GAME DAY, BALA! GAME 50: SPURS AT LAKERS, 4-2-2020, 9PM (CT)

[G R E Y]

Well the good thing about starting this RRT with this back-to-back is that there's no travel for us. No time to wallow, let's take the good from the last game - higher compete level, low turnovers - and improve our verticality and late game execution. All in.

WHERE: Staples Center, Los Angeles, CA

WHEN: Tuesday, February, 4, 2020, 9pm (CT)

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GO SPURS GO!!!

[imagump1313]

Murray is soo out of his league. Weak as ****
I really dont think he is our future at all

[G R E Y]

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[G R E Y]

Murray is soo out of his league. Weak as ****
I really dont think he is our future at all

He plays like an SG in a PG position but doesn't score like a SG.

I really thought he'd be a better facilitator given he was in on coaching meetings last season while recovering. I'll give him this summer to get that part of his game going, but after that, I'll be more inclined to agree.

In this game, we've been settling for outside shots again to start. I'd like to see us drive hard to the rim more with some weak side cutters to offset their bigs presence.

[G R E Y]

If we could *JUST* *MAKE* SOME* *SHOTS!*

[imagump1313]

Murray is soo out of his league. Weak as ****
I really dont think he is our future at all

He plays like an SG in a PG position but doesn't score like a SG.

I really thought he'd be a better facilitator given he was in on coaching meetings last season while recovering. I'll give him this summer to get that part of his game going, but after that, I'll be more inclined to agree.

In this game, we've been settling for outside shots again to start. I'd like to see us drive hard to the rim more with some weak side cutters to offset their bigs presence.

Don't get me wrong. I want to like him. But he is beyond useless. The only rebounds he gets are when no one is within 20 feet of him.
He gets his shot blocked like a 12 year old playing with men regularly.
He has no basketball sense of when to get someone else the ball. He has no idea what to do when he doesn't have the ball to be useful.
Everyone says he is a good defender but I see G-leaguers light him up every night.
He looks like a deer in headlights 90% of the time.
He has had more than enough time IMO to at least look like he is progressing but he just doesnt look like he even belongs on the same floor as professionals

[imagump1313]

This shows how far we are away and how over-matched our young guys are.
We had all of them on the floor at the end. Walker, Murray, Metu, Johnson.

Kuzma made them look like children. He did whatever he wanted with little effort. KYLE KUZMA!!
I see young players in this league every night make the most out of their opportunities or at least show little flashes of what they could grow into. Our guys look like high schoolers against pros. We are doomed.

[G R E Y]

Murray is soo out of his league. Weak as ****
I really dont think he is our future at all

He plays like an SG in a PG position but doesn't score like a SG.

I really thought he'd be a better facilitator given he was in on coaching meetings last season while recovering. I'll give him this summer to get that part of his game going, but after that, I'll be more inclined to agree.

In this game, we've been settling for outside shots again to start. I'd like to see us drive hard to the rim more with some weak side cutters to offset their bigs presence.

Don't get me wrong. I want to like him. But he is beyond useless. The only rebounds he gets are when no one is within 20 feet of him.
He gets his shot blocked like a 12 year old playing with men regularly.
He has no basketball sense of when to get someone else the ball. He has no idea what to do when he doesn't have the ball to be useful.
Everyone says he is a good defender but I see G-leaguers light him up every night.
He looks like a deer in headlights 90% of the time.
He has had more than enough time IMO to at least look like he is progressing but he just doesnt look like he even belongs on the same floor as professionals

Oof that's a tough assessment.

The bold I'd disagree with. He does get O boards, and has a knack for getting contested ones on the D end. There are those that are uncontested, but that's how it is sometimes for guys under the D basket.

He takes risks and relies on instincts to get steals, which he's good at, and he does well to contest when he can stay in front of drivers - hands up, stays vertical. That said, I have noticed that he's a step slow this season reacting to drivers' first steps and he seems to have slower twitch response this season. It's really noticeable if you go back and watch his college highlights. Hopefully it's just a recovery thing, because at times he looks like he has lead in his ass despite his slight frame.

I agree to lesser extent about other points. Off-ball smarts and purposeful movement definitely need improvement, and like I said, his passing is rudimentary, both in the half court sets and transition. Just doesn't seem to display an intuitive PG's sense of when to get guys the ball or take advantage of opportunities outside of the sets.

