Tag: In the News

Race for Spurs roster spot down to Curry, Brown

By Jeff McDonald

MIAMI — Ten days before the start of the regular season, there technically remain four candidates to claim the Spurs’ 15th and final roster spot.

Before Saturday’s 104-101 loss at Miami, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich winnowed the field further.

“We’re looking at basically two guys, Eddy Curry and Derrick Brown,” Popovich said.

Curry, a 29-year-old center whose career has become synonymous with squandered promise, has throughout the preseason displayed a consistent ability to put the ball in the basket.

In his Saturday return to Miami, where he was a little-used member of last season’s NBA championship squad, Curry contributed nine points in less than eight minutes.

“Eddy lost 20 pounds to come to camp, and he’s played through being tired, which has always been a bugaboo for him in the past,” Popovich said. “He’s worked very hard, and he’s done a lot of good things.”

Brown, a 25-year-old former Charlotte Bobcat who can guard both small and power forwards, did not play Saturday. Still, Popovich has been impressed with Brown’s versatility and defensive chops.

“He’s a talented kid,” Popovich said. “Sometimes it takes people a little longer for the light to go on. You get them into another program and things work for them.”

The Spurs have until Oct. 29 to cut their roster from 18 players to no more than 15.

In addition to Curry and Brown, two other players on camp contracts — forwards Josh Powell and Wesley Witherspoon — remain on the roster for now.

Powell logged 16 minutes against the Heat, producing eight points and six rebounds, but made only 3-of-8 field goals. Witherspoon did not travel with the team to Florida, although he has not yet been formally waived.

Prize waits: In addition to the promise of a paycheck, Curry has another reason to want to make the Spurs.

If Curry is on the team Nov. 29, when the Spurs return to Miami in the regular season, that’s the date he’s most likely to receive his championship ring from the Heat.

“It’s cool,” Curry said. “I already got sized and everything. My wife, too.”

Having appeared in just 14 games for Miami last season, and none in the playoffs, Curry admits he had considerably less to do with the Heat’s title than, say, LeBron James did.

“I don’t want to sound ungrateful,” Curry said. “My second ring will be better. I’ll say it like that.”

Got Spo’s vote: One person rooting for Curry to hook on with the Spurs is Miami coach Erik Spoelstra.

“He has really committed himself, to put himself in a position not only to be back in this league, but really be an impact player,” Spoelstra said.

jmcdonald@express-news.net

Spurs’ trip to Miami a Heat check

By Jeff McDonald

MIAMI — The Spurs take the floor this afternoon at American Airlines Arena, at long last prepared to square off with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh and the Miami Heat.

Only about four months too late.

Last June, the Spurs appeared all but ticketed for a trip to South Beach before Oklahoma City ambushed them in the final four games of the Western Conference finals.

Today’s preseason game in Miami isn’t filled with as much meaning as an NBA Finals matchup would have been. For a Spurs’ team that still considers itself very much a title contender, that doesn’t mean it is meaningless.

“It’s a championship team, a championship program,” coach Gregg Popovich said. “It’s a great way to see a lot of players play against such a good basketball team. You play a team like that, you get some questions answered.”

Spurs’ players freely admit today’s game won’t serve as a measuring stick in the manner a regular-season game against the defending league champions might.

By the time the benches clear in the second half, the festivities are likely to devolve into the Wesley Witherspoon or Garrett Temple show.

But at the outset, assuming both teams play their regulars, the game should provide a much better gauge than, say, a rematch with Montepaschi Siena.

“It’s better to play the best team than the worst,” guard Manu Ginobili said. “At least you get to play a few minutes against Wade, LeBron and guys like that, that you’ve really got to guard.”

As the preseason hits the home stretch, Popovich says he plans to ramp up the starters’ minutes leading up to the Oct. 31 regular-season opener at New Orleans.

That should be welcome news to any fan paying full price to attend this afternoon’s exhibition.

