SPURS GAME DAY! GAME 3: SPURS AT CLIPPERS, 29-10-2023, 8PM (CT)

[imagump1313]

Ive seen plenty teams totally blow offensively in one half, but then have a couple good things happen and they start scoring like crazy.

This is not happening tonight

[G R E Y]

Ive seen plenty teams totally blow offensively in one half, but then have a couple good things happen and they start scoring like crazy.

This is not happening tonight

You know it's bad when Tre does just what he did - throw the ball out to whoever for his un-Tre-like 4th TO.

[G R E Y]

3RD Q: SPURS 60 CLIPPERS 90

We're now up to 20 TOs which have cost us THIRTY points so far, and wouldn't you know it, there's the majority of the deficit.

We also can't hit a **** shot, having started shell shocked and only shook it off but a few times.

The pattern of giving up leads to start EACH Q is a new one.

What I don't like is that even though we are the one who are shooting abysmally, we are being badly outrebounded 38-27, and 7-4 on O boards.

Just **** play on both ends. Hopefully the third stringers show something prideful.

[G R E Y]

Pop starts Tre, Wemby, Doug, Bassey, and Malaki to start the 4TH Q.

[G R E Y]

Doug dunk.

Nice drive and kick out to Malaki for top of arc 3.

[G R E Y]

BREAKING: Malaki passes, I repeat Malaki passed the ball to a cutting Bassey for a layup.

Nice off the dribble 3 by Malaki just before, too.

[G R E Y]

Malaki - finish HIGH off the glass when driving on tall defenders.

[G R E Y]

Doug. Damn. Well done. Two 3s in a row.

[G R E Y]

But then we don't contest 3s...

Pop timeout.

[G R E Y]

We now have Blake, Malaki, Julian, Doug, Mamu.

[G R E Y]

I think that's twice we lobbed it to Malaki.

Why?

[G R E Y]

We haven't scored in like 3 minutes...

[G R E Y]

SPURS 83 CLIPPERS 123

We scored maybe 1 point: in the last 3 minutes. Our final two Qs were our highest scoring at 23 points each which matched the opponent's lowest output. We then allowed three 30+ point Qs.

Even though we had too many TOs in each of the previous two games, our efficiency hovered around just above and just below 50% for 126 points in both. We were an abysmal 37.5% overall, 11-33 for 33.3% from 3, and a decent 75% FTs but only on 12-16.

It's easy to attribute this game to oh well we couldn't score, but it's really about the effort and focus, both of which were sorely missing. When the shot is not falling, drive to stop the clock and get to the FT line - we did not do this nearly enough or show nearly enough physicality in either paint.

Part of the lesson is we can't just outshoot an opponent. Part of the lesson is that effort is not negotiable. How do we navigate scoring droughts? Do we lock in defensively? Not this game.

Part of the lesson is recognizing and responding to patterns in-game - in each of the first three Qs we were down early giving up scoring runs. After the first, after the half at the most, we should have locked down better.

Effort: as I mentioned before we had way more misses and so way more chances for rebounds (well, so did our opponents in that respect) but were outrebounded 48-37 and 9-6 on O boards.

Focus: TWENTY-FIVE TURNOVERS costing us THURTY-FOUR POINTS AGAINST. On the other hand, we only managed to get 6 points on their 16TOs. So the chances were there for the taking. Because of these wasted O possessions we have 11 fewer FGAs yet still made 17 fewer FGs.

Either great shooting has to make up for bad D and mistakes or near perfect D has to make up for poor shooting and we were bad at both.

I like Devin's shot selection but don't like that he didn't register an assist. He was the only starter not to.

Point-Sochan works better on D and has a lot of catching up to do on O. His handles need to be tighter, and his decisions with the ball in half court sets quicker (and obviously more sound). When he dribbles in half court sets, he turns to position his body between himself and the defender which I guess a lot of guys do but it's pretty much a defensive mechanism to protect the ball rather than being able to beat someone off the dribble or at least use handles to get out of trouble.

We've seen handles issues with Murray, Derrick, Tre early in their careers. They'd all pick up their dribbles as a defensive ball protection mechanism. And the TOs mounted with the ball in their hands as well, and that's with them being more used to running point or sharing the back court. We have to be patient with Sochan who spent one season in college and was drafted as a utility knife big turned point-forward experiment.