Ironically, he looked far better at the beginning of the season, and then has been very up and down since.

His shot is better, so there's that.

But even as he admits it himself, he has everything to learn. I'm not thrilled with some aspects of his attitude, like he's the designated starter no matter what (he didn't take it well when Derrick replacing him as starter, deleting photos of him and Pop on his Twitter, unfollowing the Spurs LOLWUT?!) so his aggression to get better is a plus, but his aggression when angry about the position change show he has a lot to learn.

To his credit, he takes the responsibility when he's not playing well. I do think Derrick has a more mature game and demeanor, but I'd like to see DJ with more seasoning before leaning more definitively. I will say this: I'm less sure as to his being our starting PG after all Ive seen so far this season than I was when he was first appointed.

If Derrick were DJ's age, I'd for sure give him the starting PG ball, so we'll see how things develop.

[G R E Y]

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[imagump1313]

He takes risks and relies on instincts to get steals, which he's good at, and he does well to contest when he can stay in front of drivers - hands up, stays vertical. That said, I have noticed that he's a step slow this season reacting to drivers' first steps and he seems to have slower switch response this season. It's really noticeable if you go back and watch his college highlights. Hopefully it's just a recovery thing, because at times he looks like he has led in his ass despite his slight frame.

This is what bugs me the most about him. He seems to play like he thinks he is the most athletic guy out there. Maybe that was the case in High School and college, where he could just float around because he was the best athlete on the floor. But let me give you a hint DJ.... EVERYONE ON THE FLOOR IS A BETTER ATHLETE THAN YOU NOW. Learn how to play basketball.
IMO its just as much the coaches fault. Why are we letting him play like this. He is out of his league. I dont remember but did he play in the G-League for us at all? Because thats where he belongs right now. He is not an NBA player, Im sorry.

I dont mean to just single him out because we have way more problems than him. Our younger guys and role players are giving us next to nothing this year. Forbes and White are shaky at best. Walker has little basketball sense, Gay and Belinelli have dropped off the map.

With all my complaints about DeRozan, he is playing well offensively himself. And Aldridge has his nights. Mills is finally playing in his perfect role of 15-20 minutes a night and doing great. Poeltl is at least progressing. But everyone else on this team is god awful.

[G R E Y]

He takes risks and relies on instincts to get steals, which he's good at, and he does well to contest when he can stay in front of drivers - hands up, stays vertical. That said, I have noticed that he's a step slow this season reacting to drivers' first steps and he seems to have slower switch response this season. It's really noticeable if you go back and watch his college highlights. Hopefully it's just a recovery thing, because at times he looks like he has led in his ass despite his slight frame.

This is what bugs me the most about him. He seems to play like he thinks he is the most athletic guy out there. Maybe that was the case in High School and college, where he could just float around because he was the best athlete on the floor. But let me give you a hint DJ.... EVERYONE ON THE FLOOR IS A BETTER ATHLETE THAN YOU NOW. Learn how to play basketball.
IMO its just as much the coaches fault. Why are we letting him play like this. He is out of his league. I dont remember but did he play in the G-League for us at all? Because thats where he belongs right now. He is not an NBA player, Im sorry.

I dont mean to just single him out because we have way more problems than him. Our younger guys and role players are giving us next to nothing this year. Forbes and White are shaky at best. Walker has little basketball sense, Gay and Belinelli have dropped off the map.

With all my complaints about DeRozan, he is playing well offensively himself. And Aldridge has his nights. Mills is finally playing in his perfect role of 15-20 minutes a night and doing great. Poeltl is at least progressing. But everyone else on this team is god awful.

Yeah he was in the G-League, did his time.

You beat me to it, but I meant "twitch" response, like how quickly he can recover from one physical move to another - minor point, but just to clarify.

I do see some improvement, but I do think some parts of his game have regressed or at least leveled off - I seem to recall he did a better job facilitating and running the team when Tony went down with that ruptured quad.

He's got a certain edge to him, and I like that to the extent that he doesn't back down, not to the extent that he thinks he * should * be a starter just because he was appointed as such to take over for Tony. Hey, we even tried to trade TP at one point, so there's no such thing as a guaranteed spot.

I don't blame coaches; it's the transition point we're in with the roster. I'm just watching highlights of the game, and clip after clip Bryn is **** bouncing around only to make wrong D decision after wrong D decision - even turned his back to th weak side man who got the ball and dunked on him. I mean, DJ's backcourtpartner is Bryn **** Forbes. Plus we're catering to two ball dominant midrangers, so we're a team in transition.

