GAME DAY, BALA! GAME 12: SPURS VS. ROCKETS, 14-1-2021, 6:30PM (CT)

[G R E Y]

After a successful road trip, we return home for a two-game stint versus a cross-town rival. Remaining confident yet hungry is vital to ensuring we are vigilant in not taking any team lightly and staying focused on growing together as we continue our good road play on home court.

WHERE: AT&T Center, San Antonio, TX

WHEN: Thursday, January 14, 2021, 6:30pm (CT)

Earn The Stripes Mode: Team-first focus and dedication to playing the right way!



GO SPURS GO!!!

[G R E Y]

Big boost is back! Glad DeMar followed the league protocols to ensure a quick return. I hope this means his dad is feeling better. Welcome back, DeMar!

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[ducler]

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[G R E Y]

We are not in sync and getting outcompeted. We need better team cohesion, Rudy needs to pass, and Jakob needs to remember he is SEVEN FEET TALL!

[G R E Y]

Hmm I'd like to take back the outcompeted comment above. We are hustling, just not staying in sync long enough to get over the hump and get a lead...

[G R E Y]

And there's our lead! Better pace, better energy, good D to O transition, good passing, good finishing. Keep building on this, Spurs!

[G R E Y]

Embarrassing. Inexcusable. These are the kinds of losses that add up later in the year.

[Phreak50]

What an embarrassment.

I know there was a report the other day saying not one player is enjoying this season but when you're getting paid tens of millions of dollars, you think you might actually make an effort?

Aldridge simply didn't want to be there today. Pop should have pulled him and never brought him back.

And I have a lot of respect for Derozan but unless we were trying to showcase him for trade value, this was the perfect opportunity to have him on the bench and give one of the young guys the chance to win the game.

Let's just move both Aldridge and Derozan for ANYTHING and properly start afresh. They've done enough mentoring. Get John Collins, Lauri, picks, anything.

[G R E Y]

**** AMEN, Pop!

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Some of our guys were trotting out there like it was a Sunday picnic game. Layup after layup, open 3 after open 3 with no hands up. Ruined the good games of several of our young players.

[G R E Y]

Bloody well better show up better with some mental focus and grit by EVERYBODY:

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[imagump1313]

We aren't a playoff team so who cares? But man, Houston had a layup line going most of the game with zero resistance. Especially in the 4th.

DeRozan had a good look at the end and it just didn't go in. I'm ok with him taking it because we lost the game long before that.

Grey mentioned over the summer once if we should go after Wood. He really seems like he was worth the money Houston paid. He destroyed us tonight.

[Phreak50]

I want to see the team achieve what they're setting out to achieve. Whether that's tanking, giving you g guys minutes to develop or pushing for a playoff spot.

Right now, we don't seem to be doing either of the above.

You don't give Derozan that shot and you don't give Patty minutes to fire away unless you're trying to win.

If we keep doing things half-arsed, we'll be stuck on a treadmill.

[Captain Ballmer]

It gives me pain to see Aldridge out there. Can't imagine you guys. One was wandering If all it takes for Jarrett Allen was a protected first round pick...

[imagump1313]

It gives me pain to see Aldridge out there. Can't imagine you guys. One was wandering If all it takes for Jarrett Allen was a protected first round pick...

I think it will take more than a pick for Allen. Cleveland doesn't want or need Aldridge. Man, I hate to say this but I would even take Drummond at this point. He might be something if he was ever coached. The guy gets 20 rebounds a night without ever being coached in this league. Then again its like Phreak was saying. To make a move at this point for anyone of value would mean they are trying to make the playoffs which isn't totally clear.

With Nurkic going down again, can we get the Blazers to offer something for Aldridge?

[Ballings7]

Yeah bad loss... glad to see a few of the guys play pretty well, but just lost it end of the 4th.

I'd be all for getting Drummond.. has improved his all-around game the last couple years or so... overlooked passer, and could really be a force defensively in the right system which he just hasn't really had that structure and organizational committment and culture yet -- he's just been losing without much hope other than to get paid more in the end.

[G R E Y]

In securing our own bigs, Jakob and Drew, I think we intended for some internal development to offset some expected LMA drop off.

