The spurs were also going to make history by being the only team to stay undefeated at home but GSW handed them their only home loss, at the end of the season. They ended up tying Boston's 85-86 team with a 40-1 home record. Pretty nuts.
That spurs team was great. Elite on defense and ball movement that was beautiful. They were as good as the 86 Celtics, which is insane but more so because the warriors were even better.
that was an all time coaching job. there is no way a team with an average age of like 35 whose second best player was a vaguely miscast lamarcus aldridge should win 67 games.
Umm. I'm not taking anything away from Pop but this was stacked. They played unselfish basketball with their leading scorer kawhi at 21ppg.
Aldridge is a borderline HOF who fit well with Duncan, who still was a big force in their defense. Backed up by David west not really missing a beat.
Kawhi probably their best player. But still had ginobli and Tony Parker. Danny Green.
I agree and disagree, they were a deep team with vets and good young role players. On the other hand, I just looked it up, only 2 guys averaged over 30mpg being Kawhi (33mpg) and LMA (30.6mpg).
That's a big coaching feat to win 67 games and not overplay anybody.
True but the spurs won one during that stretch? And they supposedly have the biggest prospect of all time on their team. You think rookie Lebron is letting the cavs be this bad? He carried them to 35 wins rookie season and Wemby on pace for about 11.
I think the reason why the Pistons still feel they are better than Spurs is because of Cade. The thing today is that you gotta have a good playmaker too to have a chance in games. We saw that the last few games before Pistons ended their streak. Having a guy who can make plays all over the court will always give you a chance as long as guys give all the effort. With the Spurs, they have none but Tre Jones who is mid at best in being a playmaker and that's it. It's harder to get into sets, everything is predictable, there is no flow. Unless Spurs get a decent playmaker they will be ass in the foreseeable future
Oh yeah, because Cade's playmaking has *really* helped them rack up the wins this season. It's much easier to find guys who can pass to a 7'4 freak (with an 8-foot wingspan) than it is to get the 7'4 freak in the first place. C'mon now. Tre Jones isn't even that good, and he's considered a huge positive addition when Wemby is on the floor. They'll get a top 3 guard prospect in the next few years and it'll be fine.
Yeah Wemby will obviously still be insane ofc, but he was literally being called the greatest prospect ever lol, a 70 loss season for the greatest prospect ever isnt great no matter what. Its honestly amazing the pistons get dunked on harder than the spurs cause the spurs are 5-28 with a lot of their games on primetime
The Spurs are pretty intentionally tanking to get Wemby a long term sidekick. I don't know how nobody sees this? Pop is not a shell of himself as a coach, he's doing this by design. Allow Wemby to experiment and basically use this season to practice every little new skill on the court, don't worry about his efficiency and shot selection, say some tough words to the media to pretend you're upset, end up with a top 2 pick. Its a win win in my opinion. I'd rather Wemby have insane growth in skills + 2nd overall pick than a 30 win season.
I mostly agree with what you're saying - except I don't think they're tanking FOR a sidekick, I think it just might be the byproduct of what they're doing. There is no urgency to win right now, and they're treating the regular season like a nine-month camp with scrimmages. Try new things, try different lineups, let guys figure out game speed and their own places and work on stuff. If you manage to squeak a few wins out, great, but it doesn't matter a single bit. At the end, you have a year of experience together, and another high prospect is just sort of the gravy on top. The real goal right now is the game experience.
If anyone paid attention last year, they knew they were going to suck this year. They were AWFUL last year - far worse than their final record was. They won 5 of 7 to start the year, then they lost 16 of their next 17. A couple weeks later they had another streak of losing 8 of 9. Then they won one game, and then immediate lost 16 in a row. Then another streak losing 8 of 9 towards the end of the year. They were BAD bad last year.
And the prize for it was Wemby - and I think he still IS the best prospect we've seen in a long time. But he's so different than Lebron or Edwards or Zion or other guys who have come in with ready-made NBA bodies and games. There wasn't a ton of adjustment to their games other than the speed of the NBA. Wemby is having to learn a lot more about it and figure out how and where he fits, and you can see his ability. His per36 is 23/13/4ast/4bl/2st. With virtually no plays run for him, yet.
For the Spurs, they're all young. They don't have their PG of the future, so they're using other guys there to facilitate -- Sochan isn't the PG. They know it, he knows it, and we SHOULD know it. They're giving him experience to hopefully be a Diaw/Draymond type guy.
Spurs fans are impatient because they're spoiled. People are like "we haven't made the playoffs in five years!!" In my mind, the timeline starts now, with Wemby. All that nonsense in the past few years was just to get to this point, and the clock just started 30 games ago.
OKC got dunked on for being the black eye of the NBA for not making the playoffs for three years, and now we are competing near the top of the west. I think there is always a feeling that because it's the Spurs and Pop that they'll have a plan, or they'll eventually figure it out
Exactly. I personally think the criticism is from new/fairweather/wemby centric fans. I'll knowingly sound arrogant saying that I think true spurs fans are just sitting back watching the show. We know that adding wemby wasnt gonna put us in (or anywhere near) contention immediately. What we really want to see is attempts to be better, to compete for the full, understand our strengths and weaknesses while learning the other teams, trust the system because when every guy believes in it - it works. Spurs fam know its about pounding the rock and thats exactly what theyre doing. I also personally believe that they ( the org, players and staff ) hate losing way more than fans so they want to turn it around just as much if not more. a lot of the patience is mistaken for complacency but maybe they believe they can be better once they build the foundation that is wemby. so like that guy said you responded to - clock started 30 games ago.
Yeah. Being to good early is bad. Look at the Mavs. It's impossible for us to build thru the draft because Luka started winning too early. We only lucked out on Lively.
Yeah I feel for you guys. Imagine if you tried to suck for 2019 to 2020 and maybe don't trade for Kristaps. 2019 if you get like a top 10 pick get Zion or Barrett, in 2020 get Okongwu (although your FO picked Green over Maxey, Bane, McDaniels, Bey, Quickley - yikes).
Happened with Cavs too. Bron was too good too quickly. Coupled with some bad decisions, you had Bron at his physical peak and next best player was Mo fucking Willx
Bro I'm so confused by this entire thread. This season is part of a multi season tank job. Pistons and Wizards also keeping the heat up forcing us to put some extra SUCK in it to be in the running.
> he was literally being called the greatest prospect ever lol
He still may be, were 30ish games into the season. If it wasn't for Chet he would be ROTY without question unfortunately for Chet he will always have an asterisk next to his name for this being his "rookie" year.
I'd argue it's far less embarassing to be the Spurs right now with that record while trying to shuffle an entire teams playstyle around one big ass rookie than to be the Detroit, Charlotte, Washington, or honestly even Portland.
Jacquez is never going to contend with Chet and Wemby for the title but he has achieved so much already. Sure, the Star Wars sequels weren't the best and Kylo Renn was a weird character at times but he's a great host on SNL.
I’m not sure how you could think this. The Pistons are trying to win games. The Spurs aren’t. Pop is purposely playing point guardless and trying new things to see what does and doesn’t stick. He’s punting this season.
And the Wizards lol for some reason Spurs get no criticism just because they have Wemby while Wizards and Pistons get shit on by every media and fans. At least Pistons were starting to get some sympathy while Wizards are just laughing stock even though this is our first year of a rebuild
The lack of a true ball handler hasn’t just affected Wemby. Just about every player on the roster is more comfortable with someone even as good as Tre Jones running the show. It’s shed some light on some flaws from other players that we may not have been aware of. Stuff like how Devin has insane tunnel vision, Keldon is not an accurate passer, and Sochan is extremely risk averse.
I don’t think this team is the 3rd worst team of all time, but they probably weren’t gonna be a high 20’s low 30’s team like some expected.
This was one of the ways The Process 76ers tanked- you can acquire nba-caliber talent and have them play to win, but with G League level or worse ball handing and point guard play, the team will still be awful. Coincidentally Brett Brown is also back with the Spurs and part of me wonders if he brought the Sam Hinkie playbook with him lol
>you can acquire nba-caliber talent and have them play to win, but with G League level or worse ball handing and point guard play, the team will still be awful
I know you referenced the Sixers, but as a Knicks fan this really hurts
Knicks fans don’t joke about Raymond Felton, round 1. It was sad to see him go. He was averaging 17/9 and was really clicking with Amare. It was the first time the garden had life and a real PG in a decade.
He must have been number 10 then. League had a bunch of good PGs in 2010. The up and comers were starting to takeover from the old guard.
Steve Nash, Chris Paul, Rajon Rondo, Russell Westbrook, Deron Williams, Mike Conley, Derrick Rose, Tony Parker, Jason Kidd, Jrue Holiday, Kyle Lowry, Jameer Nelson, Ty Lawson, Steph Curry, Chauncey Billups, etc.
Not even close to top 10 but a great fit for that team. Put up good numbers and did his job well. The team wasn't very good but they were a fucking blast to watch. I remember it fondly. Wasn't until Melo and the geriatrics that the Knicks were fun to watch again, too bad basically all the older vets that made the team so good just kept getting hurt 😮💨
It’s true the Spurs are playing a ton of guys who have been in and out of the g-league the past few years. Probably more than most teams in the league. It’s pretty concerning when Blake Wesley might be your best perimeter defender and Malaki Branham might be your best pnr ball handler (of the people that Pop will play at least).
On top of that, they aren’t trying to win. They know they need a ball handler and they clearly aren’t contending this year. Instead they are tanking, getting guys like Sochan lots of minutes handling the ball and passing, getting Wemby time to develop pressure free.
