Author: katadmin

Burning questions for Spurs’ offseason

By Jeff McDonald

Thanks to Kevin Durant and the Oklahoma City Thunder, the offseason came two victories shy of the NBA Finals for the Spurs.

What’s next for the Western Conference runners-up? Here is the answer to that question with five more, plus one:

How badly does Tim Duncan just want to eat red meat and play “Call of Duty” all day?

The Spurs’ franchise player since draft day 1997, Duncan’s contract famously expires July 1. Whether he decides, at age 36, to sign another one will largely hinge on the answer to the question above.

Duncan proved this season that his body can still handle the rigors of an NBA season, but it takes hard work — and a stringent low-fat diet — to make that happen. If Duncan is ready to finally unstrap that omnipresent knee brace, sink his teeth into a cheeseburger and fire up the Xbox in retirement, nobody would blame him.

If Duncan does decide he’d still like to play “until the wheels fall off,” expect the Spurs to come to a workable agreement with him. Duncan’s not playing anywhere else.

So how much is an aging franchise player going for these days anyway?

Less than the $21.1 million Duncan made last season, but probably more than you’d think.

Duncan appeared rejuvenated during the lockout-shortened season, including a 25-and-14 performance in Wednesday’s Game 6 ouster in OKC. Though clearly no longer an MVP candidate — and, according to the voters at least, no longer an All-Star — Duncan remains a quality NBA big man, and those don’t come ? cheap.

The Spurs have other free agents to address (namely guard Danny Green and center Boris Diaw), but must first gauge what their payroll looks like after they re-up Duncan.

How dangerous are the Olympics for Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker?

Put it this way: Coach Gregg Popovich plans to attend the London Games this summer, but don’t be surprised if he watches matches involving Argentina and France with both hands covering his eyes.

Who can forget the sight of Ginobili rolling around on the court in 2008 in Beijing, clutching an injured left ankle that would soon require surgery? Of equal concern is the daily toll year-round basketball takes on 30-something bodies, and neither Parker (30) nor Ginobili (soon-to-be 35) is getting younger.

With the Olympics piled on top of a deep playoff run, expect Popovich to give his international backcourt plenty of rest come training camp and the preseason in October.

Should we prepare for more draft-night drama?

After years of using draft night to select players whose names fans couldn’t pronounce from countries they couldn’t locate on a map, then stashing them overseas for future use (or not), the Spurs made a bold move last June to land Kawhi Leonard at No. 15.

The Spurs do not have a first-round pick in the June 28 draft, having shipped it to Golden State in the March trade for Stephen Jackson, but won’t rule out trying to move up for the right player and right price.

Tiago Splitter: linchpin or liability?

Somewhere in the middle. The former first-round pick produced a sophomore campaign significantly more impactful than his first, doubling his scoring average to 9.3 points per game, and increasing his rebounding and blocks, while serving as a capable backup to Duncan.

But Splitter fell off the map during the latter part of the Western Conference finals, proving his upside has limits. The 6-foot-11 Splitter never was meant to be the heir-apparent to Duncan as the centerpiece big man, but should be a useful rotation piece going forward.

Bonus question: Should Erazem Lorbek and Nando de Colo look into obtaining work visas?

A 6-foot-10 forward from Slovenia currently playing with Ricky Rubio’s old club in Spain, Lorbek was a sidepiece of the Leonard deal. De Colo, a 6-foot-5 guard from France, has also been playing in Spain since the Spurs drafted him 53rd overall in 2009.

Both have a chance to cross the pond and join the Spurs next season, depending on how the free-agency landscape shakes out. If you’re handicapping it, expect Lorbek to make the jump before de Colo.

jmcdonald@express-news.net

Durant hasn’t changed since becoming NBA superstar

By Mike Monroe

OKLAHOMA CITY — You would need a hypodermic needle filled with truth serum to get Thunder general manager Sam Presti to reveal which player was No. 1 on his draft board on June 28, 2007.

On the job for just three weeks as general manager of the Seattle SuperSonics on that franchise-turning draft night, Presti had the No. 2 pick in a class with two potential Hall of Famers: Texas forward Kevin Durant and Ohio State center Greg Oden.

Oden was a 7-foot, 250-pound mix of power and size some believed capable of dominating the NBA paint for years.

Durant was the best pure player in the draft, the college player of the year with an All-American personality to match his game.

Ask Presti which player he would have taken had he been in the shoes of then-Portland general manager Kevin Pritchard, whose team had first choice, and he dances around the answer as if he were Fred Astaire.

“I don’t answer hypotheticals,” Presti said. “But there were two players in that draft, and we were happy to have one of the two.”

