Monday, April 27th, 2009...11:28 pm
The Redemption and Dissolution of a Cliche
I’ve been having a difficult time writing about this series since Game One. I expected to find my bearings as the series dragged on but if anything my unsteadiness has fortified itself since Saturday’s loss. I think my difficulties have arisen from a lingering uncertainty I have about the state of the team. I am not sure whether the Spurs’ struggles are fundamentally a question of talent or psychology.
In some ways, it’s dangerous to blame one or the other: Our 3 losses find their origin in both, most likely because intelligence and mental toughness exist in dialogue with physical ability. But the dichotomy has been an inescapable element of my analysis.
I think my questions have been compounded by the fact that, heading into the postseason, I felt reasonably confident about both aspects of our team. We’ve always been known for having dark hearts and icy veins come mid-April. And although not the most talented team on paper, I was confident the more limited player’s roles had been sufficiently defined.
There was one moment where I thought I had a firm grip on the series: In the wake of Game Three. After getting blown out in Dallas, I imagined the Spurs playing a vengeful style of basketball in Game Four. Also I felt the stage was set for the Mavericks to feel cocky and come out flat. I said as much late that evening.
As we all know, neither of those came to pass. As best I can tell, only four Spurs arrived on Saturday with an appropriate understanding of the game’s importance: Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Bruce Bowen, and George Hill. Oppositely, the Mavericks maintained the collective focus they’ve shown for the majority of the series. When the game tightened up, they relied on smart ball movement and high-percentage shots. Our guys started chucking.
Speculating on the psychological state of players is always a reckless endeavor. A quick examination of their pre- and post-game quotes won’t reveal a body of evidence on which we can base our assertions; all we come across is an echo chamber of cliches. We gotta take it one game at a time. We gotta treat every game like it’s game seven. We gotta have a short memory. The homogenization of rhetoric in the NBA is a tremendous disappointment, given the highly expressive nature of the game itself.
For years cliche found its redemption in the Spurs. For most teams there seems to be little connection between the language they use during interviews and the performance they give on the court. From the day they enter the league players are taught to overwhelm the press with banality. But for the Spurs, on-court execution seemed to grant all the truisms a level of authenticity. Our particular brand of bland was always interpreted as a sign of professionalism.
But as we’ve failed to execute over the course of the series, putting my thoughts into words has been increasingly laborious. It’s not that, in the face of adversity, I’ve grown sheepish suddenly. The Spurs have lost countless playoff battles, including a uniquely painful one to the Dallas Mavericks in 2006. But even in failure, poise and team-oriented play remained a constant. I am frustrated with the style in which we are losing more than I am the losses themselves.
The truth of the matter is I’ve been attempting to rely on the old language when only new language will do. For better or worse, this is not the same Spurs team. I can no longer use the tropes of the last decade as a crutch. As a chronicler of the franchise, that is uncomfortable to admit; with each new game my previous observations have slid further into irrelevance. I am not resigned to the idea that the Spurs will lose this series, however likely a conclusion that may be. But I have come to terms with the fact that, whether we are met with failure or success, I must push myself to think about the team in original ways if I aspire for my writing to be a source of insight.
I’m not particularly proud that I had to cannibalize my own writing difficulties in order to reach this conclusion. Oftentimes writing about writing feels cheap and narcissistic. But I decided that working through my struggles out loud had some value, or was at least preferrable to the idea of quietly shuddering while the season passed me by.
9 Comments
April 28th, 2009 at 2:07 am
In a weird sort of way I think you summed up the mood well. This series has me in a very reflective and philosophical frame of mind. It definitely hasn’t been a typical Spurs playoff run.
April 28th, 2009 at 3:10 am
I still believe we can win this series and take the next three games handily if Pop stops with his new offensive ideas. All these years defense is what has made the Spurs so great, but this year without adding a premier scoring talent, Pop has tried to become an offensive team? Makes no sense to me, but then again I’m not a million dollar a year coach.
Anyways I don’t care if Hill is a rookie and Finley is a vet who showed at the end of the regular season he can still hit game winning shots. Hill plays defense, Finley gets torched.
I said this in a previous post but Finley, Bonner, and Mason have sucked this series. They are not going to come out in game 5 and just magically do good.
Bowen / Hill/ Udoka don’t have the *potential* to score as many points, but they certainly can hassle terry, JJ, and howard into average/poor scoring nights.
April 28th, 2009 at 6:12 am
This is the end guys. We are not winning this series and if miraculously, we were to win this series, we won’t win another one. It’s easy to blame this poor playoff run on injuries, but that’s not really the truth. The truth is that the Spurs have become very, very old and the Spurs’ guile and skill-level cannot make up for the team’s wary legs anymore.
Except for Parker, the Spurs never focused on developing (or acquiring) young talent, which has brought us to these crossroads. It’s easy to win championships when you have a Hall of Fame talent like Duncan in his prime. The true test of the franchise’s leadership will come this off-season – how do the Spurs retool? Do they go and sign another old vet such as Rasheed like they’ve been doing all along or do they focus on acquiring some young talent? We all know that the Spurs need an athletic wing and an athletic PF/C, can the Spurs front-office make this happen?
Regardless, we should take a step back and appreciate what the Spurs have given us – 4 championships! In the NBA where very few teams ever win championships, winning 4 championships in such a short period of time is remarkable. Let’s all be thankful for that.