“It’s only a preseason game and you’re just getting ready,” center Boris Diaw said. “But they are the defending champions, so we’re going to be able to measure ourselves a little bit.”

If nothing else, the opening quarters of today’s game should provide a stress test for the Spurs’ defense-in-progress.

The Heat boast a trio of All-Stars — led by James, a three-time league MVP — who combined to average better than 67 points per game last season. But they’ve added to the mix a pair of dangerous long-range gunners in Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis.

The 36-year-old Allen, who won a championship ring of his own with Boston in 2008, is only the most prolific 3-point shooter in NBA history with 2,718 made.

“Having players like LeBron and Wade plus Bosh, you need to put people in the paint and make everything crowded,” Ginobili said. “The addition of Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis adds two wonderful shooters. It makes them tougher.”

Improving the Spurs from the middling defensive unit they were a season ago — and have been since the 2007 championship season — was the item atop Popovich’s agenda entering training camp.

Through four preseason games, the Spurs are allowing opponents to shoot 33.8 percent and are giving up 95 points per game.

In their only loss of the preseason, the Spurs at least held Denver — the only team to average more points than them in the regular season last year — to less than triple digits.

It’s so far, so good. But then again, the Spurs haven’t faced the defending champs yet.

The Spurs believe they will know more about themselves after the smoke clears today. How much more remains to be seen.

“It’s not going to be a measuring stick to see who wins, because the preseason is not about winning,” Ginobili said. “It’s about getting better, and playing against the best players makes you better.”

Even in the preseason.

jmcdonald@express-news.net
Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN

Pregame rule likely won’t affect low-key Spurs

By Jeff McDonald

Just before the start of the Spurs’ preseason game at Houston on Sunday, Tim Duncan grabbed the ball and hugged it tight, as is his pre-tip ritual.

Lead official Ken Mauer glanced at a running clock above the Toyota Center baskets and issued a reminder: “30 seconds, Tim.”

In an effort to curb pregame routines it believes are slowing down the game, the NBA this season is emphasizing a rule that allows referees to assess a delay-of-game warning to teams whose dancing and handshaking choreography gets out of hand.

From the time the house lights go up after pregame introductions, teams are allowed 90 seconds to get jiggy. If all five players are not ready to tip off after those 90 seconds, officials can issue a warning.

Long regarded one of the NBA’s most low-key teams, the Spurs don’t expect to be affected by the rule enforcement.

“I had some 89-second handshakes worked out with my teammates,” forward Matt Bonner said. “I had to cut those out.”

Considering that Miami forward LeBron James’ elaborate chalk-tossing routine has become the stuff of shoe commercials, Bonner was asked if the new edict could rightly be called “The LeBron Rule.”

“No comment,” Bonner said. “I’m not going to say anything to get LeBron mad at me.”

Pop’s mediator: When Don Newman left during the offseason to become Randy Wittman’s lead assistant coach in Washington, it left quite a void in the Spurs’ game-day operations.

For seven seasons, Newman was the coach charged with keeping Gregg Popovich from ringing up technicals. Often, when an exchange between Popovich and a referee would get too heated, Newman would physically step between the two men and shepherd his boss back to the bench.

“He didn’t have to work very hard, because I rarely got one,” Popovich said, though perhaps that’s an indication of how good Newman was at his job. “He just acted like he was holding me back all the time.”

Newman has been replaced on Popovich’s bench by former Spur Ime Udoka, who as a member of the Nigerian national team once had to fight his way out of a gym in Algiers.

Here’s guessing Udoka is up to the task.

Habitat help: Not long after Thursday’s practice, three Spurs players zipped off to a construction site on the city’s southwest side, where hammers and hard hats awaited.

Centers Boris Diaw and Tiago Splitter and guard Cory Joseph were among the Spurs Sports Entertainment employees on hand to help with various construction projects in Coleman Ridge, a subdivision developed by Habitat for Humanity of San Antonio.

The event was part of the annual citywide United Way Day of Caring.

jmcdonald@express-news.net
Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN