Author: Jeff Koch (Page 8 of 404)

Season 51, Game 62
San Antonio 116, New Orleans 121
36-26, 5th in the West

With a healthy LaMarcus Aldridge for the entire game, the Spurs likely win this.

Even without Aldridge, the Spurs completely blew this game late, giving up a sure-fire win in the final minutes of regulation.

Both things are true. Playing without their star and best player, the Spurs were still primed to get this much-needed win at home after a very poor Rodeo Road Trip. For 46 minutes, the Spurs looked really good, zipping the ball around and playing unselfish basketball to keep the Pelicans at bay.

But those final two minutes proved to be disastrous, as the Spurs turned the ball over on 3 pivotal possessions, allowing the Pelicans to climb back and take the the lead. Then, on a pivotal box out on a missed free throw, four Spurs were unable to keep Anthony Davis off the glass as he grabbed the rebound and helped put the game out of reach.

Honestly, the Spurs would have been better off if that free throw went in. Which is kind of a microcosm for the whole season, if you think about it. (Pro tip: don’t think about it.)

That’s the rub of this season: the Spurs are good enough (even without their top level talent) this season to stay competitive in every game, but have been uncharacteristically sloppy late in games, unable to secure “should be” wins. We think of the Spurs as a machine that can out-execute you to death, particularly late in games. Well, that’s not these Spurs.

Instead, these Spurs fail to execute simple inbounds plays; these Spurs miss wide-open shots to tie or take the leads late in game; these Spurs fail to get big defensive stops. (The Pelicans scored 70 points in the second half; it’s a miracle the often offensively-challenged Spurs remained competitive.)

There are often bright spots in every game, and the players play to the best of their abilities. There just isn’t enough ability out there right now.

These last few months have put the Spurs in a precarious position: fighting for their playoff lives. It seems almost impossible to think, but the Spurs are in real danger of missing the playoffs. There is an eight team logjam in the Western Conference fighting for six playoff spots. Of those 8 teams, the Spurs are probably playing the worst right now.

They need to start winning games at home. They need to start winning games against good but not great teams.

They just need some damn wins.

There are three types of games left: games against elite teams (better); games against teams in the logjam (their equals); and games against the bottom of the league and/or the Eastern Conference (worse).

They need to win all of their games against the bottom. I have not hope of them beating teams definitively better than them. The season, then, will be won or lost in how they fare against those teams stuck in the middle with them, the logjam of the Western Conference. They have 8 game remaining against that bunch. I’d like to see them go at least 5-3 in those games. 6-2 would be better.

Truthfully, right now I’d just like to see them beat any team. I have no confidence in this happening.

I hope they defy my expectations Saturday night against the Lakers.

Go Spurs Go.

Season 51, Game 60
San Antonio 119, Denver 122
35-25, 3rd in the West

Something is rotten in San Antonio.

In all my years cheering for this team, I’ve never seen a situation quite like this. I’m sure everybody reading this has the same experience.

What in the heck is going on with Kawhi Leonard?

Speculation abounds; and not far behind speculation is accusation. Knowing so little, I’m loathe to do either. What we do know is that Kawhi’s injury is unlike anything we’ve seen before, and we know very little about its genesis or long-term prognosis; he is medically cleared to play; he doesn’t feel ready to play.

Everything after that is not publicly known. Pop gave a press conference last week saying he wouldn’t be surprised is Kawhi doesn’t come back. But that seemed aimed directly for Kawhi’s ears, not ours. Kawhi’s camp–when it does speak–denies any friction between the player and the organization, while new stories comes out every other day refuting that claim.

Kawhi has given no public statement in over a month. The Spurs organization seems unusually leaky, given their reputation for Cold War-era spy obfuscation.

And every day, Spurs fans freak out more and more.

Seriously, we’re not built for this. We are spoiled. We’ve had nearly 30 years of unparalleled success on and off the court.

I feel helpless as a fan. I want badly for Kawhi to come back and everything to be OK. But it certainly doesn’t seem like that will happen.

This has spilled over to my perception of the on-court product. The team is playing poorly, and it’s hard not to correlate the two. (Logically, I know it’s unlikely one affects the other so strongly, but emotionally it’s hard to deny.) Take away Kawhi, and the team is a star (LaMarcus Aldridge, who is a star but not a superstar) with a good but not great supporting cast of players too late in their career or too early in it.

Throw in the Kawhi drama, and it looks even worse.

The Spurs are 1-4 on the Rodeo Road Trip, easily the worst mark on the iconic annual trip. They have one game left against a rejuvenated Cleveland team, with a real chance to go 1-5 on the trip. They’ve lost 4 games in a row, and 6 of their last 7.

Continuing the 50-win streak is almost an impossibility at this point given how poor they’ve been playing and the difficulty of their remaining schedule (the hardest in the league). Beyond that, it’s a very real possibility that the team could finish in the bottom half of the West playoffs. Or, perhaps even out of the playoffs, a scenario completely unimaginable to the team and fans alike.

The team is able to remain competitive in most games, but is lacking that crispness and execution to finish most of them off. There is no rhythm, no cohesion, no collective will.

It is hard to watch, and even harder to enjoy.

Even more difficult, the drama unfolding off the court has most of our attention, as every day we wait for some break in the Kawhi story, some sign or tell that all is right in our sequestered and spoiled corner of sports fandom.

I don’t know when that sign will come, and if it does, that it can save this season.

Something is rotten in San Antonio.

The Spurs finish off the Rodeo Road Trip in Cleveland on Sunday afternoon.

Go Spurs Go.