Sochan only had two shots, both missed 3s (why? because opponents want him to shoot it, so he better find ways of beating his man off the dribble), 2 boards (2 on O), 3 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, but 4 TOs. On D, he spreads his legs so wide as to not be able to move them fast enough on perimeter coverage. He just moves them a bit slower than I recall from last season. I get that he missed like half a year and will need more reps, but it's also a matter of adjusting to different defensive stance and response out the paint rather than in it.

Every starter except Keldon had TOs. He struggled hard (1-9, 1-5 from 3, 2-2FTs) missing all his shots in the paint. His shot chart is once again 3s and deep paint. Maybe that's just the game we want from him, more manageable than the do-it-all go-to guy by default of last season. Fine, but some floaters and baby Js would be nice for him to develop.

Zach led the starters with 4 assists and 6 boards, the latter more a point of team improvement than achievement for him.

Wemby with another slow start. It's fine, he recognizes it, but when the team around him isn't going at all, it's hard to get him going. That said, we once again missed chances to pass him the ball when he had a much smaller mismatch defender sealed. Five TOs is part of growing pains. He was clearly a point of defensive avoidance, covering ground and switches well to alter passes, drives, and shots.

Cedi was great early; Doug came on well late.

Malaki rarely has a shot he doesn't like, and when he doesn't like it, more often than not he takes it. But 3-12 ain't it. He did make 2-4 from 3, and these were in the flow of the O scheme, just needs to take the blinders off for when team mates are open. The O tends to stagnate (read: guys stop moving off ball to watch him because they know he'll shoot) with the ball in his hands.

Tre with 4 assists but 4TOs is a suboptimal ratio.

Julian's 3 accuracy has flat out disappeared after he signed his contract. I don't he's one of those players who settle once they ink money, but he is far from the sharp shooter of late last season and so if the 3 isn't falling then he has to find other ways to score or contribute.

Anyway, pretty much an off to way off game for just about everyone on both ends. Too many examples for film. We know we sucked. Do what we know to do, and do it better. Put it behind us and come back with some pissed off focused energy for the next one.

We'll have variance in production but we can't have variance in effort and tenacity. For a young team it's a lot to learn at once

[G R E Y]

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[imagump1313]

SPURS 83 CLIPPERS 123

We scored maybe 1 point: in the last 3 minutes. Our final two Qs were our highest scoring at 23 points each which matched the opponent's lowest output. We then allowed three 30+ point Qs.

Even though we had too many TOs in each of the previous two games, our efficiency hovered around just above and just below 50% for 126 points in both. We were an abysmal 37.5% overall, 11-33 for 33.3% from 3, and a decent 75% FTs but only on 12-16.

It's easy to attribute this game to oh well we couldn't score, but it's really about the effort and focus, both of which were sorely missing. When the shot is not falling, drive to stop the clock and get to the FT line - we did not do this nearly enough or show nearly enough physicality in either paint.

Part of the lesson is we can't just outshoot an opponent. Part of the lesson is that effort is not negotiable. How do we navigate scoring droughts? Do we lock in defensively? Not this game.

Part of the lesson is recognizing and responding to patterns in-game - in each of the first three Qs we were down early giving up scoring runs. After the first, after the half at the most, we should have locked down better.

Effort: as I mentioned before we had way more misses and so way more chances for rebounds (well, so did our opponents in that respect) but were outrebounded 48-37 and 9-6 on O boards.

Focus: TWENTY-FIVE TURNOVERS costing us THURTY-FOUR POINTS AGAINST. On the other hand, we only managed to get 6 points on their 16TOs. So the chances were there for the taking. Because of these wasted O possessions we have 11 fewer FGAs yet still made 17 fewer FGs.

Either great shooting has to make up for bad D and mistakes or near perfect D has to make up for poor shooting and we were bad at both.

I like Devin's shot selection but don't like that he didn't register an assist. He was the only starter not to.

Point-Sochan works better on D and has a lot of catching up to do on O. His handles need to be tighter, and his decisions with the ball in half court sets quicker (and obviously more sound). When he dribbles in half court sets, he turns to position his body between himself and the defender which I guess a lot of guys do but it's pretty much a defensive mechanism to protect the ball rather than being able to beat someone off the dribble or at least use handles to get out of trouble.

We've seen handles issues with Murray, Derrick, Tre early in their careers. They'd all pick up their dribbles as a defensive ball protection mechanism. And the TOs mounted with the ball in their hands as well, and that's with them being more used to running point or sharing the back court. We have to be patient with Sochan who spent one season in college and was drafted as a utility knife big turned point-forward experiment.

