Spurs of the Moment

Aaron Brooks wins Most Improved Player, George Hill and Kevin Durant finish tied for second.

Brooks earned 403 of a possible 615 points, including 62 first-place votes, from a panel of 123 sports writers and broadcasters. Kevin Durant of Oklahoma City and George Hill of San Antonio tied for second with 101 total points.

So for those of you who still don’t know who this George Hill guy is, well you should know after Game 4. Still, he was creating a stir around the league before now and this is just further evidence that the Spurs know how to draft talent and will not fade into obscurity as the Big Three get older.

Spurs’ edge over Mavs: Fear not

Blair celebrated his 21st birthday just three days earlier. Hill will turn 24 in another week. The Spurs don’t usually win with players so young and with their stars contributing so little. Still, all of their championship teams owned the same trait: From Mario Elie to Stephen Jackson, from Steve Kerr to Bruce Bowen, from Malik Rose to Fabricio Oberto, the Spurs’ supporting casts were cut from the same sturdy fiber that Hill and Blair now share. There’s a reason why Jaren Jackson left the Spurs with a championship ring and Hedo Turkoglu didn’t. To survive in San Antonio, one must not only withstand the heat of the playoffs, but also Popovich’s personal fire.

More props given to Hill and Blair. It seems that finally more people are noticing that the Spurs have not just stood around and waited for their stars to get old while adding on a vet here and there (McDyess, Jefferson). In fact, the Spurs have been developing other talented players too like Malik Hairston and maybe even Ian Mahinmi, not to mention other players they picked up during the season such as point guard Garrett Temple.

Spurs’ Blair keeps his head in game

Knowing that the slightest hint of bravado might have given referees an excuse to call a double technical — the better to clean up some of the chippiness that characterized the second half of the Spurs’ 92-89 victory — Blair beat a hasty retreat toward the Spurs’ bench.

One more reason we have come to like Blair so much. Not only is he a maniac on the glass, prone to ripping off the arms of future-draft busts, and a beacon of hope to ACL-less people the world over, but he has a rare trait known as “common sense” that keeps him from getting into trouble with the refs during big games.

Dallas Morning News columnist: Spurs know how to win, Mavs don’t

This isn’t about effort or desire or any other intangible. This is about the Spurs, a franchise with championship pedigree, finding ways to win, while the Mavs, a franchise with a history of choking in the playoffs, finds ways to lose.

Uh oh, don’t look now but it sounds like trouble in paradise. The home team is getting berated by their own newspaper, but it’s not like they don’t deserve it. You can only rip out a city’s heart with uninspired play for so long before they show up with pitchforks and torches.

Ginobili will sit out World Championships

“My body kind of needs it, and I want to play the (2012) Olympics, so I decided to pass on this one.

“Besides, there’s another little factor here: My wife is going to have twins in a month. Those are the times you don’t want to miss. Both, one next to the other, makes me take this tough decision.”

 Thank goodness. I figured his better sense would prevail over his competitive side this summer. Plus it looks like the Spurs have a chance of going deep in the playoffs this year so he will need the rest.

The Spurs went back to their wishy-washy ways this weekend with a mind-boggling loss to the Grizzlies followed by another great win over the Denver Nuggets – a Western Conference contender. It’s a good thing the playoffs are starting soon because this recent trend of losing to bad teams but beating good ones will be much more useful in the coming weeks. Also, there hasn’t been a ton of minutes for Malik Hairston lately, but the good news is there haven’t been many for Keith Bogans either. At any rate, let’s recap the games a little bit and see what other Spurs news I can dig up.

Stupid Blue Bears
The Grizzlies beat San Antonio on Friday night thanks in part to Zach Randolph’s 28-point, 15-rebound performance. The Grizzlies outrebounded the Spurs 48-39 and held a 16-7 edge in offensive boards. It boiled down to the Spurs having seven more free-throw attempts, but the Grizzlies having 13 more field goal attempts – 10 of which they made. They were simply better at getting to the ball and outplayed the Spurs for the whole night except for the first quarter.

The game got out of hand in the second quarter when the Grizzlies scored 22 points in the paint on their way to 46 for the night. Watching Mike Conley run amuck at the end of the first half kinda shows you how important it is for George Hill to return.