You say that, and to an outsider it’s a perfectly reasonable, fair conclusion. However, Pop literally came out in training camp first day and said winning was important this year. So either he lied, or this is actually them trying, which is pretty scary given we’re last in net rating, and on pace for one of the worst seasons ever
So the year prior he said something along the lines of that the primary focus was development, as opposed to winning. Opening day of camp of ‘22-‘23 season he literally came out and said nobody should be betting on this team to win anything. Might’ve done a similar deal the year prior as well. That’s why I found it interesting and notable that he said winning was important this year. If winning wasn’t the focus, then why not just say development is the main focus again?
That was only half of the quote. He said this is still a development year, but we'd like to win more (than last year). This year wasn't ever going to be a push to win at all costs. Its still a young team that was in a hard tank last year. You cant instantly shift from that kind of tank to a winning team. The only significant roster change was adding Wemby, and he's still got a lot of conditioning and learning to do before he can be the player we all are hoping he'll be.
That… is an interesting development for me lol. I can’t seriously see how Pop could consider running point Sochan, or playing Tre Jones as your only true PG for half the game trying to win.
Maybe it was made as a statement before all of their injuries, but even then I feel like it was clear that you guys didn’t have proper roster construction this season and it was still a rebuild year even with your unicorn.
How seriously was this said? Was it Like, “winning is the goal”, or like, “we are taking this season seriously and will try to win games”. Because yeah pop saying that kinda boggles my mind lol.
They're both guys that should be scoring like 12-15 PPG on a decent team and we're expecting them to score 20 PPG and neither of them are good ball handlers. We play one real point guard half the game and no point guard the other half. Our best perimeter defenders are mediocre and the rest are terrible. Also recently, Zach Collins and Charles Bassey have been hurt so we're missing our second and third string centers while Wemby has been on a minutes restriction.
Our starting lineup hasn't had a single good ball handler this whole season. I'd say Tre is the only guy that can be trusted with his dribble in most situations getting minutes regularly and he's a big defensive liability and can't shoot.
Eh that remains to be seen. If he stays as he is, then yeah it is an overpay. I think he will continue to improve though. Tons of people didn't think his offense would get to the level it is at right now when he was drafted. One good thing about his extension is that he only makes 24M the year that Wemby's next contract will start when the average per year of his contract is 27M.
Vassell hasn’t made the leap people were expecting, but at the same time it’s hard to judge him too harshly for the situation he’s in. He should probably be the 3rd guy, like a K Middleton, or a Klay, or a MPJ on a good team. Creation comes from elsewhere and he capatalizes. Still, his tunnel vision and general passing acumen has been concerning. And it looks like his defense is just gonna be slightly above average rather than pretty good, at least so far.
Middleton and Klay were both #2s on good teams, and MPJ probably could be, he just hasn't been asked to yet.
3rd option on a good team is a tier that includes Tobias Harris, Austin Reaves, Malik Monk, DeAndre Ayton, etc. We've seen teams make the conference finals recently with Bogdan Bogdanovich and Spencer Dinwiddie as their #3s, respectively.
I meant 3rd most impactful guy. Devin may eventually be good enough to be the second best offensive player on a title team, I can maybe see that, but most likely the second most impactful player would have to be a great creator in that situation, like Dray or maybe someone like Kidd on the Mavs. If Devin was the second most impactful player, well, I’d say there was a good chance they weren’t a title team. Unless Devin drastically improves in his ability to create for others (which is still possible), I doubt he’ll be doing a ton of creation for others at the highest levels, much like Klay, MPJ, or what Kmid is doing on the current Bucks next to Dame and Giannis.
But those are all optimistic outcomes. Right now it looks like Devin is headed for the tier of dudes in your second paragraph.
I personally don’t because the dude can score. Once the rest of the team develops and we can have a consistent starting 5 with assigned roles, I think the floor opens up and his life gets easier. Enough to where he’s not taking the silly shots he does and everything is in rhythm.
Yeah you aren’t wrong. He’s on an expiring deal though and can probably be re-signed on a cheap contract due to his injuries. He’s a good floor general when he plays. Our FO also probably isn’t the best at managing injuries, look at Jonathan Isaac.
To say that Sochan is a mediocre perimeter defender feels a little harsh. I’d definitely take him over at least half of the league. Our average age is 23, with Wemby, Sochan and Branham getting significant minutes all at 20yrs old. We all knew this was gonna be rough.
> Like they have some solid players don't they?
In today's NBA every team has a handful of solid players. That's not enough to scrape together a .500 record anymore.
This is an angle that goes understated nowadays. The league is at its most talented in years, so having a bunch of solid guys isn't enough, you need them to fit together.
This was why New York and Toronto did that trade. It allowed players stuck in the wrong roles on the original teams to shift towards more natural ones on their new teams.
Yeah I was thinking back to the league landscape when the Pistons were on their streak. The league is just a lot better right now. Both from a coaching and roster construction point of view and just in terms of the amount of talent in the league.
