Tag: Manu Ginobili

Six quick takes: Why Pop’s decision was the right one

Sure, the 11-game winning streak was fun while it lasted.

But the NBA is all about positioning for the playoffs. And playing starters for extended minutes in February doesn’t make much sense, particularly when injuries and back-to-back games start piling up during the most  difficult road trip of the season.

Gregg Popovich can’t be faulted for resting Tim Duncan and Tony Parker in his team’s 137-97 blowout loss Tuesday night at Portland.

The Spurs are already struggling without Tiago Splitter, Manu Ginobili and T.J. Ford. Those injuries led to Duncan playing nearly 79combined  minutes in his last two games. You don’t ask a 35-year-old player to play those minutes and then demand much on the back end of a back-to-back.

During the month of February, Parker has played at least 38 minutes in five games. His minutes in the last two games ranked among his top 11 games of the season. It made sense to give him a chance a night of rest on Tuesday night, too.

“Those guys are out and I can’t run our other guys into the ground,” Popovich told reporters after the game. “When it’s time for them to rest based on the schedule and the time they’ve been playing, that’s what’s got to happen if you want to put some money in the bank for later.”

The Spurs were going to have trouble in Portland anyway after bringing a six-game losing streak at the Rose Garden before Tuesday’s game. They had failed to break the century mark against the Blazers in 13 straight games. If Popovich was going to pull back on the reigns in any game during the Rodeo Road Trip, Tuesday’s game made the most sense of any to concede.

“Every team is going to do this at some point with this season,” Popovich said. “Tonight was our night.”

After a day off the Spurs should be about as well rested as possible playing at the end of a nine-game road trip Thursday night in Denver. The Nuggets will play Wednesday night, so the Spurs get an edge there. Parker and Duncan should be ready to go if asked. It will be the last game before the All-Star break.

The Spurs will have a better chance of winning Thursday night in Denver than Tuesday night in Portland.

Popovich’s personnel movements only helped his chances. 

Here are a few other quick takes from perhaps the best example imaginable why a running clock is needed in the NBA when a margin is greater than 30 points in the fourth quarter.

  • Kawhi Leonard was the brightest spot in an otherwise dismal one for the Spurs in his best professional game. Leonard erupted for team-high totals of 24 points, 10 rebounds and five steals. He was as active and hustling during his latter minutes at the end of the game as at the beginning. Popovich has to be charged thinking about the opportunity to work with Leonard during the summer, building his offensive game and his strength on an otherwise intriguing skill set. Leonard can become a special player  under Popovich’s tutelage.
  • Two days ago, Eric Dawson was a member of the Austin Toros and hoping for a chance at the NBA. He received more of an early opportunity than he probably ever would have expected when he arrived with the Spurs, notching nearly32 minutes in his career debut and scoring nine points. The Spurs still need some depth inside and Splitter will be out of action for a couple of weeks. Dawson will have a chance to show what he can do during that time.
  • James Anderson’s wishes to be traded probablyo didn’t get much of a lift as he struggled through a miserable shooting effort. And when his shooting is struggling, Anderson sometimes goes into a funk defensively that harms his entire game. If he’s going to get a shot somewhere in the NBA, he needs to make the most of opportunities like the one he had on Tuesday night.
  • Even if they were playing the Spurs’ junior varsity team, Portland made a complete turnaround from earlier in the season. The Trail Blazers were struggling offensively, hitting only 32.9 percent from 3-point territory and ranking 18th in the league. They hit 53.6 percent of their 3-pointers in the first quarter to effectively blow the game open and never looked back.
  • Even with the huge lead, Gerald Wallace and Wesley Matthews were surprisingly playing early in the fourth quarter with the game already settled. Matthews hobbled off the court early in the fourth quarter with a sprained ankle. It should have made Portland coach Nate McMillan realize the ramifications of playing his top players  too much in blowout games. If he needed any rationale, maybe he should have looked at Duncan wearing a suit along the Spurs’ sidelines for inspiration.

A Spur’s path: From a crash to his dream

Column by Buck harvey

Ten years ago almost to the day, Eric Dawson saw his world turn upside down.

Literally. He was flipped during a game and landed face first. He was out cold, and his high school coach remembers one vivid detail.

A tooth jammed through a lip.

“I knew there was some damage,” Wayne Dickey joked Monday. “Because he kept talking about what a good coach I was.”

Sam Houston hung on to beat Kerrville Tivy without Dawson, advancing in the playoffs for a game the next day against Roosevelt. Dickey left it up to Dawson and Dawson’s mother whether he should play.

What followed is a reason Dickey says Dawson is among the top three players he had in more than 30 years of coaching.

And why Dawson finally reached his dream Monday night.

Dawson happened to be in Los Angeles last weekend with the Toros, the Spurs’ minor-league team. After Tiago Splitter and Manu Ginobili went down against the Clippers, the Spurs asked Dawson if he wouldn’t mind joining them on their charter to Salt Lake City.

Dawson says it was “the call I’d been waiting for all my life.” And ever since he got it, he says he’s asked himself, “Am I really here?”

He grew up a Spurs fan. Tim Duncan won his first title when Dawson was in high school, and now they are in the same locker room.

