Spurs bench bounces back, but at a price
Despite the recent 18-game stretch of dominance that coincides directly with Tiago Splitter’s return to the starting lineup, there’s been a feeling of something missing — a void in the Spurs’ system that’s been acknowledged yet understandably tolerated, given the team’s 15-3 record since Feb. 27.
Make no mistake about it: The Spurs have been dominant. Since falling in Portland, 111-95, on the back end of the Rodeo Road Trip, San Antonio has outscored its opponents by an average margin of 14.2 points per 100 possessions while boasting an offensive rating of 111.8, both tops in the NBA during that time. Tony Parker has bounced back in a big way from his midseason maladies (or really, just his hamstring injury, and whatever lingering effects it had), Kawhi Leonard has played the best, most consistent basketball of his young career, and Splitter has re-emerged as a major factor on both sides of the ball.
But it really hasn’t felt like the Spurs of last season. For the most part, at least. This version has been top-heavy — reliant on that core group of starters to produce, and hopeful the bench would simply maintain status quo rather than bust the game open as it did so often during last year’s title run. One of the major factors in that has been the overall drop in 3-point production by a full three percentage points (39.7 to 36.7), a drastic falloff, relatively speaking. The reserves have experienced an even harsher decline, going from 39.6 percent from deep to 35 percent from the 3-point line this season.
Where last year the bench would light a building on fire like a flame through the drought-ridden south-Texas countryside, this season it’s been trying to light a match in the rain. Manu Ginobili has been more inconsistent this season, though his shooting numbers from deep haven’t really changed; Marco Belinelli has been steady, but underwhelming as a shooter in comparison to last year; Boris Diaw had been significantly worse prior to his recent, and most welcomed surge; and Patty Mills has been a mess for the better part of two months. It’s led to a lot of mixing and matching and blending of the starters and bench players, as Gregg Popovich has been pulling strings regularly in an effort to create consistency over 48 minutes.
On Wednesday night, for what feels like the first time in a long time, he got it in the Spurs’ 103-91 win in Orlando. San Antonio’s primary bench unit, a 5-man group consisting of Diaw, Belinelli, Ginobili, Aron Baynes, and Cory Joseph, played 14 minutes together and pounded the Magic by 62.5 points per 100 possessions! The lid finally came off the basket for the reserves (9-of-23 from the 3-point line for the bench; 13-of-29 total for the Spurs), and perhaps equally as important, not a single starter played more than Tony Parker’s 22 minutes.
Side note: For all the negative attention the Spurs have received over the years for their propensity to rest players in most back-to-back game-night situations, there’s been very little made of the fact they’re hardly doing it this season. Granted, that has a lot to do with the fact their place in the standings doesn’t afford that luxury, but we should probably acknowledge that 38-year-old Tim Duncan has now played in 48 consecutive games, the longest such streak for him since the 2010-11 season when he was 34 years old. So on nights like these, where the bench blows it open, it’s good for the starters to get a chance to rest their old legs.
Forget for a second the absurd net rating, and focus on the 14 minutes. Popovich has had all sorts of issues finding a regular bench group, a problem he did not have last season. In fact, that specific five-man group has appeared in 13 games this season and averaged just 4.4 minutes of court time, and that’s the Spurs’ MOST-used five-man unit comprised solely of bench players that has appeared in at least 10 games.
Still, the bench surge came at a price: Pop may have just made a change at the backup point guard position. Patty Mills is now shooting worse than 30 percent from the 3-point line over his last 26 games. He’s been given every chance to produce since returning to the lineup in December following recovery from a summertime surgery on his shooting shoulder, as the team understands how crucial his scoring was in that second wave off the bench. But his misfirings have been killing the Spurs.
To be clear, this is just speculation. Perhaps the coaching staff has opted to give Patty a bit of a break in hopes that a little time off the floor might clear his head. But given recent quotes from Popovich, I’m not sure that’s the case.
“Hopefully, he’ll get it, but he won’t get it if I don’t play him,” Popovich said last week. “We’ll suffer through it with him and see if he can get it together.”
Bench production had become a real issue as the playoffs loomed closer by the day, and Mills was looking really bad. I have no idea if it’s a full switch, but since returning to a regular role, Joseph has looked good. He’s a very good defender, a solid rebounder, and a steady ball-handler capable of running an efficient offense. But he’s not Patty. From time to time he’ll hit a hot streak, but Mills was a threat to break a defense at any point on any given night. It’s not that Pop wanted to replace him as Parker’s backup, it’s that he may have had to.
Mills will keep getting chances to regain his form if San Antonio continues to steamroll teams on the schedule ahead — this team is just different when he’s lighting it up — but timing has become a real issue. With just seven games left to play, Pop was faced with a decision: Do I continue to let Patty play through this, or do I give Joseph the chance to get in rhythm prior to the postseason? It’s going to be interesting to watch going forward, because if there is a player who can flip a switch, it’s Mills.
During last year’s playoffs, Patty shot 26.1 percent from 3 in the first round, 57.1 percent in the second round, 26.3 percent in the conference finals, and 56.5 percent in that NBA Finals massacre. So, we’ve seen he can be up and down. But the current lull has lasted longer than just a series or two. Mills has made better than 40 percent of his 3s in just six games since Jan. 31, and it’s only seemed to get worse over the last week.
For at least one night, the bench looked explosive again. Whether or not momentum starts to build from this remains to be seen, but you kind of have to let it ride in the case this does spark a run, don’t you? The Spurs aren’t built to be top-heavy anymore, so this type of performance from the reserves might be a positive sign of things to come. Unfortunately, it might be at the expense of one of the team’s most exciting players.
Sometimes, at a certain point, sacrifice is needed for the greater good.
Stats courtesy of NBA.com