But I'm not sure we expected the LMA drop offs to be a. as frequent and b. as dramatic. When LMA's game is on, he's still quite productive; that's undeniable. He's bouncy, engaged, and contributing well in various facets of the game on both ends. But we frankly don't know which version we'll see on any given night. We can't really rely on a day's rest in between games to be enough every time. And when it isn't, he looks like a shell of himself. Like two rebounds in over 30 minutes of play for a starting 6'11" C is woeful, that's on top of the poor shooting and defense. I'm compiling some clips for my post-game write-up/rant (I've calmed down some...).

The problem we're facing now, too, is that while LMA's consistency is to be expected with a decline (and we have to adjust to its extent), Jakob's noticeable decline is not. I'd take 50%FT 'efficiency' right now. But he's averaging just over 20% this season. TWENTY PERCENT! And that's on top of lower efficiency across the board in just about every category. I'm compiling some clips of him, too.

Add to these the wrecking ball Drew being out for Covid protocols and Trey not being able to get minutes but for necessity's sake, and we're up **** creek with paddlers steering the canoe in circles.

Foresight is 20/20. Perhaps we can pick someone up with the NBA/NBPA soon-to-be-agreed upon third two-way contract allowance.

This is surely an eye opening situation that we need to address but as I write that I am not sure that Drummond is the solution. I realize my case is harder to make after the monster numbers he put up tonight, but there's a thread on the GB filled with fans who've watched him game after game for years and his flaws are as glaring as his strengths, if not more so, BBIQ deficiency being the biggest one, which causes him to think he's more than what he is, and do more of what he isn't good at which hurts the team.

Drummond seems more suited to a team that needs to fill that final specific role, a contender that needs a rim/ball protecting presence with no holes elsewhere. That's not us. Is the thinking that LMA for Drummond would be the exchange? If so, why would the Cavs do that? They want assets back not an exchange of expirings.

We want to compete for the playoffs and surely want - need - to shore up the bigs position. Wish we'd have looked into Milutinov but that's a pipe dream now. Magic and Hawks also have a plethora of bigs, perhaps they'd do something. Or if we deal with Portland (Nurkic will be out two months) a third team would have to get involved as they don't have any bigs we want.

The main thing is to strengthen the bigs position either through trade or hypnosis therapy for Jakob without giving up youth or picks assets. LMA is still valuable for a contending team that doesn't need as much from him as we seem to given how much we play him.

Once Drew returns he can help with our rebounding at least. He frankly outplayed / outhustled Jakob in the bubble, and so the issues with Jakob go back a ways.

So yeah, not much in way of specific solutions here, but I add my voice to those that call for a solidifying of our 4/5. We can't keep playing around it. The only other thing I can think we try is use the 1-4 more, be more G/F oriented like we were in the bubble so the 4/5 is less exploitable but that would require LMA to be on board on nights he doesn't have it. We can't keep going to him to get him going for four quarters but must instead give the ball to those who do have it going on any given night. The team to a man has to at least agree to that as a starting point.

[Captain Ballmer]

It gives me pain to see Aldridge out there. Can't imagine you guys. One was wandering If all it takes for Jarrett Allen was a protected first round pick...

I think it will take more than a pick for Allen. Cleveland doesn't want or need Aldridge. Man, I hate to say this but I would even take Drummond at this point. He might be something if he was ever coached. The guy gets 20 rebounds a night without ever being coached in this league. Then again its like Phreak was saying. To make a move at this point for anyone of value would mean they are trying to make the playoffs which isn't totally clear.

With Nurkic going down again, can we get the Blazers to offer something for Aldridge?

I was mentioned of Spurs because you might as well been involved on the 4 team Harden trade instead of Cavs. You could get Prince+Jarrett inexchange for a pick and expirings that Cavs included(Exum and protected first). Maybe Pop and RJ thinks different so who knows.

[Phreak50]

With Nurkic going down again, can we get the Blazers to offer something for Aldridge?

I had a quick look at Trade Machine and nothing really works.

Unless we take Nurkic and other junk.

I'd like to see Aldridge happy again and think retiring in Portland might make that happen but I dunno if anything can be done there.

Btw Gump, I still stick by my, 'wouldn't trade White for Trae Young' thoughts.

[G R E Y]

A bit late with this one, but here goes...

Trap game, trap game result. *sigh* Largely self-imposed and self-imploding. * double sigh *

Once again we went away from what we declared is the central way of playing, away from bubble style of play catering to the strengths of the young guys around whom vet strengths are to supplement this. What we reverted to instead was this hybrid that we’ve proven time and again doesn’t work, the one where the vets play ISO ball and the young guys play transition style. There’s too much friction between them where we can’t decide which is dominant and it’s like one foot on the gas and another on the brake.

