Tag: San Antonio Spurs

Report: Raptors to target Lindsey for GM opening

For the third time in as many summers, Dennis Lindsey’s name has come up in connection with another team’s general manager search.

, the Toronto Raptors are preparing to target Lindsey, who just finished his fourth season as the Spurs’ assistant GM, as a candidats in their front-office hunt.

Bryan Colangelo currently holds dual titles of president and GM in Toronto but, according to the report, is willing to surrender GM duties to the right candidate.

Lindsey is believed to be on that list, along with former New Orleans general manager Jeff Bower and Philadelphia GM Ed Stefanski.

According to the Yahoo! report, Toronto has not scheduled interviews with any candidates, and might not commence with a formal search until next month.

Lindsey has been a hot commodity almost since joining the Spurs prior to the 2007-08 season. In the past two summers, he turned down GM positions in Minnesota and Phoenix.

Brown adds Person, Snyder to his Lakers’ coaching staff

Former Spurs assistant and Cleveland head coach Mike Brown dug into his connection with the Spurs with two hirings to his new staff with the Los Angeles Lakers.

Former Spurs player Chuck Person and former Austin Toros coach Quin Snyder will join former Detroit coach John Kuester on Brown’s staff with the Lakers.

Person was a member of Phil Jackson’s staff last season with the Lakers where he received rave reviews coaching the team’s defense. He was a member of the Spurs from 1994-96 and still holds the franchise’s record for most 3-pointers in a season with 190 in 1995-96.

Snyder was most recently was on Doug Collins’ staff at Philadelphia this season as an assistant. He coached the Spurs’ developmental league team in Austin from 2007-10, taking the team to the playoffs in each season and was coach at Missouri from 1999-2006. Earlier this week, Snyder interviewed for the vacant head coaching job with the Minnesota Timberwolves.

“I’m very pleased to add Chuck to my coaching staff,” Brown said in a statement. “I’ve seen firsthand his dedication and his desire to making the players he coaches better. … With the addition of Quin to my coaching staff, we’ve added someone with an extremely intelligent basketball mind.”  

It’s interesting that one of the Spurs’ fiercest traditional rivals now has such a strong connection with Gregg Popovich and his staff with the Spurs.

Will Spurs Nation still have an intense dislike for everything Purple and Gold of the Lakers with such familiar faces running the team?

Battier says ‘magical run’ carried Grizzlies past Spurs in playoffs

Even a couple of months after the upset occurred, Memphis forward Shane Battier remains a little suprised the Grizzlies stunned the Spurs in the first round of the playoffs.

The Grizzlies’ six-game series victory over the Spurs was only the second time since the NBA went to a best-of-seven series for all rounds of the playoffs that a No. 8 seed toppled a No. 1 seed.

And it still is a, he said in an interview with radio station WFAN in New York City earlier this week. (Hat tip to Sports Radio Interviews.com)

“We knew that we had a favorable matchup in the Spurs,” Battier said. “Did we think we could beat them and take the Thunder in second round to seven games? I’d be lying to say I knew that was going to happen.”

The Grizzlies had never won a playoff game, much less a series before their matchup with the Spurs this year. But after splitting four games with San Antonio earlier in the regular season, Memphis has confidence coming into the playoffs, Battier said.

“We knew we had a chance against the Spurs. We felt that we matched up great against them,” Battier said. “We were younger and we were more athletic.

“After we won that first game in San Antonio, we all looked at each other and said ‘hey guys we can do this.’ We went on a magical run, the city was behind us, it was simply electric, and it was a fantastic lightning in a bottle run for us.”

It also didn’t hurt them that Manu Ginobili missed the first game of the series with what turned out to be a broken arm. But the Grizzlies took advantage of his absence in that game and held serve by winning the rest of their home games to claim the upset.

Battier said he hopes that the labor impasse between owners and players will be short. And he made an interesting comment that the NBA can’t go through an extended lockout like the NFL has endured.

“I’m cautiously optimistic that we will get something done before missing any games. We all know what’s at stake,” Battier said. “We can’t afford to go through what the NFL is going through and we can’t afford to lose the fans. I just think we have a perspective after going through this in ’99 that it’s in the best interest of everybody to hammer out a fair deal.”