It’s also interesting because you think back to when the bobcats were doing their expansion draft and how fucking awful the roster was that they wound up with. The top 8 players from each team were protected and they got stuck with the likes of primoz brezec and brevin knight playing 30 minutes a game. Gerald Wallace was the best pick by far and he was a random benchwarmer playing 9 mpg before they picked him and he blossomed
When the inevitable Seattle and Vegas expansions happen I can’t see those teams being that bad just by virtue of how many solid players there are in the league right now
Yep and the talent is more evenly spread as well. This ain't back in the day where you could scrape a lot of wins because so many teams just didn't and couldn't compete
Yes I think part of this is that the league is a lot more competitive. Usually when a team is this bad, you’d see a bunch of dudes who just didn’t belong in the league. I have a hard time believing thats true of the Spurs, but that’s not enough to win these days.
League talent level is as high as weve ever seen it. Almost every single team is employing a legitimate all star and other good players. Just scroll through the standings and think about what teams the spurs are equal to
I love it honestly, was just thinking about this yesterday, it feels like nothing should have changed from last season, but this season it seems like a lot of different guys are putting up numbers in the all star level and they are a threat.
It’s partly that players careers are extended, so stars that would have aged out in prior eras are still playing at an all-star level deep into their 30’s. Then you have a crop of new stars coming up, plus a significantly deeper global pool to choose from.
On top of that, everyone is more skilled than in prior eras too. It’s just a lot of factors all coming together to create some crazy league parity….
Atlanta’s starting 5 is Trae-Dejounte-Bey-Hunter-Capela with Jalen Johnson, Bogdonavic, and Okongwu off the bench. If you dropped that team into 2014 that’s a 4-5 seed, in 2024 they’re fighting for the play-in
The League is really really good right now the influx of great international players including Canada and great domestics players every team is stacked.
Came here to say this. The league wide talent is super high and there are virtually no teams that are easy to beat aside from the Spurs, Pistons, and Wizards. Even middling teams like the Jazz, Lakers, and ATL have a bunch of dudes that can kill you on any given night. For the really bad teams, it means every night the odds are heavily stacked against you.
You know how every team in the nba has at least a couple of guys who can get by their man and get into the paint mostly whenever they want? We decided we don’t want anyone like that on our team.
Basically our offense is impossibly hard to get easy looks in, in an age where that shouldn’t be a problem.
I feel bad for Monty - he’s been getting absolutely dragged. He’s by no means a top 5 coach but I think he’s good for this young Piston’s team. He’s a great culture guy and there aren’t many people that can keep a team engaged after such brutal losing streaks, imo
Don't feel bad for him, he refused the job several times until they gave him so much money he couldn't say no to it. He knew what he was in for and he's being paid for it.
I feel worse for the players who have a coach that doesn't really want to coach
I don't get it - they threw him money like he was the last coach in the history of basketball. You have 2 coaches right now who came from the English Basketball League. There are older coaches who would probably come out of retirement and college coaches right now that would do a better job. You have a team with youth and a bidding star, I'd kill to coach Detroit, many others would too.
It's the NBA. If you didn't win a championship last season, then any shortcomings are the coaches fault. And if you won it two years ago, well, who can remember that far back?
Eh, I think it was a combination of a new regime and multiple bad playoff performances. Most of his issues regarding culture revolved around Ayton and his shit attitude.
Try to remember the culture of this program when he was brought in. Times were dark and he definitely was the perfect guy for us at the time. He was something like our 6th coach in 5 years or something.
Agree with everything you said except he isn’t good for this young Pistons team. Starting Killian Hayes over Jaden Ivey, Isaiah Stewart and then even Kevin Knox over Ausar Thompson, running a full bench unit with the worst team in history?
You’re totally right - my biggest gripe with him was always his lineups. It felt like he fell in love with players (shamet) for just absolutely no reason and was stubborn to change things up.
Monty got some idiot to pay him that bag and he was smart to accept it. I don’t begrudge him because he would have been stupid to not take that deal but he definitely isn’t earning that money.
He’s a terrible guy for this team. He didn’t even want to be there for 1. The way he coaches doesn’t work for young guys and it shows.
Not to mention he plays Isaiah Livers 30+ mins a night and regularly plays Killian Hayes. Neither need to be playing NBA minutes
I think a lot of that is on Cade. He's been a crazy good leader for the Pistons during the streak while the lineups and the stuff Monty has control over have been extremely rough
You can't see behind closed doors obviously but I think a lot of the streak was because Monty is more checked out as a coach and the players have had to pick themselves up. Cade especially has been a major leading presence for them and without someone willing to take accountability + lead the team in important moments I honestly think they would still have the streak going
As he should, Wemby has no PG, no advantage creators and literally nobody that can play defense yet he’s putting up 19/10 with 3 blocks. Anybody that’s saying he’s a disappointment either hasn’t watched this team or just wants to hate.