When it comes to choosing between players whose talents and potential are deemed equal, size typically rules. After all, a pair of 7-footers, Hakeem Olajuwon and Sam Bowie, were selected ahead of Michael Jordan in the 1984 draft. Jordan’s six championships with the Bulls argue strongly that size alone shouldn’t trump transcendent skill.

Presti’s very first draft-night decision as a GM was made for him when the Trail Blazers chose Oden. But read between the lines of his elaboration on the hypothetical and there is inference, however slight, he would have chosen Durant if he held the No. 1 pick.

“Having been in San Antonio, in such close proximity to Austin and having relationships with the coaches at Texas, I was thrilled to have an opportunity to add Kevin to our organization because he personifies so many of the values we want our franchise to be identified with: humility, hard work, character, team focus and great citizenship,” Presti said. “We’re very fortunate to have him as a player. We’re more fortunate to have him as a person.”

The person who seemed too good to be true in 2007 hasn’t changed. Durant remains the humble, team-oriented superstar who insisted a national basketball magazine include the entire Longhorns starting lineup on its cover before he would agree to pose for the photograph.

When he trotted to the sidelines to give his mom a kiss during a stoppage of play in the final minute of the Thunder’s closeout victory over the Lakers last week, Durant endeared himself to anyone able to see the televised sincerity of his affection.

“The biggest compliment I can pay Kevin is that his development as a player has changed, almost by the month, since I’ve known him,” Presti said. “But the person I met in 2007 is the same.”

NO CEILING

Durant averaged 28.03 points per game this season, becoming the first player since Jordan to lead the league in scoring for three consecutive seasons.

At age 23, it also made him the youngest to do so, and there is little reason to believe he won’t have a chance to match the league record of seven consecutive titles shared by Jordan and Wilt Chamberlain.

But Durant values a championship more than scoring titles and there is evidence of this in his performance in this season’s first two playoff rounds: He doesn’t even care if he leads his team in scoring so long as it wins. In his team’s first-round sweep of the Mavericks, Durant averaged 27.0 points but led the team in scoring just once. In the second-round elimination of the Lakers, he averaged 26.8 points but led the team only twice.

Guard Russell Westbrook has been the Thunder’s top scorer five times in nine playoff games so far — James Harden in one — and the Thunder have proven more difficult to defend when this happens. A year ago, he was his team’s high scorer in three of five games in the Western finals against Dallas and the Mavericks won four of those.

Does that Western finals failure mean a breakthrough against the Spurs is imperative?

“I can’t worry about myself or my legacy,” Durant said. “I’ve always been intrigued on how we do as a team and how we press forward as a team. At the end of the day, when I’m done playing, what’s going to be looked at is what the Oklahoma City Thunder team did that year.

“I know it’s going to be a tough matchup. I really respect the Spurs. We looked up to those guys when we were in the lottery my first two years. We wanted to kind of mold ourselves after them. But it’s time for us to go ahead and try to compete with these guys and make it a series. That’s what it’s about: Come out there and try to win every game.”

SIMILAR PATH

After spending seven years with the Spurs, Presti knows Durant shares traits with Tim Duncan, the Spurs’ captain, two-time NBA Most Valuable Player and three-time Finals MVP.

“It’s hard to compare people, obviously,” Presti said. “But Kevin has helped to establish the standard by which we live on a day-to-day basis here. He has a genuine appreciation for the work and craft itself. He has a humility and respect for the profession. And he is someone that is also a great representative of the community, not only the organization.”

Duncan has done that for the Spurs for 15 seasons. Durant is flattered at the suggestion his career might follow the same arc in Oklahoma.

“If I could pattern my career after Tim Duncan’s, every step?” he said. “Four rings? Labeled as the best power forward ever? Play for one of the best coaches to ever coach? Play in a great city? Of course I would.

“Hopefully, my story is planned out like that. Of course, I want to aim a little higher, but I will just take it a day at a time. You never know what will happen. But I love to be here and would love to fight for a championship every single year.”

mikemonroe@express-news.net

SPECIAL TALENT

Five years ago, Kevin Durant decided that playing basketball for one year at the University of Texas would be enough. He was ready to take his talents to the NBA.

Five years later, no one doubts that decision. Three years ago, he became the youngest (21) to win a scoring title in what would have been his junior year at UT.

This season, he won that scoring crown for the third straight time.