At its worst, it manifests in what we saw tonight: Rudy’s tunnel vision for missed passes to open teammates and his finishing 2-7; Patty over dribbling due to our lack of movement and rushing shots; DeMar passing when open and taking end of clock (and game) shots; LMA bricking shots throughout the game when our young guys were hot. There’s pounding the rock to get players to finally break through a shooting slump (suboptimal when we gave up leads that way), and there’s pounding the rock to get young guys who got us leads to learn to finish games.

You could tell from the first few possessions what the feel of the game would be, and in this case, our good D and driving start by our young guys was shadowed by our vets mostly stinking it up, bookended by LMA's first and last missed 3 of the game.

We started with a DJ steal and a layup. Our young Spurs kept driving inside for three nice finishes and once we established out inside game, we tried to establish the outside one to no effect. This seemed to take some wind out of our O. We were slow in setting up our shots and missed the lot of them. You’d think we’d learn from the transition points we got that beating our opponent down the floor and driving at them that this is what we should have kept doing, but we went kept going away from what worked after only three or so possessions at a time.

And so in appeasing both styles – transition and ISO half court some vets prefer - we looked out of sync throughout this game, from bad passes to poor shot selection and misses to open drives and 3s allowed.

I don't understand the lack of cohesion and mental focus. I don’t understand the lack of carry-over from one decent win to the next. We continued more of what we didn’t do well from the previous game, and I suspect part of it is we took this opponent for granted, thinking we could just outlast them or something.

We talked pre-game about this being a must win, and yet we made bone-headed plays throughout the game, including, disappointingly, when we worked to secure leads in the 3RD and 4TH Qs, this after climbing back from a 1ST Q double digit deficit - again - against a nine-player squad.

We finished that 1ST Q down only 3, but that was thanks to some of their TO’s and missed shots which made the stats for both teams nearly identical. Down also by 3 at half was an achievement considering DeMar was 1-6, LMA was 1-5, DJ was was 1-5 and Jakob was 0-1. All our starters were in the minus after two quarters.

Our young guys, particularly Keldon and Lonnie, were carrying us. Keldon drove relentlessly and finished well, getting to the FT line consistently. He hit 3s (2-3) and he even mixed in a mid-range J! Coupled with his aggressive rebounding and disruptive defense deflecting passes and preventing easy drives, and he was a standout in all the right ways. He led us in scoring (29), shots made and taken (12-16), FT’s (3-5), and starters with O boards (3) while chipping in 2 assists, a steal, a block, and some thunderous dunks.

Lonnie also got his shot from anywhere he wanted. It was that kind of night. He seems to play well against this opponent, and was making 50% of his shots up until the end of the 3RD Q. Yet for some reason he played the fewest minutes of all the starters throughout each of the Q’s, and only took – got to take? - two shots in the deciding 4TH Q, this while leading the team in 3s (4-7) and +8 rating.

DJ started slow again, both in terms of his scoring and his setting the pace. Far too slow and deliberate for far too many possessions. He took responsibility after the game for the focus and energy that we need to bring. To his credit he was terrific on D:

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He also co-led us (along with DeMar) with 7 assists.

Devin had a strong showing for us as well. He’s such a smart player without the ball. He made sharp, quick, timely cuts, led the bench in steals (3) and scoring (12) on an efficient 4-6, 1-3 from 3 and 3-3FT’s while grabbing 3 boards and dishing 1 assist for a bench high +5. He’s not yet a solid ball handler in the half court, but he makes up for it with speed downhill and hops at the rim.

This was one of the rare nights when our bench was outscored (33-26) and it was largely due to vets getting a lot of minutes and not doing nearly enough with them. Again, they tended to revert to old habits, old ways of trying to score. Rudy did have an O board putback, but that was his only point other than a right side mid-range J. Kind of telling that he made as many team-oriented points via the putback as he did in his tunnel vision way. No assists, steals, or blocks when on good nights he contributes across the board is telling of the kind of game he had.

