STICKY - Suns vs Spurs - Round 2

[Calvin Klein]

Marbury hit the game-winning floater three. Amare tied it in regulation.

Wow, I can't remember that. Anybody have a youtube link?

[Blackification]

Marbury hit the game-winning floater three. Amare tied it in regulation.

Wow, I can't remember that. Anybody have a youtube link?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dU1zVPd2NA

most of the analysts have spurs in 6

[Calvin Klein]

Marbury hit the game-winning floater three. Amare tied it in regulation.

Wow, I can't remember that. Anybody have a youtube link?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dU1zVPd2NA

most of the analysts have spurs in 6

oh that makes duncan's 3 looks like a mirror of this.

Check out Marbury's reaction after the 3

[-SDU-]

as if you guys dont remember that 3? that sent it to overtime and then marbury banked a 3 at the end of OT for the win

after that marbury flattened penny and knocked him over whilst frank johnson ran around like a (Please Use More Appropriate Word)

[-SDU-]

heres the marbury one

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBS9hH9c ... re=related

that was so awesome because we had no timeouts and were forced to foul them and they choked on the FT's

[Calvin Klein]

Well I absolutely remember Marbury's. I just completely erased Amare's.

[Kerrsed]

Great video of the lockeroom after our Game 6 victory.

http://www.nba.com/suns/video/2010/04/30/po10rd1gm6041029lockeroomwmv-1304369/index.html

Click on the video that says "Suns Postgame Locker Room - April"

As soon as Frye enters the locker room he yells "Somebody crack me open a cold one!!!!". Team chemistry looks great!

[ls2ws6]

lol @ alvin gentry signing autographs for people who wanted jared dudley.

cool video

[Kerrsed]

lol @ alvin gentry signing autographs for people who wanted jared dudley.

cool video

LOL not Dudley, they were there for Bayless!

[KJ7]

Well here is what I think we should do tactically against the Spurs.

1.Put Nash on Jefferson

Grant Hill must take Manu. JRich takes Spurs' Hill. That leaves Nash on Jefferson. And I'm OK with that to be honest. It basically means that they will want to post him up and that takes them out of their normal offensive routine. It also means that both Dice and TD will have to be out at the 18 foot mark to give Jefferson room, which means one of our bigs can go and double Jefferson.

It's a gamble but one I'm more comfortable with then say having Nash on one of their penetrating guards. If they go with Parker/Hill/Manu at the same time while Nash is on then we are going to have concerns. Won't surprise me if they finish games with all those 3 on so Nash will just have to take Hill and we'll all hold our breath.

If we have time-outs up our sleeve in close games I would put Dragic on in defensive situations then sub on Nash when we are attacking.

2. Bigs must run from the start til the end

And this leads me to an adjustment I'd make in the starting line-up. IMO we should start Amundson and get him and Amare just sprinting up the court. The biggest diff this time around since last time is that Duncan is no spring chicken anymore. While he's still extremely effective around the basket he doesn't get up and down the court anywhere near as well as he used to.

Not only that Duncan's partners in crime are Bonner and Dice, not exactly the quickest bigs getting around. There are lots of easy buckets to be had if we push the ball and our bigs continue to work.

Sorry Collins, I just don't think he's gonna slow Duncan down and therefore I don't see any reason why he should start. If Lou/Amare get into foul trouble then start Collins in the 2nd half.

3. Play some zone

Spurs have 3 good 3pt shooters in their play-off rotation (ie. players who got more than 15mins in the first play-offs series). If Jefferson and Parker are on at the same time I think we should play zone. That really leaves them with 1 good 3 pt shooter on the wings. You just keep a hand in the face of Hill/Manu and suffocate the middle.

You do *not* under any circumstances play zone when both Hill and Manu are on the court. I know Jefferson is a bit like Grant Hill and sneaks in a few from the corner but a zone pretty much takes care of the corners so that shouldnt be an issue.

4. Post JRich up

IMO he's stronger than both Manu and Hill. When Frye's playing center and we are spacing the floor, get JRich down low and let him go to work on either of those guys. Manu will undoubtedly flop and might get JRich into some foul trouble but it's a gamble I'm willing to take quite frankly.

I wouldn't be posting him up every possession or anything but every now and again it could really make us unpredictable in our offense. If we are too predictable they will know what we're doing and therefore coach against it. And their coach is the best at finding ways to stop a predictable system.

5. Let Dragic know how important he is

This is the player who must slow down Parker and that will go a huge way to seeing our 2nd unit beat theirs. If he can slow him down that allows us to rest Nash for a little long and also allows guys like Grant Hill and Dudley to go onto their wing players.

It will give us a massive massive boost.