Sochan only had two shots, both missed 3s (why? because opponents want him to shoot it, so he better find ways of beating his man off the dribble), 2 boards (2 on O), 3 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, but 4 TOs. On D, he spreads his legs so wide as to not be able to move them fast enough on perimeter coverage. He just moves them a bit slower than I recall from last season. I get that he missed like half a year and will need more reps, but it's also a matter of adjusting to different defensive stance and response out the paint rather than in it.

Every starter except Keldon had TOs. He struggled hard (1-9, 1-5 from 3, 2-2FTs) missing all his shots in the paint. His shot chart is once again 3s and deep paint. Maybe that's just the game we want from him, more manageable than the do-it-all go-to guy by default of last season. Fine, but some floaters and baby Js would be nice for him to develop.

Zach led the starters with 4 assists and 6 boards, the latter more a point of team improvement than achievement for him.

Wemby with another slow start. It's fine, he recognizes it, but when the team around him isn't going at all, it's hard to get him going. That said, we once again missed chances to pass him the ball when he had a much smaller mismatch defender sealed. Five TOs is part of growing pains. He was clearly a point of defensive avoidance, covering ground and switches well to alter passes, drives, and shots.

Cedi was great early; Doug came on well late.

Malaki rarely has a shot he doesn't like, and when he doesn't like it, more often than not he takes it. But 3-12 ain't it. He did make 2-4 from 3, and these were in the flow of the O scheme, just needs to take the blinders off for when team mates are open. The O tends to stagnate (read: guys stop moving off ball to watch him because they know he'll shoot) with the ball in his hands.

Tre with 4 assists but 4TOs is a suboptimal ratio.

Julian's 3 accuracy has flat out disappeared after he signed his contract. I don't he's one of those players who settle once they ink money, but he is far from the sharp shooter of late last season and so if the 3 isn't falling then he has to find other ways to score or contribute.

Anyway, pretty much an off to way off game for just about everyone on both ends. Too many examples for film. We know we sucked. Do what we know to do, and do it better. Put it behind us and come back with some pissed off focused energy for the next one.

We'll have variance in production but we can't have variance in effort and tenacity. For a young team it's a lot to learn at once

I stopped watching 6 minutes into the 3rd.

Nothing we were doing was worth watching.
I'm still trying to understand what we are attempting to do offensively. It looks like an AAU game.
I know we are young but the turnover thing is beyond ridiculous right now. We should be 0-3.

I'm not mad or anything. There are going to be plenty of moments with this team where they just aren't going to get it.
Pop said it perfectly, it was bad for the most part but what is good is that he can use this game to get his points across to them in the future.

[imagump1313]

[quote="G R E Y"]

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[quote]

It's not just tonight Sir. Its been every game.

[G R E Y]

Spoiler:

SPURS 83 CLIPPERS 123

We scored maybe 1 point: in the last 3 minutes. Our final two Qs were our highest scoring at 23 points each which matched the opponent's lowest output. We then allowed three 30+ point Qs.

Even though we had too many TOs in each of the previous two games, our efficiency hovered around just above and just below 50% for 126 points in both. We were an abysmal 37.5% overall, 11-33 for 33.3% from 3, and a decent 75% FTs but only on 12-16.

It's easy to attribute this game to oh well we couldn't score, but it's really about the effort and focus, both of which were sorely missing. When the shot is not falling, drive to stop the clock and get to the FT line - we did not do this nearly enough or show nearly enough physicality in either paint.

Part of the lesson is we can't just outshoot an opponent. Part of the lesson is that effort is not negotiable. How do we navigate scoring droughts? Do we lock in defensively? Not this game.

Part of the lesson is recognizing and responding to patterns in-game - in each of the first three Qs we were down early giving up scoring runs. After the first, after the half at the most, we should have locked down better.

Effort: as I mentioned before we had way more misses and so way more chances for rebounds (well, so did our opponents in that respect) but were outrebounded 48-37 and 9-6 on O boards.

Focus: TWENTY-FIVE TURNOVERS costing us THURTY-FOUR POINTS AGAINST. On the other hand, we only managed to get 6 points on their 16TOs. So the chances were there for the taking. Because of these wasted O possessions we have 11 fewer FGAs yet still made 17 fewer FGs.

Either great shooting has to make up for bad D and mistakes or near perfect D has to make up for poor shooting and we were bad at both.

I like Devin's shot selection but don't like that he didn't register an assist. He was the only starter not to.