April 28th, 2009 at 6:15 am
Great post, Graydon. Like Chris said, you sum the mood up very well. I haven’t been posting around here as of late, because like you, I just don’t know what to say.
You mentioned the 2006 Mavs series being painful, and I agree. That season, I really felt like was the start to a changing of the guard. But this season is starting to feel like the end of an era. Buck Harvey has a good article at the SA Express website about Bowen, and it possibly being his last game as a Spur.
April 28th, 2009 at 7:02 am
I agree with everyone and with the sentiment of your post. I think there is a collective somber mood that is being felt by Spurs fans everywhere. It’s been an unbelievable run and it’s hard to be upset when you’ve won as much as the Spurs have. But I think we all realize we’re closer to the end of an era, rather than the beginning of a new one.
I truly hope that with the front office’s ability to retool and keep a championship team together, this will not be one of the final chapters in this team’s amazing run. But I think that in the back of each of our minds is the thought that this could be it. That the best days are past. And so we’re filled with a mix of reflection, solace, and contentment.
I’ll be cheering as hard as ever tonight for the Spurs to extend the series, but I think I will be doing it with a little sense of sadness.
April 28th, 2009 at 7:56 am
I believe your “writing about writing” perfectly echoes the feelings of myself and maybe other Spurs fans.
During the regular season, I felt like I could get a real sense of what this team was capable of. After seeing how well Roger Mason and George Hill filled in for TP and Ginobili. I was giddy at the prospects of what the team would be like by mid-season. Manu would get his legs back underneath him, round himself into “game shape” and join Hill in the second-unit backcourt. It was exciting to imagine how annoying those two would be to the opposition on defense.
Then, well, the wheels just fell off. Or, well, Manu’s wheels just fell off.
Then, I watched Pop scramble to fill the sudden, unplanned void Manu left by attempting to convert Mason into a point guard and seemingly giving up on Hill’s regular season development. I was confused. And it seemed like the Spurs themselves were confused. I’m left trying to figure out what happened behind-the-scenes for Pop to start doing this. And I still don’t have any answers. It’s all so confusing.
April 28th, 2009 at 8:44 am
Graydon, I understand your feelings and appreciate you sharing them. This entire season has been odd, since losing opening night followed with the dramatic one point loss in Portland. I get these reflective thoughts caught in my mind and yet, I don’t believe now is the time for a recap. There will be more games to play.
I don’t believe the current playoff failures are about age. Jason Kidd is 36 and he’s been the second best Mav, behind Howard. Role player Dampier at 33 has contributed more than any of ours, and that is the difference. Every Mav that plays contributes in some way. The same can’t be said of our role players, the under 3o guys Bonner Mason and Gooden plus 31 year-old Udoka. Should the team get younger going forward? Yes. But a best-of-seven in the rested 1st round is not about old it’s about execution. Our predominately veteran bunch has failed at times on both ends of the floor. They should take their lead from old guard TD, TP and BB; all three with at least three rings. The former two are outplaying their star Mavs counterparts but receiving no help.
April 28th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Hey Graydon, I am also very glad that you were able to take what had been clouding the heads of many spurs faithful and put it into a written body that’s easier to understand. Unfortunately, it’s not what many of us want to come to grips with, but it must be done sooner rather than later for the five steps of grief to go by quicker.
The fact is that this is a far different spurs team than what we’re used to seeing, and it’s always hard to have to accept change. As you’ve said in your post, one of the reasons for this is our physical limitations. We are pretty long toothed, and in the past couple of years, the most athletic players (from what i could remember) were ginobili in his prime, and francisco elson ( boy could we use him for this series). We are missing the quick slashing and ball movement that creates layups (outside of tony parker). Our players are smart and realize this, so this is where the psychological limitations come in, as their confidence is being taken down by physical limitations. So it is no coincidence when they try to make up for it by relying so heavily on what they do best, (shooting 3’s). This has made our offense anemic and in turn directing your blog title to our disastrous offense.
However, I would also like to point out that another reason for the change of the spurs play is that very fact that we chose to change. This can be blamed on either the Lakers potent offense, or Pop’s decision to adjust our team to have a puncher’s chance at beating the Lakers. How would we be able to stop Kobe, Pau, Bynum, Odom, or even the surging Ariza? Not to mention the bench mob? Pop decided that since the Lakers one weakness is playing defense intermittently, and their strength is being an offensive juggernaut, he would make offense a bigger priority in the hopes of increasing our punching strength, as opposed to our blocking, since the lakers have too many arms. Almost every change in the line up has been offense at the expense of defense, Bonner in the starting line up, Mason at the 2 instead of Finley, Finley at the three instead of Bowen, Mason at the back up PG instead of Hill, (although i think this was a mistake that popovich has somewhat realized). This strategy might not be great, but it is the best against the Lakers. Unfortunately, it’s not good against other teams. Our one focus this season was on how we were going to beat the Lakers, and we were consumed by it so much that we lost sight of who we were, a defense first team. I don’t care if we never beat the Lakers. I would prefer going back to our old ways, where we didn’t win by outscoring our opponents, but by giving them 48 minutes of hell.
What do you think Graydon, were we focused a little too much on the Lakers or is it time for me stop being a hoops junkie and begin my 12 steps?
April 28th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
[...] reading Graydon’s piece on the current psychology of the Spurs, I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. [...]
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