Conclusion

We win this if our bigs get out and run and we manage to keep the tempo quick. It's not unlike the Blazers series where they are really well drilled defensively in the half-court but if we get up their nice and quick and they don't have time to settle in we will get easy baskets.

On the other side of the court we really need JRich to do a good job defensively. We also need to make sure we limit how much of a liability Nash is defensively by putting him on the right person (ie not their best dribble-penetration players).

I have under-played how Nash and Amare offensively purely because I just expect them to do what they usually do. We just can't rely too heavily on them. It will be interesting to see how Spurs react. They usually don't mind Nash and Amare getting their own as long as no-one else gets going. But I think this series we have more players who can do things one-on-one which will allow us to mix things up a little.

Amare simply can't have another ordinary rebounding series this time. We need him to pull out some of those 14 rebound games. If we play Lou for 25mpg he will just naturally have a lot of boards as he's our best rebounder on this team. I think we just need Lou and Dud's ability to be gritty/nasty and if either happen to mistake Manu's bandage for the ball I'll be honest there's a small part of me that won't be that disappointed.

If Lopez comes back then great, but I'm just going to assume he won't play in this series and if he does he better be 100% and ready to go.

[Never Fear 33 Is Here]

I say G. Hill will have an awesome series....................according to the box scores he will anyways.

[lilfishi22]

Well here is what I think we should do tactically against the Spurs.

1.Put Nash on Jefferson

I'm not sure about this, but I think it could work. If we make him shoot 3's by leaving him open then I think we have a chance since he's not a good 3PT shooter but that's really the only way Nash can beat him defensively. Personally, I like Hill on TP/Hill rather than JRich on them. Hill has the length and the quickness to cover those two. JRich isn't as quick but he's strong and I think he'll do a decent job on Ginobili.

2. Bigs must run from the start til the end

I think we should definitely make it our objective to run, run, run. We saw what happened when we slowed it down and lost to an injury-plagued Portland team. It's going to happen again if we don't keep the tempo up. We're much more athletic than them so we should push it on every opportunity if we can and slow it down for important possessions.

I'm not sure about Lou starting since we could benefit from his energy off the bench. I think Collins would play OK against a slower TD rather than a much quicker Aldridge. Most fast breaks are ran with 2 other players anyway, I think we should be OK with one slow guy since it's not like we need all 5 guys to run.

3. Play some zone

Our zone has been excellent and I would like to see us go to it more often. They have a few good 3PT shooters but our close-outs even when we're playing zone has been great and I think we should do fine playing zone even when they have zone busters in the game.

4. Post JRich up

I'm expecting Manu to flop on every opportunity he gets so he's going to try to pull that gimmick against JRich's post game. But JRich's post game has never been about muscling his way to the basket and running over his man, it's always been about putting the opponent in a bad position and then spinning to the basket. He hardly ever gets called for the offensive foul when playing in the post because of that.

Keep our ball movement up and we'll find JRich in the post for the mismatch on a few possessions.

5. Let Dragic know how important he is

Dragic=Parker stopper.

Conclusion

We win this if our bigs get out and run and we manage to keep the tempo quick. It's not unlike the Blazers series where they are really well drilled defensively in the half-court but if we get up their nice and quick and they don't have time to settle in we will get easy baskets.

On the other side of the court we really need JRich to do a good job defensively. We also need to make sure we limit how much of a liability Nash is defensively by putting him on the right person (ie not their best dribble-penetration players).

I have under-played how Nash and Amare offensively purely because I just expect them to do what they usually do. We just can't rely too heavily on them. It will be interesting to see how Spurs react. They usually don't mind Nash and Amare getting their own as long as no-one else gets going. But I think this series we have more players who can do things one-on-one which will allow us to mix things up a little.

Amare simply can't have another ordinary rebounding series this time. We need him to pull out some of those 14 rebound games. If we play Lou for 25mpg he will just naturally have a lot of boards as he's our best rebounder on this team. I think we just need Lou and Dud's ability to be gritty/nasty and if either happen to mistake Manu's bandage for the ball I'll be honest there's a small part of me that won't be that disappointed.

If Lopez comes back then great, but I'm just going to assume he won't play in this series and if he does he better be 100% and ready to go.

This Spurs team is definitely beatable even without Lopez and if it wasn't for JRich's missed dunk we would've swept the season series. If I recall, we won one of those games with Lopez only playing 4min.

I'm pretty excited about this series and it will come down to 3 things as usual, defense, bench production and tempo.

[BurningHeart]

Absolute fantastic analysis, KJ. I would add "don't double Duncan" to it. Don't want any perimeter douches of theirs getting open looks.

[Alyosha12]

Main advantages for us compared to previous years are that :

1)Bowen won't be around to limit Nash and knee his nuts anymore this time. Horry's gone too.

