Speculate how this bubble team would have done from Day 1.
Assume CIA Popped did not have access to his pets Bryn Bryn, etc. You know what, assume he took a position on Nancy Pelosis staff giving speeches and was not the coach of this seasons Spurs. Spurs have a real coach since Sept 2019 training camp.
How many games we win?
This team is actually better than last years team. So definitely playoffs. Seed 6-8 probably. We all knew it, we all saw it. Only Flopovich didn't. It took him that long to find a roatation that works and only through injuries and a Covid-19 break of 3 months
I'd say 10 more wins, at least.
Bruh, he saw it. For some unknown reason he plays players just because he can.
No sense in me trying to add to that. Pretty much says it all.
+45w
White/Murray
Walker/Keldon
Demar/Keldon
Lyles/Gay
Aldrige/Jakob
I counted about 15 regular season games that we lost only due to Flopovich's rotations. All close games where we had a chance to win them, but couldn't cause he kept Forbes and Belinelli out there. Sometimes even both and Mills at the same time
I doubt KJ would be this good at the beginning of the season he was just getting used to the league. And others were coming off injuries. White, as I recall, had foot problems (though maybe it was later, I forget)
If Bryn and Beli had had car accidents during the pre-season, this team would be at a minimum 5 wins better off, and likely 10...
Playoffs easily with a decent chance to get out of the first round so long as they didn't play the lakers, clippers, or nuggets...
But Pop cared more this year about treating his veteran players "the right way" and making sure Forbes gets a second contract somewhere...
I wonder how the players on the team really feel about pretty much having a year of their careers wasted so Forbes can get a Jonathan Simmons contract somewhere then be out of the league in two years like he was
KJ wouldn‘t be the player he is now if he hadn‘t played in the G League.
Difficuilt to gudge ..
1.aldrige won us few games
2. Young gays wouldnt be as good at beginning of the seoson and the presure to perform constantly Could have negative affect
3. Most bubble games were against team without thier best lineups and some teams had no motivation nothing to play for
That said .. next seoson would be exciting
Which is the same thing Keldon says himself. And White. And Lonnie.
But nah, people here know better. They are actual coaches here on spurstalk.
man, in my personal life Im a manager. If i listened to random ass people on how to do my job, i would be fired. I dont know why people think they know any better than the people who have proven to be successful.
Its like nothing happens behind the scenes with these people. Decisions are made on a whim with no thought behind it, thats what people think how the Spurs run their organization.
Im not at all saying the Spurs make no mistakes. But when people make comments about how this could have been done or that and this.... It's pure ignorance.
Young players are always going to say things like the G-League made them better players because they want to play in the NBA. There is no doubt that Lonnie and White were better than Bryn and Marco, and Pop was giving Bryn and Marco way too much playing time. Maybe KJ isn't as good right away, but with consistent playing time against NBA players, I don't see why he wouldn't get better like every other rookie who doesn't have to go to the G-League.
Oh good, another thread for posters to re-write the past and act like they absolutely know what they are talking about.
This should go well.
Bubble team. We don't know how they play on the road and how good are they when they play teams like Houston at full strength. The young guys have shown they can play with NBA talent, but what was the best team they beat? The Grizzlies or New Orleans? Good chance neither of those even make the playoffs in the bubble.
Are you pretending that posters haven't been calling on popovich to bench Forbes/start Derrick all year?
None of this is surprising
Sure, that's not true for every player. But Siakam is a good example. Man, he was bad,really bad when the Raptors played him in the NBA for 1,5 years. Then they sent him to the D League and he came back much better and played with confidence
Players talk about that jump from rookie season to sop re season. Coming into camp the second time around and knowing what to expect. The season being postponed in essence made this their second season. Keldon especially grew from his G League experience and now being with the guys in the bubble. No way he plays like he has if he was in regular rotation back in October.
There is almost no pressure playing in an empty stadium. Playing in front of 18,000 people at home or on the road affects your performance (actor/observer) effect. This experience has been great for the young guys. Many who should contribute significantly next season. But this year had they been asked what they have in bubble they would have struggled.
Pop apologists ITT . Maybe it was good for Johnson to get his feet wet a little bit in the gleague but pop has absolutely no excuse for playing the literal worst defenders in the nba together like he did throughout the season. It was disgraceful
At the apologists. As I said in my "assessing the youth thread", given the way things broke around the league and their relative health, they probably would have made the playoffs.
Either way, there's no excuse for him continuing to do the same idiotic through 63 games. He was more concerned with the perceived floor than the ceiling. As a result, he never gave his team their best chance. Worst coaching job in the league.
What he didn't get was, by playing lineups with no designated shooter, he'd have forced a bunch of the players who upped their volume recently, to do so from day one.
It's been said. Everybody gets it, and we don't need another thread full of trolls complaining about it.
I've gone on record that saying Forbes doesn't deserve to be in the starting lineup, and that Murray/White/Wlaker should be played more. That falls squarely on Pop, and I'm not defending him for that.
But I'm also not going to sit here and write revisionist history just to make up some imaginary number of wins the Spurs would've gotten if things hadn't gone the way they already did. I'd be better off spending my time pissing in the wind.
But hey, if that makes people feel smarter because you can predict things after the fact, knock yourselves out.
Probably wasn't even Pop that figured out the current rotation either. I'm assuming Will Hardy or Becky had something to do with it. They're no longer playing stupid, backwards isoball and Demar is surprisingly making plays and deferring to teammates. It reminds me how the Spurs played drastically different after 2010. Budenholzer was the key architect in that change and I'm assuming the current assistants also figured out what wasn't working with this year's roster. Bryn and Patty being benched for "rest" says it all. Pop loves those two but I'm assuming the assistants realize they're the glaring hole in the defense.
We would have won 50+ games and been a top 4 seed in the West. As others have already pointed out, Popovich is the single biggest reason for the team’s underachievement this season. It seems like he only started caring about basketball again during the bubble.
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