Richard Jefferson had one of his off nights with only seven points on 1-of-4 shooting, and he only grabbed two rebounds. Not his A game in other words. Manu Ginobili, for his part, at least led the way for the Spurs with 26 points, eight rebounds, and five assists. A comforting stat line in light of his recent contract extension. Unfortunately he was off from downtown on 1-of-6 shooting from beyond the arc. Fortunately, Matt Bonner was able to hit 6-of-10 from deep on his way to 19 points off the bench. We needed every bit of it since McDyess was back to playing like crap (0-of-3 from the field for zero points, four boards and a turnover in 15 minutes), and DeJuan Blair couldn’t stay out of foul trouble (5 points, 3 rebounds, but four fouls in eight minutes). Tim Duncan did his usual double-double thing with 15 points and 10 rebounds, plus he had five assists. Temple was adequate with eight points as the starting point guard again, but Tony Parker played about the same amount of minutes (26) and had 13 points and eight assists. I think he will be starting again before season’s end.

No One’s Scared of the Nuggets
The Spurs showed up in Denver though, as they kept the pressure on the Nuggets all night before turning the game into a blowout in the 4th quarter. The Nuggets got about 50 technicals in the second half, two of which got Carmelo Anthony booted from the game. He finished with 19 points, four rebounds, two steals, one assist, and five turnovers. I kind of understand them losing their minds though. The Spurs shot 45  free throws in the game. That is not a typo. Forty-five free throws – they made 30 of them. The Spurs also outrebounded Denver 48-31 and shot 46% from the field compared to only 39% for the Nuggets. So basically it was everything that could wrong kind of did for the Nugs. Billups was on his game though with 27 points – he just couldn’t get anyone else going as he only had three assists. Yes, that was the team high for both.

For the Spurs, Tim Duncan had 18 points and 10 rebounds. RJ bounced back with 15 points, seven boards, and two assists. Ginobili was slowed down a little bit with only 15 points of his own to go with seven assists, three boards, and a steal. Temple was still the starter at point guard but only played 20 minutes, finishing with 11 points and four rebounds. He might have played more if not for foul trouble. Tony Parker played 31 minutes and had 12 points, six assists, two rebounds, and… you will never guess… five turnovers. Sheesh, man. DeJuan Blair had one of his better games lately with 12 points and eight rebounds in 19 minutes off the bench.

Next On the Schedule
There are only two games left. Monday night’s game against the T-Wolves, and the Wednesday night finale against the Dallas Mavericks. They should be able to win against the Wolves easy enough, unless they pull another Nets/Grizzlies game out of their hats, so the real fun will start on Wednesday when the Spurs play the Mavs. Then it’s Playoff Time! But I’ll get into all of that in my next update. Stay tuned…

Ginobili’s Summer
Manu signed a nifty contract for $39 Million over three years, but is still deciding on whether or not he will play in the World Championships this summer. Personally, I would like him to take off because it would suck immensely if he got hurt after the Spurs just gave him all that money. Also, with his wife set to give birth to twins, maybe staying with her is a better way to spend the down time this year. I wouldn’t blame him either way – he’s a professional basketball player so that’s what he does – period. Still, I hope he leans toward an easier summer. He says he will make his decision in the coming days.

The Spurs play the T-Wolves tonight and then the Clippers tomorrow in what Ginobili refers to as must-win games.

“Both are teams that don’t have a shot at making the playoffs, so they don’t have much to lose, and we do. It’s very important to keep our focus, play hard for 48 minutes”

Good point since after the Wolves and Clips our boys will be facing only two teams the rest of the month that are under .500 (Golden State and New Jersey), and the other eight teams they face later this month include the Magic, Lakers, Cavaliers, and Celtics – all elite teams in their conferences, not to mention division leaders.

Spurs’ Hill can’t think in terms of replacing Parker:

Hill expects the final 20 games to be educational. The lesson he learned on Wednesday, when the Knicks applied occasional double-team pressure: Be prepared for anything.

“They caught me off-guard,” he said. “I just wasn’t all there, but I know now what to do in that case. I’ll beat my man next time.”

There is also a nice feature piece on George Hill on NBA.com. As Ginobili points out:

“A year ago, you could tell that he was a rookie, maybe wasn’t up to the situation,” said Manu Ginobili. “But not now. Not anymore. He’s earned a lot of confidence from everybody. He’s guarding the best opponent, taking responsibility at the point when Tony’s not on the court.”

Speaking of Manu Ginobili, he says he is looking forward to playing in the World Championships. I hope that doesn’t mean we can look forward to him breaking down again next season.

I want one of these “Los Spurs” jerseys that the Spurs wore against the Knicks on “Latino Night”…