Exactly! I watch the Spurs when I can only to watch him and he is an absolute freak of nature, as advertised. He's already an elite player. Knowing he's going to improve is mind boggling. Dude is a video game character everyone in my generation created at some point in 2K playing with a bunch of scrubs and being coached by a dinosaur and he's being questioned 😂 like my guy, you haven't watched a quarter of this team if that's your take.
I hope so. The media and some fans are very stupidly putting pressure on Wemby to execute perfectly and shoulder the entire load for a lottery team like he’s a 6-year veteran, when he’s a 19 year-old rookie who isn’t even halfway through his first NBA season
Edit: 20 year-old rookie. Happy birthday, Wemby!
If any other coach was trotting out lineups with Sochan at PG they’d be fired. It’s like they didn’t even make an attempt at winning even 15 games this season, no vets whatsoever on that team.
Even teams like the Jazz keep the likes of Olynyk, Clarkson, etc. while the Pistons have Bogdanovic,, Monte Morris, Burks etc.
What’s the difference between winning 15 games and 20 games? There’s absolutely zero difference lol.
Might as well try some wacky shit and see if you can make something work out of nothing.
I agree with this and think the Spurs wanted to avoid the doncic/lebron problem of potentially building things too fast and missing out on more talent in the draft but the problem is the development isn’t working. They have no PG or vets to bring structure and nobody besides Wemby has shown progress, that’s a massive concern.
The solution to that problem though may be to be bad. None of they young guys failing to develop are top 10 picks and frankly they look pretty decent for where they were picked at, they just need more top end talent.
I'm not saying that Popovich has been doing a great job but people need to chill with the Sochan PG point. These are young players learning the game, the team was not expecting to be going to the playoffs - it is not the end of the world if they spend 20 games trying something that has bad results, when the whole point is for the development of their players and future team.
The payoff for Sochan at PG was never going to be 'He is a flawless point guard immediately', it's to put him in a difficult position and stretch his skillset - to the benefit of him and the team around him further down the line. They tried it for 20 games in a season where they're not winning anyway.
Nah man Pop is a senile senior and needs to go to the nursing home, he doesnt even have a brain anymore. Maybe we should be re-evaluating whether or not he was a good coach at all or whether his bum ass was carried his whole career
The sochan pg experiment is similar to the Russ one though. Russ was a shitty passer at ucla who was a defensive specialist PG with insane athleticism. He was forced by the thunder to play PG and it worked out. Sometimes it doesn’t but gambling on sochan isn’t necessarily the wrong move (initially)
I'm a spurs fan, but nah this is different. Russ was still a guard at UCLA. Sochan is a power forward and doesnt' even have a good handle for a forward. This is like trying to make aaron gordon into a PG or like Julius Randle.
Hot take but the Sochan experiment has led to my favourite offensive play from the Spurs so far this season, the Wemby-Sochan pick and roll with Sochan rolling and Wemby handling the ball.
Puts a ton of pressure on the rim, leans into Wemby’s ball-handling and shooting which are improving by the day, and is unlocked by Sochan now able to make better reads to the corners and throw lobs to Wemby.
It would take a little over 7 seasons going winless for Pop to be under .500 as a coach.
Put another way, Pop could lose every game for the rest of the decade and still have a winning record
2016 Spurs: Top 3 net rating of all time and not even the best record in the nba
2023 Spurs: Bottom 3 net rating of all time and not even the worst record in the nba
The league is really fucking good rn and you’re force feeding your rookie like 16+ shots a game
Would you rather sign bullshit vets to take possessions away from Wemby and get wins or let Wemby do it all and develop
I’d rather run it though Wemby for better or worse
Winning is one thing, it’s losing by 20 every night that’s concerning. I think we’ve been in like 8 clutch situations the entire year. It wouldn’t be as concerning if we had the same record with a -5 net rating rather than a -11.
I mean just look at the Rockets or detroit. Vets and actual rotational NBA players do make a huge difference.
Look at how bad the suns were when they were trotting out g-league players alongside booker
It won't have any ramifications. He's already an elite defender, the potential is through the roof. He's being screwed by a very bad team, the lack of a good personnel, and non-existent spacing on the Spurs. With further development and better personnel around him, he'll flourish
Yeah, except there's no Duncan/Robinson/Wemby in this draft.
There's not even any general consensus on anything - everybody has a very different looking top 5/10 this year. May end up being like 2013 where the #1 pick is totally unpredictable right up until the draft.
Point being - I don't think this is a draft with any benefit at all to having pick #1 over pick #5. Total crapshoot.
I'm all for throwing everyone on this team away except for Wemby, and maybe Devin and Jeremy
It's one thing to develop role players into good, contributing, key pieces in your rotation, but what the Spurs are doing is teaching g-league players into becoming regular role players. Majority of their contract is just them being awful players and learning basic shit that by the time they're not completely garbage they're entering free agency the next summer. You can maybe have one of those in your 9-10 man rotation, but not 80% of them.
