I know, I know, it’s only March. The Spurs still have 23 games and 7 weeks left in the regular season. Then it’s crunch time, when Tim, Tony, Manu and the gang have to consistently win four out of every six or seven games against the league’s best opponents over a period of roughly two months.
For all practical purposes, the 2008 NBA playoffs have already started. Just five games separate the first-place Spurs from the eighth-place Warriors. Two playoff teams have double-digit win streaks (Spurs-10, Rockets-15) and four teams have won at least eight out of their last 10 games. Take any of the playoff teams in the West and drop them in the East and they’ll be no worse than the #3 seed. The Western Conference has never been stronger in my lifetime.
What this means for the Spurs and every other playoff contender is that the playoffs have already started. Win four out of every six games, and you should hold your spot. Slip just a little, even for a week, and you may find yourself making plans for a fishing trip come April. Just ask the Denver Nuggets, who the Spurs face this Friday. Two weeks ago they were in the middle of the playoff pack. After playing .500 ball for the past ten games, they now find themselves in the ninth spot, two games out of contention.
In today’s Daily Dime, Tim Legler goes out on a limb to pick the Spurs and Lakers to face off in the Western Conference Final. He gets everything right but the final result.
man, very true….
The Spurs are not a dynasty. For one thing, they have never won successive NBA titles, which is something a team has to do to even be considered a dynasty. In fact, they have been lucky in winning their four NBA titles. These lucky breaks are why most real NBA experts don’t really respect the Spurs and don’t consider them a dynasty.
In 1998-99, a season tainted by being reduced to 50 regular season games, the Spurs were lucky that they only had to play the Eastern Conference’s 8th seeded team, the Knicks, in the finals, as the Knicks upset the top-seeded Heat.
In 2002-03, the Spurs were lucky that the Eastern Conference was so poor that its top-seeded team, Detroit, only won 50 games. The Spurs were also lucky that Detroit was upset by the second-seeded Nets.
In 2004-05, the Spurs were lucky that Phoenix key player Joe Johnson missed most of the Western conference finals with a fractured orbital bone. The Spurs were lucky to face the second-seeded team from the East, Detroit, in the NBA finals.
In 2006-07, the Spurs probably had more luck than in any of their other previous “championship” years. They were lucky that they did not face Dallas in the playoffs, as the Mavs were the top seed in the West and had knocked the Spurs out of the playoffs in 2005-06.
In Game One of the real NBA finals against the Suns, the Spurs were lucky that Phoenix guard Steve Nash missed most of the last minute of the game with a bloody cut on his nose. When Nash went out, the Suns were only down by two points, and he had scored the team’s previous seven points. By the time Nash returned, the Spurs were winning by four points with only nine seconds left.
In Game 3, the Spurs were lucky in having key officiating calls go their way against Phoenix, as Tim Donaghy, who was caught in a gambling scandal, was one of the refs. The Spurs were lucky that the NBA commissioner’s office took away Phoenix’s momentum after the Suns won Game 4 to tie the series by suspending two key players, Stoudemire and Diaw, for going on the court during an altercation, even though Stoudemire and Diaw did not get near the altercation. The Spurs were lucky that Duncan, who went on the court during another near altercation in the same Game 4, was not suspended. The Spurs were lucky that they only had to play Utah in the Western conference finals and Cleveland in the NBA finals, rather than top-seeded Dallas and Detroit, which were both upset in the playoffs.
For more on refuting the Spurs as dynasty myth, see
https://winningtheturnoverbattle.blogspot.com/2007/06/why-spurs-are-not-dynasty.html