A Not so Disappointing Finale

The Spurs’ season has ended in a first round defeat to the Dallas Mavericks. Oh, the agony. Make no mistake, Dallas was the better team. However, the absence of Manu clearly played a vital role in this series. I just have one thing to say to Dallas fans. How can you root for Dirk? The guy is seven feet tall and chooses to post up 20 feet away from the basket on defenders that are a foot shorter and are outweighed by 50+ pounds. This undersized defender will proceed to push Dirk 3 to 5 more feet away from the basket. If Dirk finally manages to secure the ball, he turns into the defense, makes a face, pretends to get hit, and then shoots a fade away. Wow. Just wow. How does that guy live with himself? He’s essentially a WNBA all-star. People like to be nice, they say he is a finesse player. “Finesse player” is a label that gets attached to players that have no guts and do not like contact. They like to stand at the three point line and shoot fade-aways over points guards while pretending to get fouled. It’s just atrocious. How do you look at yourself in the mirror? Can you even make eye contact? “Great game Dirk. It was awesome when you posted up Tony Parker 22 feet away from the basket, missed a fade-away over him, but with your solid acting skills sold the foul. Way to go, man.”

But I digress, without Manu, the Spurs were a .500 ball-club. .500 teams do not make it out of the first round. Even though the Spurs managed to lock up the 3 seed, their record was not indicative of the team that took the floor.

Due to the missing Manu, the Spurs were forced to ask their role players to produce much more than they were acquired to produce. It also forced the Spurs to play many players out of position. In the perfect world, Manu would have played backup point guard and Roger Mason would have spotted up for wide open threes. Instead, Roger Mason was forced to play out of position and handle the ball, which took him away from his strengths.

The ESPN/TNT analysts blamed the Spurs’ role players for not stepping up in the playoffs. I would argue that due to Manu's injury, the role players were not put in the position to succeed in the playoffs. Mason, Bonner, Thomas, Udoka, and Finley are not creators. We did not acquire them to run the offense or create shots for others. We acquired them to hit the wide open open jump shot that Tim, Tony, and Manu create. Without Manu, the Spurs were ultimately predictable and were not able to create the open shots that our role players were acquired to make. Instead of spotting up for a wide open three, Mason would have to run the pick and roll several times to get a contested pull-up three pointer. Bonner, Udoka, and Finley would often have to give a pump fake and drive into the lane instead of taking the shot because they were not open. So let’s not place all the blame on the Spurs’ role players, they were not hired to perform the job that they were forced to execute.

On the bright side, how good did Tony Parker and Tim Duncan look? Tony could not be stopped and Tim looked like he turned the clock back five years. If you throw out Game 3’s stats, the game in which the Spurs were blown out and Tim and Tony barely played in the second half, Tony averaged 33 ppg, 4 rpg, and 8 apg, while Tim averaged 24 ppg, 9.5 rpg, and 4 apg for the series. The last two games of the season, Tim averaged 27.5 ppg and 9 rpg.

Clearly, some roster work needs to happen during this off-season. However, I hope the Spurs do not do anything too drastic. I think Tim and Tony proved that they still have a lot left in the tank, and if Manu can get healthy, this team’s championship window has not closed. We need our role players to get younger and more athletic. I expect to see the Spurs shed players like Finley, Udoka, Vaughn (Fingers Crossed), Oberto, and Bowen in exchange for youth and athleticism. Hopefully the big three, Roger Mason, and George Hill will still be wearing the silver and black next year, but everyone else is dispensable.

In retrospect, it was probably better that the Spurs lost to Dallas. Denver would have been next up to bat. Have you been watching the Denver/New Orleans series? Denver is playing the most physical brand of basketball in the playoffs. They are doing what Erica Dampier threatened. They will physically beat the Hell out of the Mavericks. I’m not guaranteeing a series victory, but I am guaranteeing that Barea will get thrown to the floor many, many times. And it will make me happy. Even if the Spurs were able to beat Denver, the Lakers would be waiting. And the Lakers are exceptional. If Kobe broke his foot in Game 1 and Gasol decided to leave Earth in favor of his home planet, and the Spurs somehow pulled out that series, the Cavs would be waiting in the Finals. A championship was pretty much impossible this year. I couldn’t even talk myself into it. Well, at least once I found out Manu was officially done for the season.

Well, that’s all I have for now. As far as this blog in concerned, I will continue posting. NBA playoffs will be a central topic for the coming months as well as more funny additions similar to the Pirates piece.

Cheers and Jeers,