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The San Antonio Spurs have been active in this, the early hours of free agency. They kicked off by signing the reigning Defensive Player of the Year Kawhi Leonard, then found a great home for Center Tiago Splitter, trading him to the Atlanta Hawks and into the hands of his former coach, Coach Bud. They followed this up by inking arguably the best 3 & D player in the league, Danny Greene, to a Four year, $45 million deal. But now the heavy lifting begins.
The Los Angeles Clippers came out swinging last night and delivered a 30 point first quarter, while holding the Spurs to 18, that set the tone for the rest of the game. The Spurs are looking to rebound tomorrow night in Los Angeles. Chris Paul led the Clippers with 32 points while Center Blake Griffin contributed 26 points and 12 rebounds. The Spurs were led by Kawhi Leonard with 18.
“They’re still the defending champs, and they’re going to be the defending champs every night,” Clippers coach Doc Rivers said. “We have a lot of confidence in our team, but you just have to stay humble and respect who you’re playing.”
“We give them a lot of credit, because they sustained it longer than we did,” Spurs Forward Tim Duncan said. “They played harder longer. They had the energy with their home crowd behind them.”
At the beginning of every season for the past decade, the San Antonio Spurs have been all but written off ‘old’ and they go through the slog of the long season, sometimes rife with injury, sometimes not but always showing up in the postseason. The Admiral sets sail and they win. Slam Duncan sets records in nearly all statistical categories over a 17 year career and still manages to average 13.6 points per game, 9.1 rebounds, 2.9 assists, 2.0 blocks shooting 50% from the floor and career high 7.% from the line in under 30 minutes a game.
And now, we are in the midst of the passing the throne. First from Five-O to Duncan to Ginobili to Parker and now to Kawhi Leonard.
“It’s going to be Kawhi’s team, anyway,” Parker said. “Timmy transitioned to Manu, Manu transitioned to me, and now it’s going to be transitioned to Kawhi. I’ll try my best to stay aggressive and be involved, but Kawhi is going to be the man.”
That came after the Spurs sent their in-state rival Houston Rockets home confused and concerned in a 110-98 thumping. Leonard, who has been averaging 19.9 ppg, 5.8 RPG, 2.8 steals and 2.7 assist over the past 10 games had an off night of 20 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and four steals.
“Give them credit, they took us out of our game and we couldn’t sustain anything in the second half,” Rockets coach Kevin McHale said.