2)If Lopez comes back and manages to play at the level he was playing at right before he got injured then it'll be the first time since Kurt Thomas got traded that we've got capable post defender with legit size on the roster to put on TD.

3)Dragic gives us a nice backup guard alternative to Barbosa (who always struggles vs the Spurs) with his very different skillset and mindset.


Main advantages for the Spurs are :

1) Povovich/Duncan/Parker/Manu is a deadly postseason combo that always figured out ways to beat us in the past.

2) Impressive performances despite their young age by George Hill and Blair.

3) They just eliminated a Mavs team that they usually have issues matching up against.


Will be interesting to see how Gentry adjusts to what Popovich will throw him, gonna be by far the biggest coaching test of his career so far...

Dragic = Park stopper lol.

I still believe he really is. Because of his length and explosiveness parker can't use his speed against him at all and he can't shoot over him. Man i wish i could find this one play from a preparation game between Slovenia and France here Parer tries to play 1on1 vs. Dragic and is just shut the hell down and can't do anything, he tries to penetrate but Dragic blocks him like a monster.
Also found this nice compilation of Dragic mixes while trying to find that play.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u8LZm3s ... re=related

[KJ7]

Absolute fantastic analysis, KJ. I would add "don't double Duncan" to it. Don't want any perimeter douches of theirs getting open looks.

I don't really have a hard and fast rule about double teaming. One thing I hate seeing is a slow team that tries to double. All you need is one big guy holding position against TD and the rest should be fast players who swing/hustle their backsides off. That means Dudley or Lou *must* be at PF if we are to double.

So if we start doubling with Collins and Amare on the floor I'll be pretty upset. You're just not going to block TD cos he just reads the game too well. So you double to get the ball out of his hands.

So yeah, taking into consideration both teams starting line-up I wouldn't want us to double from the outset of matches but I think we might be able to pick our spots for 2 or 3 mins where we double depending on who we have out on the floor.

[dantian]

The reason of switching Nash on someone else is we need his energy to create for us on offense. Thus, he is not to fight through screens with effort, which makes Parker indefensable for him. But Parker is not as in form and healthy while Hill not yet experienced enough yet. In addition, we have sufficient alternative offense that now Nash could try to put in effort to limit Hill/Parker. Just try to deny them to get the pass would be good for start. If they throw it down to TD, don't leave the 3pt shooter wide open. Let the others play 4 on 4 defense. We should be fine.

Amare will defend TD in crunch time, but will let Collins/Lou take on him in early going to avoid foul trouble.

[BurningHeart]

Absolute fantastic analysis, KJ. I would add "don't double Duncan" to it. Don't want any perimeter douches of theirs getting open looks.

I don't really have a hard and fast rule about double teaming. One thing I hate seeing is a slow team that tries to double. All you need is one big guy holding position against TD and the rest should be fast players who swing/hustle their backsides off. That means Dudley or Lou *must* be at PF if we are to double.

So if we start doubling with Collins and Amare on the floor I'll be pretty upset. You're just not going to block TD cos he just reads the game too well. So you double to get the ball out of his hands.

So yeah, taking into consideration both teams starting line-up I wouldn't want us to double from the outset of matches but I think we might be able to pick our spots for 2 or 3 mins where we double depending on who we have out on the floor.

I just feel like we always get beat by San Antonio when we double Duncan. I don't want any of their loser pest players hitting random, nonsensical threes all game.

[garrick]

Using Dragic is key I think, he can use his speed and draw fouls on the SA big men who are somewhat slow footed.
We don't have a penetrating PG who slashes to the basket when Nash is in the game so Gentry's going to have to be on top of his game in regards to substitutions.
If SA is going to crowd the paint like the Blazers did and I think they will we will need Amare to look for the open man and kick it out instead of trying to bulldoze his way in the paint, basically we are going to have to take all the good things we did well versus the Blazers and improve on it because these Spurs team are much much better than the a Blazer team without a healthy Roy.

[KJ7]

Another thing which will be interesting to see is how we deal with SanAn switching on the PnR. With Nash having that sore hip I'm sure they'll be happy to work him pretty hard in one-on-one situation with TD/Dice. I think we've got enough alternatives now where Nash gets rid of the ball and sets a pick off the ball and then comes back to reclaim the ball if the first play hasn't worked out.

Not to mention I think we'll rely a little on Grant Hill and Amare taking their man on one-on-one a bit. I can see Amare exploding in this series. Perfect series to make mgmt realise he's worth the max.

[Miklo]

Great breakdown KJ7, spot on. Double teaming will certainly be a story, but it could go either way and whether or not we do it is fluid IMO.