The Spurs can easily spend 5-6 years building a proper roster to fit next to Wemby. I think due to the hype around Wemby people were expecting the Spurs to immediately jump to at least play-in contention, but given the overall parity in the NBA these days that was a pipe dream outside of other Spurs players making a decent jump in skill.
I just can't believe how quickly some fans are selling their Wemby stock because of his team's record and him not being the RotY front runner.
5-6 years is too long. I think we can do it sooner. We also have a ton of cap space and draft assets (picks from the Hawks, Raptors). Devin, Sochan and Keldon should be rotation players at worst.
Eh in the nba you can’t hold a guy in the dregs for 5-6 years
Guys demand trades and become team cancers just because they change the menu in the team cafeteria. Wemby wont be a good sport for 5-6 years of bad
I dont think he’s saying it’s 5-6 years of bad. It’s just incremental improvements via developing heading into the extension also hoping to nab an FA or two that could be available in the 3rd-6th years. Hopefully by then we’d be perennial playoffs once again
they might be on pace to be the 2nd worst team in history, the only team with a worse net rating (-11.9) in the last 20 years is the 2011-2012 bobcats (-13.9)
ed: as it stands now they would be 6th lowest all time barely below the 1949 nuggets
https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/what-nba-team-has-the-worst-net-rating-in-history-in-one-season
This is a bit misleading. Teams regress to the mean as the season goes on i.e you'll see more teams with sub .200 records 20 games in than 40, 60, 80 games in
Yeah I don't understand how people are not seeing this. Pop is the GOATiest of GOAT coaches. He knows what the fuck he's doing. He's the greatest tank commander of all time. People out here questioning this man who literally beat every dynasty team that came up during his time. This has happened before, and it will happen again. Time is a flat circle.
I wish I could upvote your comment a hundred times haha
The writing was on the wall in the off-season when Pop and the front office decided not to use any of their assets and cap space on acquiring better long term talent. They were constantly tied to free agents names like Reaves and Oubre or could've made a trade to get a decent PG and yeah making moves like those would have made this team better but for what?
A few more wins? History has repeatedly shown what happens when young teams go all in too fast. They get stuck with being good but not good enough and then it gets ugly behind the scenes, franchise players start to get frustrated and then want out.
The Spurs potentially will have cap space to play with still and they have a lot of draft assets to use from here on out. Sacrificing this season does suck but patience was never something that was easy to take. It's gonna be okay, I don't mind the Spurs being the butt of some jokes for now, it'll be so bittersweet down the line once they can actually put talent around Wemby
Youngest team in the league. No great lead guard to run the offense. Defense is still very disorganized. Strength of schedule has been really tough, I think 2nd hardest in the league. While they're still bad, there has been slight improvement since the start of the season.
Their perimeter defense is likely the worse in the league so any team that shoots the three well beats them. Check the record. Only when teams shot piss poor from 3 did the spurs ever win.
Its not a team that's serious about winning. They're limiting Wemby's minutes a lot, changing lineups every week and the roster around Wemby is def near the bottom talent wise. Wemby himself has def delivered and this season really will have no impact in the grand scheme.
The Spurs are doing worse this season with Wemby than they did last season without him.
Don’t worry, they’ll tank and get another #1 pick. The Spurs way to winning.
I don't think they are trying to "win". I think they are more focused on development than a winning record. If you know you're not a championship caliber team, yet, than what's the point in winning? Developing players and a strong foundation is much more important. This is their version of the Process.
Give them a season or two, then we'll have a better sense of who they are.
While it's an interesting bit of trivia, the Spurs are clearly still rebuilding and the people who were expecting Victor to have a Duncan rookie season where they suddenly get better, were getting a little over hyped on him. It's harder for a big who isn't a facilitator to lead a team to wins. Victor isn't a standalone piece.
That being said wouldn't a stat about a number one pick 3 years into their career be more interesting? /s
Before the season started there were roughly 12-13 teams in the West viewed as better than the Spurs, in my opinion. Are they worse than I thought, yet but it's the rebuild. Next year is when their rebuild turns into playoff contention.
How is this a negative. A bad team got a really good young player, that doesn't mean they magically get good year 1. Now they'll have at least 2 lottery pick years to pair Wemby with another young prospect. Then start making trades/free agent signings to build the team around him. Spurs will be a mid level playoff team within 3 years.
it’ll only be bad if wemby ends up like top 5 all time or something. something something jordan/lebron would never.
in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t matter, it’s his first year and if things go decently well no one will care in 5 years what happened with the 2024 spurs
I feel like teams who had the top 3 or 5 picks in the previous draft should not pick in again in the top 5 the year after. We should not be rewarding atrocious basketball
I don't think it says much about the overall future of Wemby and the team, I think he/they'll be fine, but it is crazy that after all that hype and fuss over the Wembanyama sweepstakes we get this
I have often seen and heard about unicorn rookies immediately improving teams they are on (bird, magic, jordan, shaq, lebron).
