Tag: James Anderson

Facing Grizzlies again motivation for Spurs

By Jeff McDonald
jmcdonald@express-news.net

Tim Duncan swears he has not looked at the film. Not once since leaving Memphis after the Spurs’ stunning first-round playoff exit in April has Duncan felt the slightest need to dissect what went wrong, not even for the purposes of autopsy.

He doesn’t have to.

“It’s pretty crisp in my memory,” Duncan said.

For five months during the NBA lockout, the image of defeat played on a continuous loop in the minds of Duncan and the other Spurs who suffered through one of the most disappointing playoff losses in league history.

That is a long time to burn.

Tonight at the ATT Center, the Spurs open a new chapter, the start of a lockout-compressed season many thought would never happen. But first, they must close an old wound.

The Spurs begin their new campaign against the same team that unceremoniously shut down their last one. In stunning the Spurs in six games, Memphis became only the second No. 8 seed in the best-of-7 era to oust a No. 1.

“There’s definitely a lot of motivation there,” said point guard Tony Parker, who was outplayed in the series by his Memphis counterpart, Mike Conley. “I want to play them in the playoffs, but I’ll start with the first game of the season.”

Even Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, never one to play up the payback angle or any other made-for-TV storyline, sees a smidgen of added impetus in the opener.

Of course, beating Memphis in Game 1 of the regular season won’t erase the disaster of last season’s playoffs. But it could be a good first step toward cleansing the palate.

“People are people,” Popovich said. “I’m sure when the game starts, our people will be motivated because they got beat by a very good team last year.”

In a way, tonight might feel like a continuation of last April, a Game 7 without the pesky drama of win-or-go home. Though nearly eight months have passed since the last time the Spurs and Memphis met, little has changed with either team.

Zach Randolph, who averaged 21.6 points and 9.2 rebounds against the Spurs in the playoffs, is still a load. The Grizzlies do welcome back small forward Rudy Gay, the club’s perennial leading scorer who missed the postseason while recovering from shoulder surgery.

The Spurs, meanwhile, bring back a roster almost identical to the one that won a Western Conference-best 61 games last season before falling short in the first round.

The most significant addition since April — besides a two-armed Manu Ginobili — is first-round draft pick Kawhi Leonard, the small forward from San Diego State obtained in a draft-day trade that shipped reserve guard George Hill to Indiana.

The Spurs also will expect greater contributions from a pair of second-year players — guard James Anderson and center Tiago Splitter — than they got in last season’s playoffs.

“If we win, it doesn’t take back what happened last season,” forward Richard Jefferson said. “It’s just one game.”

For the Spurs, bigger challenges lie ahead after Memphis leaves town. Tonight’s game is the first of 66, overstuffed into 129 days.

Though the Spurs won a title in 1999, the last time the NBA staged a shortened campaign, Duncan said there is a smaller margin for error than in a full season.

“You don’t want to get yourself stuck in a hole and have to find a way to fight yourself back, especially with all these back-to-backs and all the games in not many days,” said Duncan, the only player on the Spurs’ roster active in ’99.

“You have to take care of stuff, especially when you’re healthy, especially when you’ve got everybody.”

The Spurs hope to start a new championship push tonight, against the team that ended the last one.

One door opens, but not before the other one closes.

“There’s no excuses, they beat us, congratulations to Memphis,” Parker said. “Now it’s a new season.”

Spurs’ Leonard crams for NBA test

A month ago, Spurs rookie Kawhi Leonard was sitting in the bleachers at San Diego State’s Viejas Arena, watching his former teammates beat Southern Utah in their season opener.

He only wished it felt like he had never left.

“The lockout was tough, not just on me but on every rookie,” Leonard said. “I was ready to get started in the NBA.”

After 150 days of labor limbo, Leonard’s education as an NBA player began, finally, with the opening of training camp last week.

Between now and the Spurs’ Dec. 26 regular-season opener against Memphis, the 20-year-old small forward will be asked to cram nearly six months of NBA 101 into a little more than two weeks.

Obtained in a draft-night trade that sent popular guard George Hill to Indiana, Leonard — taken 15th overall — arrives as the Spurs’ highest-drafted rookie since Tim Duncan went No. 1 in 1997.

Though coach Gregg Popovich has sought to tamp down expectations for Leonard, the Spurs clearly did not part with a key rotation piece like Hill to bring in a player they did not think could contribute soon.

“Kawhi is what we expected, in that we knew he was a hard worker; that he was a committed player; that he responded well defensively, and rebounding-wise,” Popovich said. “Already he’s a little more explosive than we expected — the stops and starts, that sort of thing.”

Even without the benefit of summer league, offseason workouts with the Spurs’ player development coaches or even a full training camp, Leonard — 6-foot-7 with catcher’s mitt hands — can be expected to quickly work his way into the team’s muddled small-forward mix.