I want to wait until we get the roster construction we want going forward. Given that DJ played better with more movement-oriented guys, and now he has to find his role within the roster I * think * we're moving towards (versatile, athletic two-way guys, based on drafting) I'm still invested in his development. But I'm not as 100% sold on his being the future-now PG as I once was. I'm open to putting any Spur there who does it the best. Right now it's Derrick.

EDIT: I see you've added some thoughts. So about those - I think of this season as an assessment of sorts. We've reaching the limits of these guys in terms of what the vets can give us and how far we can accommodate our game to cater to their strengths. DD is playing som eof his best basketball but he needs the ball a lot to do that, as does LMA, and our O actually flows really well when the ball doesn't stick with them or Rudy. That said, they are great when we do get into scoring droughts and we need buckets. They're smart O players who know how to score. But the rest of the athletic young guys would benefit from an altered system catered to their strengths, and I think that's coming.

Rudy's declining, no question.

Derrick needs more minutes, more consistently - he did better in that circumstance.

Bryn needs fewer. Far far fewer. I'm now you of last season when I see him out there; I'm seeing every mistake especially on D and I hate each moment. We're likely going to re-sign him. Asset retention and all that. Then, let's ship him out or put him into Beli's role - bench spot up shooter.

Beli found his shot, actually, but he was only going to be in a supportive off-the-bench shooter, to plug in for a need at the 3.

Lonnie definitely has more athleticism than smarts right now, but that will come with experience and more system seasoning - the kind that will cater to our young athletic guys. Right now it's sort of trying to cater to strengths of almost two teams - the half court midrangers, and the young athletic guys who want to run and it's not always meshing well. We're a team in transition, and sometimes it will look messy as we move from one group to another.

I'm looking forward to seeing what we can do with the younger group of guys and with all that 2021 cap space we're carefully keeping open.

[G R E Y]

So how is it that we can make a basket one night and have such a hard time the next when it's on the same court? One of those inconsistency issues that has plagued us this season. Sure, it was the second game of a back-to-back, but we missed in an impressive variety of ways that defies even this reason.

Some reasons: not getting enough vertical movement for drives, and instead passing around arc wasting time until we put up end of clock heaves; not recognizing mismatches and getting the ball quickly enough to the guy who had one; not finishing off the glass. And sometimes we just missed, it happens: LMA 0-3, Patty 0-4 in the 1st Q. At one point we were 0-10, and had one point until 8:41. Scoring was laborious as if we were over-thinking it and too intent on laying the groundwork for a good shot, but then couldn't finish, and that combined with giving up easy ones in transition (17-2 for them in the first half alone) made for a hard night.

Important details added up. On P&R coverage, Bryn rolled with their big when LMA was on him, giving the ball handler ample space and time to make the shot in our key; at the defensive FT line, we gave up an O board and putback on their missed second FT. Pop was livid. Rightfully so. These were not plays that required otherworldly, rare greatness, but fundamental basketball smarts: recognition, hustle, response.

We only had 3 turnovers in the first half (and only 5 for the game!), but were outrebounded 30-17, and made only 17-47 shots, 5-15 from 3, and a mere 2-3FTs - none from the starting group.

We started the second half again settling for outside shots, and though they have a strong interior presence, we didn't move enough to bring them out and generate chances inside from, for instance, weak side or back door cuts, or setting up and taking better advantage of switches. We did finally go inside to LMA who made some good physical moves but we were down 74-59 by that point, and we did not do enough of it overall. LMA (3-10) and Trey (1-5) had a hard time with it, though it wasn't just up to them to get more inside.

Meanwhile, as our shots were not falling, our D was not sharp. At one point, DeMar actually stepped out of the way of a driving opponent -- not even getting blown by because that would mean he was at one point in front of the driver, not angling himself so as to direct the driver to help D or less space, no, actually got out of the driver's way. I couldn't believe it. First three film examples of what not to do ought to be this one play just for how egregiously bad the decision was.