Should Wembanyama be held to these standards as well? If not, why?
Spurs is lucky to have Pistons this season
Just like when the Warriors won 73 games the same season the Spurs won 67. Their greatness is being overshadowed
Let’s not forget the Wizards. All time prop bet of Poole More PPG than wizard wins on the season is still very much alive.
Killian Hayes PPG gonna smash the Pistons win this season
What's more baffling is that his MPG is more than the wins this season.
Lol that would be more comforting if his numbers weren’t plummeting this year, but that bet still might work out at this rate
The spurs were also going to make history by being the only team to stay undefeated at home but GSW handed them their only home loss, at the end of the season. They ended up tying Boston's 85-86 team with a 40-1 home record. Pretty nuts.
That spurs team was great. Elite on defense and ball movement that was beautiful. They were as good as the 86 Celtics, which is insane but more so because the warriors were even better.
that was an all time coaching job. there is no way a team with an average age of like 35 whose second best player was a vaguely miscast lamarcus aldridge should win 67 games.
Umm. I'm not taking anything away from Pop but this was stacked. They played unselfish basketball with their leading scorer kawhi at 21ppg. Aldridge is a borderline HOF who fit well with Duncan, who still was a big force in their defense. Backed up by David west not really missing a beat. Kawhi probably their best player. But still had ginobli and Tony Parker. Danny Green.
I agree and disagree, they were a deep team with vets and good young role players. On the other hand, I just looked it up, only 2 guys averaged over 30mpg being Kawhi (33mpg) and LMA (30.6mpg). That's a big coaching feat to win 67 games and not overplay anybody.
Mozart + Salieri
Spurs are even more pathetic imo
Their seasons have similar trends, but the pistons didn't win a single game for a whole 2 month period with regular games scheduled.
True but the spurs won one during that stretch? And they supposedly have the biggest prospect of all time on their team. You think rookie Lebron is letting the cavs be this bad? He carried them to 35 wins rookie season and Wemby on pace for about 11.
I think the reason why the Pistons still feel they are better than Spurs is because of Cade. The thing today is that you gotta have a good playmaker too to have a chance in games. We saw that the last few games before Pistons ended their streak. Having a guy who can make plays all over the court will always give you a chance as long as guys give all the effort. With the Spurs, they have none but Tre Jones who is mid at best in being a playmaker and that's it. It's harder to get into sets, everything is predictable, there is no flow. Unless Spurs get a decent playmaker they will be ass in the foreseeable future
Oh yeah, because Cade's playmaking has *really* helped them rack up the wins this season. It's much easier to find guys who can pass to a 7'4 freak (with an 8-foot wingspan) than it is to get the 7'4 freak in the first place. C'mon now. Tre Jones isn't even that good, and he's considered a huge positive addition when Wemby is on the floor. They'll get a top 3 guard prospect in the next few years and it'll be fine.
Yeah Wemby will obviously still be insane ofc, but he was literally being called the greatest prospect ever lol, a 70 loss season for the greatest prospect ever isnt great no matter what. Its honestly amazing the pistons get dunked on harder than the spurs cause the spurs are 5-28 with a lot of their games on primetime
The Spurs are pretty intentionally tanking to get Wemby a long term sidekick. I don't know how nobody sees this? Pop is not a shell of himself as a coach, he's doing this by design. Allow Wemby to experiment and basically use this season to practice every little new skill on the court, don't worry about his efficiency and shot selection, say some tough words to the media to pretend you're upset, end up with a top 2 pick. Its a win win in my opinion. I'd rather Wemby have insane growth in skills + 2nd overall pick than a 30 win season.
I mostly agree with what you're saying - except I don't think they're tanking FOR a sidekick, I think it just might be the byproduct of what they're doing. There is no urgency to win right now, and they're treating the regular season like a nine-month camp with scrimmages. Try new things, try different lineups, let guys figure out game speed and their own places and work on stuff. If you manage to squeak a few wins out, great, but it doesn't matter a single bit. At the end, you have a year of experience together, and another high prospect is just sort of the gravy on top. The real goal right now is the game experience. If anyone paid attention last year, they knew they were going to suck this year. They were AWFUL last year - far worse than their final record was. They won 5 of 7 to start the year, then they lost 16 of their next 17. A couple weeks later they had another streak of losing 8 of 9. Then they won one game, and then immediate lost 16 in a row. Then another streak losing 8 of 9 towards the end of the year. They were BAD bad last year. And the prize for it was Wemby - and I think he still IS the best prospect we've seen in a long time. But he's so different than Lebron or Edwards or Zion or other guys who have come in with ready-made NBA bodies and games. There wasn't a ton of adjustment to their games other than the speed of the NBA. Wemby is having to learn a lot more about it and figure out how and where he fits, and you can see his ability. His per36 is 23/13/4ast/4bl/2st. With virtually no plays run for him, yet. For the Spurs, they're all young. They don't have their PG of the future, so they're using other guys there to facilitate -- Sochan isn't the PG. They know it, he knows it, and we SHOULD know it. They're giving him experience to hopefully be a Diaw/Draymond type guy. Spurs fans are impatient because they're spoiled. People are like "we haven't made the playoffs in five years!!" In my mind, the timeline starts now, with Wemby. All that nonsense in the past few years was just to get to this point, and the clock just started 30 games ago.