“It’s been a long journey,” Dawson said Monday night before the Spurs-Jazz game, and then he went through the journey: From the Dominican ?? Republic to Japan to Korea, with stops in between with the Toros in four different seasons.

He could have stayed overseas and made a nice living. But he kept coming back to the Toros, because this was the way to reach his goal.

“I wanted to get those three letters behind my name,” he said of the NBA. “I’ve got it now, and I’ve got to capitalize on it and stick.”

He will be pressed to do that; the odds are always against anyone with a 10-day contract. More than likely, the Spurs are giving a nod to the Toros and what they do, while also rewarding someone who had earned his promotion.

Dawson didn’t play Monday night when the Spurs won their 11th in a row. But he should be ready tonight in Portland, when a back-to-back situation might require Dawson to offer some relief.

Still, no matter what happens next, Monday night was worth a celebration for him. He’s the basketball version of Crash Davis, the fictional character of “Bull Durham.” After all the years, and all the chances to quit, Dawson was in The Show for the first time Monday.

That’s how Dickey sees it, too. Dawson didn’t start until his senior year at Sam Houston, then academic questions stopped him from going to a Division I school.

“So he was always working his way up,” Dickey said, “and he kept at it.”

Dawson kept at it 10 years ago, too. He returned the next day after his collision and, with the left side of his face noticeably swollen, he made his first five shots and went on to lead his school in scoring.

Sam Houston would lose, and that would be Dawson’s final high school game. Afterward, he talked about Dickey, who has since retired.

“He taught me to work hard in class,” Dawson said that day, “and never give up in anything.”

All of it was a signal of what would have to happen for Dawson to eventually earn a place on the roster of his hometown team. He would have to pick himself up, again and again.

bharvey@express-news.net
On Twitter: @Buck_SA

Expect lots of ‘small ball’ from short-handed Spurs

By Mike Monroe

SALT LAKE CITY — The Spurs had just lost Manu Ginobili and Tiago Splitter during an otherwise stirring Saturday road win over the Clippers, but the team’s leading scorer and lone All-Star found a way to remain upbeat.

“We’re used to playing without Manu now because we already played 22 games without him,” said Tony Parker, whose 30 points and 10 assists became an afterthought after Gary Neal’s 3-point heroics in the Spurs’ 10th consecutive victory. “In that sense, it’s a comfort, but let me be clear: I still want Manu on the floor.”

Barring a minor miracle, Ginobili won’t be on the floor until after the All-Star break. He returned to San Antonio on Sunday and will have an MRI exam on his strained left oblique (rib muscle) today.

The absence of Splitter — the 6-10 center from Brazil who’s been having a breakout season — might be a greater challenge during the final three games of the nine-game rodeo road trip.

Splitter suffered a strained right calf in the first half Saturday when he pump-faked Clippers All-Star Blake Griffin into the air and drew a foul when Griffin crashed into him as he went up for a shot.

Splitter remained with the team when it traveled to Utah for tonight’s game against the Jazz at EnergySolutions Arena.

The Spurs have not given an update on Splitter’s condition. Based on coach Gregg Popovich’s comments after Saturday’s game, it does not seem likely he would hurry Splitter back into action, especially with the All-Star break coming up this weekend.

The loss of Splitter leaves the Spurs with only three legitimate big men: team captain Tim Duncan, undersized starting center DeJuan Blair and reserve Matt Bonner.

The solution is apparent.

“We’ll probably end up having to play a decent amount of ‘small ball,’?” Popovich said.

An early adapter to the small-ball concept pioneered in the NBA by one of his mentors, Don Nelson, Popovich often has employed lineups this season using only one legitimate front-court player. While he enjoys the tactical advantage such lineups often produce, circumstance has made them a strategic necessity.

After Splitter departed Saturday’s game, Popovich leaned heavily on the 35-year-old Duncan, the 13-time All-Star who has upped his production from last season despite playing a career-low 27.8 minutes per game.

Duncan logged a season-high 41 minutes and 20 seconds in Saturday’s overtime victory and grabbed 17 rebounds, matching a season high.

It was his longest stint in a regular-season game since Feb. 2, 2009, when he scored 32 points and had 15 rebounds in a road victory over the Golden State Warriors. He put in several 40-plus minute performances against Dallas in 2009 and 2010 playoff series, including 42:52 as the Spurs closed out the Mavericks in the first round April 29, 2010.

Popovich ruled out increasing Duncan’s workload, no matter how many games Splitter may miss.

“That wouldn’t be very wise,” he said. “The way he played (Saturday), those minutes, you can’t do that very often. That wouldn’t be wise for the future.”

Duncan is willing to do whatever is asked of him, but he understands the wisdom of conserving his energy for the postseason.

“I’ll give all that I can, but I don’t know what that may be,” he said. “Pop’s always been great about keeping our minutes down, especially in this compressed season.

“We have this halftime coming up with the All-Star break. We have three more games before the break and, hopefully, we can keep it together, whatever that means.”

Like Parker, Duncan believes the young players who thrived during the 22 games Ginobili missed with a hand injury have gained the requisite confidence needed to carry them through this latest misfortune.

“It helps that we’ve been through it already,” he said. “We found a way to get it together and keep it together without guys before. Hopefully, this will be the same.”

mikemonroe@express-news.net