A look some of Durant’s numbers:

1 – 2007-08 NBA Rookie of the Year

1 – 2012 NBA All-Star Game MVP

3 – All-Star Game appearances

25 – 30-plus point games this season, including four 40-plus point nights and a 51-point outing against Denver

26.0 – Career scoring average against the Spurs in 17 games (Spurs are 12-5 in those meetings)

26.3 – Career scoring average, which includes NBA-best 30.1, 27.7 and 28.0 the past three seasons

27.4 – Career playoff scoring average in 32 games, including 26.7 this postseason

49.6 – Career-best shooting percentage this season

9,978 – Career points total, just 136 shy of what the Spurs’ Manu Ginobili has in 10 seasons

– Douglas Pils

Offensive adjustments not foreign for Spurs

By Jeff McDonald

OKLAHOMA CITY — A Swiss, a Frenchman, a Congolese and an Argentine all walk onto a basketball court.

What sounds like the setup to a bad joke was actually the defensive recipe Oklahoma City coach Scott Brooks used to get his team back into the Western Conference finals.

With off-guard Thabo Sefolosha blanketing Tony Parker, and with power forward Serge Ibaka flummoxing Manu Ginobili on most every pick-and-roll, the Spurs’ juggernaut of an offense looked downright mortal in a 102-82 loss in Game 3 on Thursday.

“They brought it,” said Ginobili, whose team had a franchise-best 20-game winning streak stopped. “They got us on our heels. Now we know how it’s going to be.”

Still up 2-1 in the series, how the Spurs respond in Game 4 tonight at Chesapeake Energy Arena will go a long way toward determining how much longer this thing plays out.

First order of business: Solving the Thunder’s International House of Defense.

Sefolosha, a 28-year-old from Switzerland, is 6-foot-7. His combination of length and quickness made it difficult for Parker to scoot around him.

After averaging 26 points in Games 1 and 2, Parker managed 16 in Game 3 and committed five of the Spurs’ 21 turnovers.

Parker, who had been guarded in the first two games mostly by Russell Westbrook, was not exactly surprised by the change.

“It’s not the first time,” Parker said. “They did it before in the past. I have to keep being aggressive and choosing my spots.”

Of greater significance, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said, was Brooks’ other major adjustment.

The call to switch most every pick-and-roll often left Ibaka, the NBA’s top shot-blocker at 6-foot-9, paired with Ginobili on the perimeter. The 22-year-old Republic of Congo native handled the assignment well, keeping Ginobili out of the paint and unable to throw the pick-and-roll passes he prefers.

Ginobili went 1 for 5 from the field and added four turnovers to the Spurs’ tally. His counter in Game 4 is simple.

“Attack better,” Ginobili said. “When they collapse the paint, try to find the open teammate. Basic basketball. It’s not something Xs and Os wise. I’ve got to be sharper, more decisive. The spacing’s got to be better.”

With their trademark pick-and-roll effectively sabotaged, the Spurs struggled to keep up with OKC on the scoreboard.

After seemingly getting any shot they wanted in Games 1 and 2, the Spurs were forced into more one-on-one isolation plays in Game 3 than they would have liked.

The ball movement that was the staple of the Spurs’ winning streak disappeared. The offense stagnated.

During their streak, the Spurs averaged better than 109 points per game. The 82 they mustered Thursday were their fewest in the postseason since a 101-81 loss at Dallas in the 2010 first round.

“Our pick-and-roll defense was very good against probably the best pick-and-roll offense,” Brooks said. “We did a good job of getting into the ball, did a good job of being up into the ball with our bigs. That was the key.”

In addition to pouring in an uncharacteristic 19 points, Sefolosha snagged six steals — most in the playoffs against the Spurs in 11 years.

Oklahoma City logged 14 steals in all, scored 20 of their points off Spurs miscues and seemed to deflect even the most routine passes.

Given the overwhelming success the Thunder defense enjoyed in Game 3, the Spurs can expect a similar switch-everything approach tonight.

“We have to use the mismatches we get from that to our advantage,” said Tim Duncan, who is 13 of 41 so far in the series. “Tony and Manu will be expecting those kind of switches, and they have to attack them in a different way.”

If the Spurs can figure out a new plan for dealing with OKC’s defensive alterations, they have an excellent chance of bringing a 3-1 lead home with them.

And if they can’t? The punchline that follows won’t seem so funny.

jmcdonald@express-news.net
Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN

SPURS VS. THUNDER
Western Conference finals
(Spurs lead best-of-7 series 2-1)

Game 1:

Game 2:

Game 3:

Game 4: Saturday – Spurs @ Thunder, 7:30 p.m. TNT

Game 5: Monday – Spurs vs. Thunder, 8:00 p.m. TNT

*Game 6: Wednesday – Spurs @ Thunder, 8:00 p.m. TNT

*Game 7: Friday – Spurs vs. Thunder, 8:00 p.m. TNT

– All times Central
*If necessary