Point-Sochan works better on D and has a lot of catching up to do on O. His handles need to be tighter, and his decisions with the ball in half court sets quicker (and obviously more sound). When he dribbles in half court sets, he turns to position his body between himself and the defender which I guess a lot of guys do but it's pretty much a defensive mechanism to protect the ball rather than being able to beat someone off the dribble or at least use handles to get out of trouble.

We've seen handles issues with Murray, Derrick, Tre early in their careers. They'd all pick up their dribbles as a defensive ball protection mechanism. And the TOs mounted with the ball in their hands as well, and that's with them being more used to running point or sharing the back court. We have to be patient with Sochan who spent one season in college and was drafted as a utility knife big turned point-forward experiment.

Sochan only had two shots, both missed 3s (why? because opponents want him to shoot it, so he better find ways of beating his man off the dribble), 2 boards (2 on O), 3 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, but 4 TOs. On D, he spreads his legs so wide as to not be able to move them fast enough on perimeter coverage. He just moves them a bit slower than I recall from last season. I get that he missed like half a year and will need more reps, but it's also a matter of adjusting to different defensive stance and response out the paint rather than in it.

Every starter except Keldon had TOs. He struggled hard (1-9, 1-5 from 3, 2-2FTs) missing all his shots in the paint. His shot chart is once again 3s and deep paint. Maybe that's just the game we want from him, more manageable than the do-it-all go-to guy by default of last season. Fine, but some floaters and baby Js would be nice for him to develop.

Zach led the starters with 4 assists and 6 boards, the latter more a point of team improvement than achievement for him.

Wemby with another slow start. It's fine, he recognizes it, but when the team around him isn't going at all, it's hard to get him going. That said, we once again missed chances to pass him the ball when he had a much smaller mismatch defender sealed. Five TOs is part of growing pains. He was clearly a point of defensive avoidance, covering ground and switches well to alter passes, drives, and shots.

Cedi was great early; Doug came on well late.

Malaki rarely has a shot he doesn't like, and when he doesn't like it, more often than not he takes it. But 3-12 ain't it. He did make 2-4 from 3, and these were in the flow of the O scheme, just needs to take the blinders off for when team mates are open. The O tends to stagnate (read: guys stop moving off ball to watch him because they know he'll shoot) with the ball in his hands.

Tre with 4 assists but 4TOs is a suboptimal ratio.

Julian's 3 accuracy has flat out disappeared after he signed his contract. I don't he's one of those players who settle once they ink money, but he is far from the sharp shooter of late last season and so if the 3 isn't falling then he has to find other ways to score or contribute.

Anyway, pretty much an off to way off game for just about everyone on both ends. Too many examples for film. We know we sucked. Do what we know to do, and do it better. Put it behind us and come back with some pissed off focused energy for the next one.

We'll have variance in production but we can't have variance in effort and tenacity. For a young team it's a lot to learn at once

I stopped watching 6 minutes into the 3rd.

Nothing we were doing was worth watching.
I'm still trying to understand what we are attempting to do offensively. It looks like an AAU game.
I know we are young but the turnover thing is beyond ridiculous right now. We should be 0-3.

I'm not mad or anything. There are going to be plenty of moments with this team where they just aren't going to get it.
Pop said it perfectly, it was bad for the most part but what is good is that he can use this game to get his points across to them in the future.

Well the first game we came out blazing but Mavs are poor defensively so perhaps it inflated our sense of how 'it' could work. Still, we lost to a team with two professional clutch scorers.

Then we did that play to the expected level of opponent in the second game, perhaps thinking we could ease and breeze our way through it but the effort increased.

In this one, we faced a team good on both ends and were on our heels from the start.

My sense is that Sochan is not confident as the point-forward and the team is not confident around him right now. It permeates both ways. You can see we are super deliberate in setting up plays and thinking our way through it so much that we lose sight of basic things like... holding onto the ball or not telegraph passes.

But Pop called point-Sochan the official 2023-2024 experiment and so it's something Sochan and the rest of the guys have to settle into. And there's going to be growing pains along the way.

What has permeated in all three games is a mindset that I think you and Pop refer to, a consistency of approach, a resilience that manifests in more physicality and finding ways of playing rather than the resignation we tripped over in this one.

It's actually a lot to incorporate at once with a whole new starting group, a PF learning a new pos6on the fly, and a generational talent whose skillset is awesome and we've barely scratched the surface of maximizing.

Some games it'll look like AAU and some more like the 1ST Q of the first game. I just want to see an improvement towards the latter with some more consistent competitive pride. Both are aspects of the game and being better pros. I want to see how we respond now.