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I wonder if that has any causation from the Olympic talk when foreign national teams started competing with the US using worse players, because they were able to foster consistent chemistry
Based upon a comment that Dejounte made in the NBA Draft thread (paraphrased, the Spurs like to keep players), I thought it would be interesting to look at Roster Continuity over time among different eras. Data is sourced from here: https://www.basketball-reference.com...ontinuity.html
Definition of Roster Continuity: the % of a team's regular season minutes that were filled by players from the previous season's roster.
First, I looked at the Spurs in the in the Gregg Popovich Era (1994-95 thru Present), which I define not by Pop's coaching tenure but since he became GM in 1994. In a homerun confirmation of Dejounte's hypothesis, the Spurs Rank #1 in Roster Continuity at 76%, compared to a league average of 66% and a median of 65%. The table below outlines other eras I looked at:
Era Rank Spurs Avg League Avg League Median Pop Era (1994-95 thru Present 1 76% 66% 65% Duncan Era (1997-98 thru 2015-16) 1 77% 66% 65% Pre Duncan Pop Era (1994-95 through 1996-97) 11 70% 65% 65% Kawhi-Present Era (2011-12 through Present) 1 79% 65% 65% Post Kawhi Era 4 75% 66% 66% Pre Pop Era 25 65% 71% 71% Drob Era Pre Tim 24 63% 69% 68% Drob Era Pre Pop 27 59% 73% 73%
Observations:
- No matter how you slice it, in the Pop era the Spurs have valued roster continuity. Even in the Post Kawhi era, they have been extremely stable in their roster continuity. The year immediately following Kawhi's trade, the fell to 63%, which would have been bottom half of the league, but then had several more years of very high continuity, save for the 2022-23 season, which we can call the "Pre-Tank" year that saw us trade away Derrick, DJM and others.
- I included some pre-Timmy stats just for fun. Pop was a little more of a wheeler and dealer before Tim, but was still top half of the league in continuity.
- Pre-pop, the Spurs were near the bottom in the league in continuity. Not surprising considering there was more FO/HC turnover.
- DRob's early career sure dealt with a lot more turnover.
- If you are wondering who has the worst roster continuity in the Pop era? It's New Orleans, at 59%. The Nets at 61%, the Bucks at 62% and the Wolves at 62% are right behind.
- Worst in the Post Kawhi era? The Lakers at 51%
Conclusion: if you're expecting a huge roster turnover this offseason, it would be uncharacteristic of the Spurs to do so. Not saying it won't happen, just that it is outside of the PAFTO modus operandi.
I wonder if that has any causation from the Olympic talk when foreign national teams started competing with the US using worse players, because they were able to foster consistent chemistry
difference between then and now is the Spurs were generally had good teams or were contenders for the entirety of their existence until recently. There may be minimal turnover the last couple of seasons but the only player left from 2020 is Keldon, so the entire roster has been completely overturned in those 4 years and i expect something similar to happen in the next few years. , we only have 4 players left from the 2022 team
I do think this is actually the most important consideration. It's like up till 2 years ago people were still pointing to the history of never doing trades at the deadline as proof they wouldn't and then they did. This is a fundamentally different situation and they will act differently. That being said, I expect no more than 3-4 new faces coming in because its still just one offseason.difference between then and now is the Spurs were generally had good teams or were contenders for the entirety of their existence until recently. There may be minimal turnover the last couple of seasons but the only player left from 2020 is Keldon, so the entire roster has been completely overturned in those 4 years and i expect something similar to happen in the next few years. , we only have 4 players left from the 2022 team
This team is a completely different situation than any team since that 1st era. Pop can laud the effort all he wants, at the end of the day these guys cannot dribble, shoot, defend or pass like even a mid tier NBA team. If the Spurs stay with that I hope Victor walks.
Maybe they bought into their own system bull .
Different times, different situation. You cant make a raw comparison (and conclusion) without bringing some context.
spurs had roster continuity for a while because they've been compte ive and/or contending and/or satisified with what they got for a while... You don't change a winning team, or a few role players, when you already get your core or what is obvious can be your core. Why would you do that?
And the reason why spurs were above the league average is because they were precisely competing/contending/making the POs for 20 years in a row where other teams had more ups and downs and difficulty to build compe ive teams.
I mean if you have rosters made of Tims/Drobs/Manus/TPs/Bowens/Barrys/Horrys/T,iagos/Borises/Finleys...in their prime, or as clear future valuable players, ofc you'll value continuity, it's not even a question. But that doesn't mean you necessarily will with a roster made of Wesleys, Branhams, Jones, Sochans or Keldons...
