Sean Marks. No doubt in my mind that Carlisle and his coaching staff are smarter than this group. Should have given Budenholzer a raise - he was clearly the brains behind this team.
We are physically weak and ty on defense against real basketball players. That's just a combination of being too old and too European.
We are also a very weak team, mentally. Our extremely meek, extremely timid players don't have the mentality to make the plays necessary to win.
We aren't a smart team anymore and that means we can't make up for our lack of strength, speed and length.
Oh well, blow this up.
Hang Tim's, Tony's and Manu's jerseys in the rafters and retire their asses.
The sooner we get on with the struggling, the sooner we can get back to prominence.
I think they are.
And how long are we going to say this TO , until they wake up and get it right? Right now I don't see it man.
Duncan only has stamina to take over the game for a quarter or two at most, at the expense of completely worn out rest of the way and relative non-factor. See game 6 last year when he turned back the clock in the first half and had very little left in the second half. He is got great hands and can get easy passes or offensive rebounds and blue collar his way to decent stats, but these do not do anywhere near the same damage as drawing double teams and posting up ISO play when the team desperately needs a basket and clock is running down.
Parkers because of playing for the national team, is unfortunately the same way. I am actually scared whenever he scores 15 points in a quarter, he is probably going to go downhill rest of the way.
When is the last time you saw Duncan/Parker score 60+ points together? Even 50+ is extremely rare.
Also, teams will let both of them take medium to long range jumpers all day, even if they get on a good streak they can not sustain it. The easiest way to beat the Spurs is to let Duncan play 1v1 and he will be out of stamina for both sides of the floor later in the game. Any team's #1 offensive option can easily out-produce Duncan with stamina alone, with blue collar bruisers wearing down Duncan. It is sad the best player on your team is 38 and not much Popovich can do about it.
Even when you look at Dirk vs Duncan today, Dirk got his points via ISO play when the team had no other options. Duncan gets most of his through good passes and offensive rebounds. That is the difference.
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