Sure he drove on the next play, but he still often has the mindset of making it up on the other end. That's fine if he's actually trying on D and gets scored on, but you don't conserve energy on one end and leave your teammates picking up the slack so as to then have some juice left on the other. I'm just a fan and notice it and get irritated by it. I wonder how teammates who get stuck with his taking plays off on D feel? Pop timeout right after. Then of course he had to get his frustration tech in - always helpful to the team, thanks very much. Sometimes it fires others up, but more often you could feel it coming when things don't go his way enough, legitimately or not, and it just has to be managed.

There were some good defensive highlights: Derrick stepped up to take another charge; Lonnie had a strong defensive presence, wide stance, active feet, arms out, with terrific effort on the boards (loved his O rebound dunk).

We did go on a 13-3 run to close the gap to 81-72 with a more movement-oriented line-up with Jakob anchoring the middle. He's so mobile for his size and runs the floor very well and is good at clean-up duty and the occasional pop-a-shot (accuracy is a work in progress largely due to not using the glass).

But again defensive errors added up. Jakob having his back to his man in a baseline inbound in our end for their alley oop dunk will not make his 'best of' defensive highlights package. When every stop counts, each miss followed by giving up points in transition sequence added up.

We frankly looked tired by the 4th Q, understandably so given it was the second game in as many nights, but it felt as if we were dispirited, too. We were not running out with great effort to close out 3s, and with a pattern of one and done shots coupled with giving up second chances on their O rebounds, well, our 11-point deficit ballooned to 21. They scored more in each quarter. We gave up three 30+ point Qs, ending with 42. Half of those were scored on a scorching seven 3s by them in about 3.5 minutes. We actually made one more 3 but as is often the case, the timing and not just sheer volume made a difference in swinging the game.

We were pounded on the boards 58-28, points in the paint 62-50, and 24-6 on fast break points. So interior and transition really hurt us. Though we only gave up 6 TOs, we actually gave up more points (9) than they did (6) on their 14 TOs.

DJ had a solid performance (5-9, 1-1 from 3) but I think by now DeMar handling the ball so much and his team-high 7 assists is as much an indication of his improvement at finding guys as it is of perhaps getting to the point where it is hindering our young PGs from developing in that area. We need wins, and DeMar is good to learn from in certain aspects. We shot poorly tonight, but DeMar often leads us in assists, and the hope is that in time DJ (2 assists) and Derrick (bench-high 5 assists) get more chances with the ball in their hands. There's always a balance of experience and development, and it's often a fine line.

Bryn (4-8 from 3) and Beli who was in when we went on that 13-3 run (4-5, 3-3 from 3 overall) did what we needed them to do on O. No complaints there. Lonnie had a solid outing shooting 4-7, 2-2 from 3. He had a nice variety of shots from the paint out. It still felt as if he was settling for outside shots more, but he made them at a decent rate. It's a matter of growing in experience, recognizing when to do what, and he's learning that. When he does drive, at times he tends to have the ball in out in one hand, exposing it or telegraphing what he's about to do and he's been stripped or rejected often enough that protecting the ball closer to his body ought to be a more prominent part of his tool kit.

Our bench has often been a strength and buoy this season but in this game it was 15-38, though a solid 7-14 from 3, this despite Patty's forgettable 1-7 from beyond the arc. He's been arguably our steadiest player this season, and it wasn't for lack of effort. It can't always be him that saves the day.

In the last 3.5 minutes or so, Pop brought out a DJ, Lonnie, Keldon, Beli and Metu line-up to close out the game. It looked like you'd expect with guys who don't play together often, too many one and done shots, but I still always have hope of seeing some effort in running plays properly to show they're learning and can be the next guy up and belong.

Side note: I was thoroughly unimpressed with their taking a shot on their final possession. Really poor sportsmanship. We dribbled out our final possession.

This was one of those rare games in which every one of our players was in the minus. The stat by itself means little, but a team-wide trend does confirm the eye test and score. We were outmatched by their strengths and in what usually are ours. Though we had more attempts (91-85) they made a whopping 58.8% of theirs to our 44%.

Fatigue was certainly a factor, but we more guys who want to take on the mantle to play tougher and get our spirits up. There are certainly several fixes within our control, not the least of which is more vertical play, a concerted mindset to box out, and attention to details - closing out quarters, ball protection, finding good to great scoring chances.

The RRT is a grind. Keeping the focus simple of learning from each game, trusting the system, and improving in the next one during the next stretch of matches will hopefully help us navigate out of bad patterns and break through to better ones. Finishing games strong and showing some fight and collective resilience would be a good start.