Flash forward today... Spurs are a bottom of the league team without a core and trying to see how they can find it out of a few youngsters, with only one player you know will stay here, Wemby... using 10, 20 or 30 years rosters without more context and data (what was the record of those teams, what was the age of the players, in their prime or youngsters, what was the actual value of these players) to conclude spurs will value continuity with today's roster is not a receivable analysis.
Specially that Pop ad RC have never been in the situation they are today, a rebuilding project from scratch, with suddenly a unique player falling in your hands waiting for help and a better environment to keep progressing then a bunch of youngsters who didn't show much after 2,3... 5 years that would let you imagine they could cons ute your next core. Is Wemby gonna have to wait 4 years before playing with a guy who can make a lob or an entry pass?
Last edited by JPB; 4 Weeks Ago at 06:10 AM.
You might note that no conclusions about the future were drawn in the original post, it merely provided a look at the past using different cuts.
With that said, if we only look at the last three years (no one would confuse those teams with contending), we would see:
2021-22: 73% compared to a league average of 65%
2022-23: 63% compared to a league average of 70%
2023-24: 82% compared to a league average of 70%
Avg 2021-2024: 73% compared to a league average of 68%
The two years proceeding those, where we also did not make the playoffs, we had 80% and 90% continuity rates, respectively.
The only below league average Continuity rates for the Spurs in the last 15 years occurred 1) after Kawhi was traded which coincided with Tony going to CHA and Manu retiring and 2) after the 2021-22 season which saw us trade away Derrick (during the season) and Dejounte (offseason) and saw another heavy minute contributor (Lonnie) leave.
There is limited history of PAFTO operating in a "bad team" environment, but in that limited history we haven't seen them be that much more aggressive in roster re-shaping relative to how the rest of the league conducts itself (which isn't good or bad, it's just an observation). This backups Dejounte's position that the Spurs generally like to keep players. It may, or may not, give us an indication of PAFTO's proclivity to move on from young projects like Sochan, Branham, Wesley and Champagnie.
If we want to make a forward looking prediction at the Spurs "reverse continuity rate"* in 2024-25:
- If the Spurs brought back the entire roster next year (which they won't), they'd be starting off at a reverse Continuity rate of 96.1% (via the loss of Doug and the minimal impact of Mamadi Diakite's 3 GP)
- If the Spurs ONLY move on from and replace Osman, Mamu, Graham, Bassey and Cissoko, the Spurs would enter next season with a reverse continuity rate of 85.3%
- If the Spurs move Keldon, you can subtract 10.8 from the number above
- If the Spurs move Collins, you can subtract 7.7 from the number in the second bullet
- If the Spurs move Branham, you can subtract 8.1 from the number in the second bullet
My best guess is that
- the Spurs do most of the things in bullet 1 (Bassey and Cissoko are wild cards, but their Continuity contribution is relatively small, as are Graham and Mamu's. Cedi makes up the bulk of the Continuity lost in Bullet 2)
- The Spurs move one of Keldon, Collins, Branham. So my prediction would be that the Spurs enter next season with a reverse continuity rate of somewhere between 74-77%, which would still be above league average
PAFTO may in fact do more this offseason, but I think that 74-77% is the most likely from a roster prediction standpoint and just happens to mirror PAFTO's history. The actual continuity rate that results from that 74-77% reverse continuity rate I would imagine would then end up somewhere around 60-65%, which would be below or near league average the last decade or so, and the last few years the league average has trended higher so it would be well below. So that would be a welcome sign.
*"reverse continuity rate": actual continuity rate is the % of minutes played by guys on last year's roster... the "reverse continuity rate" is something I made up to help with being more predictive... this is the % of the previous year's minutes are on the next year's roster. I would expect the actual continuity rate to be significantly lower than the reverse continuity rate because we would expect certain players to have their roles reduced and those minutes eaten up by new players, especially if we add two top-10 picks.
Last edited by scott; 4 Weeks Ago at 06:39 PM.
Numbers porn, my favorite! Thank you for putting this together! The D Rob era was messed up, this really highlights that. Between injuries (TC, Willie Anderson, Sean) and taking chances on high risk/high reward players (Rodman, Sweet Pea, Rod Strickland, etc) the Spurs struggled to find second and 3rd options to put around D Rob. That man was the ultimate big toe. It’d be interesting if you weighted coaching turn over and included it in your percentages, as coaching changes probably have a greater impact than changing one starter of average NBA starting ability.
i hope the Spurs learned from that time and have better luck with Wemby’s co-stars going forward.
Spurs during recent years are known to be a conservative(opposed to change) organization.
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