For now, 31-year-old Richard Jefferson is the apparent starter, with the Spurs still chasing at least one veteran — Washington’s Josh Howard — on the free-agent market.

In terms of learning curve, Leonard already is five days ahead of fellow first-rounder Cory Joseph, the Texas point guard the Spurs took 29th. A native Canadian, Joseph has yet to practice while clearing up immigration red tape.

With the Spurs hoping to get younger and more athletic — not to mention more defensive-minded — on the wing, Leonard should find a role relatively quickly.

“He has a knack for the ball, you can already see it,” said second-year guard James Anderson, who trained with Leonard in Las Vegas during the lockout. “His defensive tools will help us out. His youth, getting out and running the floor, it will bring us more firepower.”

Spurs rookie Kawhi Leonard (center) tosses the ball to Danny Green (left) as DeJuan Blair looks on at a recent Spurs practice. (Kin Man Hui / kmhui@express-news.net)

In two seasons at San Diego State, Leonard logged 40 double-doubles, second in school history behind Michael Cage. As a sophomore last season, he averaged 15.5 points and 10.6 rebounds as a second-team All-American.

The most daunting obstacle standing between Leonard and early playing time is the calendar.

One week after draft day, the NBA locked out its players. For the first five months of his professional career, Leonard couldn’t contact his new coaches, get into his new locker room or draw a paycheck. If he ever regretted his decision to leave school early for a lockout, Leonard would never admit it.

“I got drafted 15,” he said. “That was my dream growing up.”

In place of a proper offseason with Spurs coaches, Leonard worked out with future teammates such as Anderson and Jefferson, grilling them on the basics of the playbook. He also watched film of Spurs games, hoping to pick up pointers by osmosis.

“I’m just trying to learn the offense so once I get in the game, I won’t be clueless,” Leonard said.

His NBA career delayed for 150 days, Leonard is glad to at last be on the court for his first training camp. His college career is over, but for Leonard, the education is just beginning.

“I watched these guys growing up, and now I’m on the court with them,” Leonard said. “I just try to have fun and open my eyes and ears so I can learn a lot.”

Spurs notebook: Healthy Anderson anxious to show his stuff

After missing most of his rookie season training camp, second-year Spurs guard James Anderson found waiting nearly two-and-a-half months for the opening of this season’s camp a mere inconvenience.

Now, with Gary Neal on the shelf after undergoing an appendectomy on Monday, Anderson figures more heavily in the Spurs’ early-season plans.

Anderson got off to a good start last season, making 10 of 20 on 3-pointers in the first six games of the season but appeared in only 26 games after a stress fracture in his right foot was discovered Nov. 11. He returned to the lineup Jan. 29 but played a limited role thereafter.

“We want to watch him play,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. “We haven’t really seen him. He was hurt so much last year and missed camp and had such a spotty experience during the year. He’ll obviously get a chance to get out on the floor with Gary out. We’ll see what we see.”

Anderson played in a makeshift pro league in Las Vegas during the NBA lockout and reported to camp intent on proving himself.

“Anytime you get injured, it’s heartbreaking,” he said. “At the same time, you’ve got to take care of your body. That’s what this league is all about, taking care of your body.”

SHECKY POPOVICH: The Spurs coach went all stand-up comic on Neal on Tuesday, making light of Neal’s enforced idleness.

“They took out his appendix,” Popovich said. “He didn’t come to practice.

“Remember when we got our appendixes taken out? Next day, we were out shoveling snow. He gets his appendix out, he’s lying in bed: ‘It hurts, Coach. I can’t do anything.’

“I sent him a little card. It had a doe on it, a little deer. It smelled of flowers and everything. I wanted him to know we were thinking about him. If I was worth anything, I would have thought of sending ice cream with it, just to make him happier.”

The team’s medical staff won’t allow Neal to get back on the court until Monday.

“He’s probably going to miss three or four games, I’m thinking, something like that,” Popovich said. “Then he’ll be ready to go. He’s not going to forget how to shoot, but he was working really hard at the defensive end of the court, trying to improve the all-around part of his game, so that’s a tough break for him.”

MCDYESS DEADLINE: Center-forward Antonio McDyess remains a camp absentee while the club determines his contract status. Though the 16-year veteran announced his intent to retire after last season, he remains on the team’s roster, with half his $5.2 million contract guaranteed, even if he goes through with retirement.

The club has until Monday to decide if it is going to guarantee the other half of McDyess’ deal. It is possible his expiring contract could be used as part of a trade.

“We’re taking our time deciding how we want to approach the whole roster,” said Popovich, also the team’s executive vice president of basketball operations. “Every team is still looking around, making calls. We’re still looking around. It’s early. Things are starting to settle out, obviously, but things can happen to round out a roster.”

BUTLER WAIVED: The Spurs waived forward Da’Sean Butler. The club had signed him late last season after he was waived by the Heat. He did not play for the Spurs.