Patty fared little better on a 3-10 performance, lowlighted by 1-7 from 3. Again, there’s pounding the rock, and there’s passing it to those who are hot; there’s passing it to those who are hot, and there’s dribbling the air out of the ball. We had too many possessions where guys stood around waiting for something to happen and it took us far too long at times to set up our plays. Each fed off the other in the wrong way. I thought Patty’s bench high 27 minutes and bench high shot attempts were both too high given the output. Plus Patty was a team worst -14 because the opponent kept looking for and finding him in mismatches and scoring on him at will. That we hardly had any help D and rim protection and allowed layup after layup only compounded the problem.

Speaking of rim protection, Jakob finally got a couple of blocks which was good to see. We’d come to rely on Blockob, but his overall game has slipped to a concerning level. We passed it inside and once again he had an open layup that he missed because he refused to dunk the ball. He motioned like he had been fouled or was stripped, but both could have resulted in a made basket if he only bothered to finish hard at the rim! He instead keeps doing the thing that isn’t working.

Jakob and free throws. Holy Mother of God. The camera angle in the game that I noticed showed him palming the ball, as in the ball resting fully in his entire palm like he was a waiter or statue or something, and he just kind of pushed the ball forward. I’m just a fan, ok? But it’s actually hard to describe all that’s wrong with what he’s doing. You know good mechanics and FT shooting when you see it. And when you don’t. Then someone posted a GIF from behind Jakob, and all sorts of other issues were apparent. LOOK. AT. THIS. ABOMINATION. IF. YOU. CAN.

Spoiler:

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His right foot is aligned with the right side of the rim so he leans his body left to compensate to try to get the middle of the basket. His body is not squared with the rim. I mentioned the palming problem which you can’t see here, but what in the world is his left hand doing? Nothing! He’s not actually using it to help guide the shot! And most important, his shooting elbow is not pointing toward the basket. It’s a one-handed, palmed, pushed, out-of-balance FT. Like this CAN’T be what Chip is teaching him. It just CAN’T BE. It’s clear WHY he is missing; it’s not clear why the hell he is shooting it like he is. What a collection of horrible mechanics.

Anyway, in the second half he finally grabbed the basketball on O boards and we were able to secure second possessions, and led us with 4 O rebounds, so credit to him for the better focus there.

His starting counterpart had an off game on both ends. He looked stiff and was not mentally there. As I mentioned earlier in the game thread, if we can’t rely on a day off between games for LMA to be ready, we have to either rely on other bigs to step up (itself an issue) or we make the switch to a more G/F-oriented game.

LMA has trouble guarding these young, bouncy, wiry Cs on a good day. The more athletic and mobile, the harder it is for LMA to keep up. He can’t use his strength to body them on D because they’re too quick and jump too high. He can post them up on O so that’s an advantage, though they did well to double him, and at one point forced an errant pass out of bounds. When LMA’s tired and not mentally locked in, you get defensive contesting like this:

Spoiler:

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Hahahahaha! Jesus Christ. I mentioned this kind of stellar contesting in the Wolves game, the one where he looked like he was in a Swan Lake production, and some intrepid fan captured it:

Spoiler:

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Like that can’t happen. It just can’t. They torched us from layups and open 3s:

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Couple that with only 2 rebounds (he has only one double digit rebounding game so far) and giving up the most points on D, and it made for a poor night:

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On O, LMA only took 10 shots, and that 4-10 is deceiving given he was only 1-6 from 3 yet we kept going to him to take it. These ill-advised shot selections killed our momentum whenever we could generate enough of it. His missed 3s early in the 1ST and 3RD Q’s indicated his shot was off, so it made no sense to go to him late in the game for it.

Down 103-101 after giving up a nine-point lead with four and a half minutes left (and a five point lead with three and a half minutes left), because of a series of defensive mistakes, DeMar drove and had an open enough lane to get to the rim but instead kicked it out to LMA in the left corner who airballed it.

I thought we ought to have had Keldon and Lonnie in with the rest of the starters late in the game. Instead, we had DJ, Patty, DD, Rudy, LMA, I believe, so four vets who struggled throughout the game (minus DeMar who made some 4TH Q shots) and DJ. I think the idea was to get DeMar scoring late, and so Patty the better ball handler than KJ or LWIV was out there and Rudy for the rebounding made sense. But we didn’t need a 3 there, and certainly not from someone who struggled from the arc all game while our two best 3 shooters were on the bench at the time.

DeMar began the game tentatively. He didn’t hustle after loose balls, and was driven on easily. He was also too passive in giving up open shots to others for lower percentage ones but got to scoring more in the 4TH Q.

What I liked is that we finally went away from the DeMar end of Q ISOs in this game. In each of the first three Q’s, we created different shot opportunities for different players, two or three which went it. 1ST Q was a display of wonderful passing and movement. Patty was in the upper left quadrant and passed it to Jakob in the key who zipped it over to Keldon on the weak side who laid it in. To finish the 2ND Q, DeMar drove and kicked it out to DJ on the left side of the arc who dribbled under it and whipped a pass cross court to Devin for a right side 3 miss. At the end of the 3RD Q, DJ brought it up slowly, probed his options, and used a Jakob screen to drive on the right side for a sweet off the glass swirl in.

But to end the 4TH Q, we went to DeMar three consecutive possessions, four it you count his pass out to LMA for the airball when DD had the open lane. DeMar made a left side layup, then missed another at the rim with yet another too low a finish so that it increased the chances of it being contested, and decreased our chances of getting an O board. His final shot was a bump into their steady, heavy PF into a fadeaway J that just swirled out. It was an open shot, not a bad one though I thought driving would have been a better option, and something for either Lonnie of Keldon better still. Too much DeMar late, not enough of the guys who kept us in it throughout the game.

DeMar is our closer, but it would be good to spread that around late so other guys get the experience like we did with the end of Q shots. One game, one change at a time. But it’s not about the single shot here or there. All plays throughout accumulate to put us in the final possessions we found ourselves in.

We had chances to pull away, but we keep giving points away through lack of focus and poor defense so we gave up a string of points right back. Our early deficit was from giving up 3s and layups, and this pattern repeated throughout the game. In the 2ND Q, Devin stole the ball, Keldon got a huge O board putback to pull us to 34-33 but then we quickly got down 40-33 on a travel and two made 3s on us. In the 3RD Q, DeMar made an alley oop pass to Keldon for a dunk and a 69-60 lead only for them to get a quick J on Patty who just entered the game, followed by a LMA turnover as he tried to to take his man off the dribble on the left baseline but lost the ball. We then fouled them on a made basket, missed a rushed Patty left corner 3, and allowed a step back J for 69-67.

It’s a game of runs and mistakes and mitigating them as it progresses. The point is that we kept getting torched the same way throughout the game without adjusting well enough to stop our opponent strengths. We also went away from what was working for us on O and the vet habits that reared their heads to our detriment. When vets play to the bubble style, we thrive collectively; when they play their own preferred way, we’re two teams competing for dominance.

When we did focus on ball movement, we ran some new more advanced sets to some success. These were good to see. But we need to collectively stay committed to ball movement and transition play. There’s a reason we’re the only team in the league with seven players averaging at least 10PPG. And our best Q, the 3RD, was the only one where we scored over 30 points and had a 79-75 lead going into the final twelve minutes.

Some some consistency issues keep surfacing: starting with the slow half court sets, getting into 1ST Q deficits, and not contesting at the rim and at our arc. We’re also being outrebounded overall: we outrebounded our first two opponents, and have been outrebounded 10 consecutive games since. Perhaps we can make boxing out and possession protection more of a priority? We are terrific in ball protection overall, though in this game we gave up 18 points on just 10 TO’s whereas we converted 22 points off of their 18TO’s. The rate of conversion ought to be lower with the one and higher with the other. Details.

Details here, details there, mental lapses throughout added up. We can play better, that’s the positive, but the buy-in and consistency has to be there from everybody. Whenever we start and stay with pace and transition we create our own energy and impose our play.

We just returned from a 4-1 road trip, but are only 1-4 at home after this game. There’s a message here, and there’s clearly work to be done with both continuing to strengthen the patterns of play that work for us, and changing those that don’t. We have the personnel and the capability for both, but we must stay the course, must stay mentally sharp to instill the good changes we want. Change does take a mental toll, and it’s caught us a couple of times. But it will be well worth the effort if we can more consistently commit to bubble style of play being at our core – D-out, transition, movement, ball sharing and sharing the scoring – and each guy really doing all that’s necessary to help facilitate it. We’re a far better team playing this way.

[imagump1313]

Btw Gump, I still stick by my, 'wouldn't trade White for Trae Young' thoughts.

That's ok, I'll let you hold on to that

Seriously, I would trade anyone on this team for Young. Could you imagine this roster with Trey Young instead of Murray? That would be a playoff team.