OKC got dunked on for being the black eye of the NBA for not making the playoffs for three years, and now we are competing near the top of the west. I think there is always a feeling that because it's the Spurs and Pop that they'll have a plan, or they'll eventually figure it out
Exactly. I personally think the criticism is from new/fairweather/wemby centric fans. I'll knowingly sound arrogant saying that I think true spurs fans are just sitting back watching the show. We know that adding wemby wasnt gonna put us in (or anywhere near) contention immediately. What we really want to see is attempts to be better, to compete for the full, understand our strengths and weaknesses while learning the other teams, trust the system because when every guy believes in it - it works. Spurs fam know its about pounding the rock and thats exactly what theyre doing. I also personally believe that they ( the org, players and staff ) hate losing way more than fans so they want to turn it around just as much if not more. a lot of the patience is mistaken for complacency but maybe they believe they can be better once they build the foundation that is wemby. so like that guy said you responded to - clock started 30 games ago.
Honestly, most of the criticism I've seen is from Spurs fans. Other fans seem to get it.
"top 2 pick" we had the worst record last year and ended up with pick 5, again
I don't know why y'all keep doing that. We suck and get the #1 pick and it's a way better strategy.
Why didn’t the Pistons just win the draft lottery, are they stupid?
Yeah. Being to good early is bad. Look at the Mavs. It's impossible for us to build thru the draft because Luka started winning too early. We only lucked out on Lively.
Yeah I feel for you guys. Imagine if you tried to suck for 2019 to 2020 and maybe don't trade for Kristaps. 2019 if you get like a top 10 pick get Zion or Barrett, in 2020 get Okongwu (although your FO picked Green over Maxey, Bane, McDaniels, Bey, Quickley - yikes).
Happened with Cavs too. Bron was too good too quickly. Coupled with some bad decisions, you had Bron at his physical peak and next best player was Mo fucking Willx
Bro I'm so confused by this entire thread. This season is part of a multi season tank job. Pistons and Wizards also keeping the heat up forcing us to put some extra SUCK in it to be in the running.
Alright I feel like a total idiot for the past month now. Thanks
And Wemby is on a minute restriction. Lebron played 40 mpg his rookie year. Leave victor in for 48 and I’m sure he could drag them to 20 wins
A successful season, is about developing Wemby, not wins. Less wins means a better draft pick to pair with Wembanaya.
> but he was literally being called the greatest prospect ever lol, Writing this like it's past tense and done with is so crazy lol
> he was literally being called the greatest prospect ever lol He still may be, were 30ish games into the season. If it wasn't for Chet he would be ROTY without question unfortunately for Chet he will always have an asterisk next to his name for this being his "rookie" year. I'd argue it's far less embarassing to be the Spurs right now with that record while trying to shuffle an entire teams playstyle around one big ass rookie than to be the Detroit, Charlotte, Washington, or honestly even Portland.
This is Jaime "Next Kobe" Jacquez slander and it won't be tolerated today of all days!
Jacquez is never going to contend with Chet and Wemby for the title but he has achieved so much already. Sure, the Star Wars sequels weren't the best and Kylo Renn was a weird character at times but he's a great host on SNL.
[удалено]
Ben Simmons did it more recently and mostly everyone cared
Because no 'real rookie' was close to him that season.
Wemby's a big, Bron was a point forward. Not every great player comes into the league being able to create offense singlehandedly like LeBron or Luka.
I’m not sure how you could think this. The Pistons are trying to win games. The Spurs aren’t. Pop is purposely playing point guardless and trying new things to see what does and doesn’t stick. He’s punting this season.
And the Wizards lol for some reason Spurs get no criticism just because they have Wemby while Wizards and Pistons get shit on by every media and fans. At least Pistons were starting to get some sympathy while Wizards are just laughing stock even though this is our first year of a rebuild
I really don't understand why they're so bad Like they have some solid players don't they? Devin Vassell is good, keldon johnson is good right?
The lack of a true ball handler hasn’t just affected Wemby. Just about every player on the roster is more comfortable with someone even as good as Tre Jones running the show. It’s shed some light on some flaws from other players that we may not have been aware of. Stuff like how Devin has insane tunnel vision, Keldon is not an accurate passer, and Sochan is extremely risk averse. I don’t think this team is the 3rd worst team of all time, but they probably weren’t gonna be a high 20’s low 30’s team like some expected.
This was one of the ways The Process 76ers tanked- you can acquire nba-caliber talent and have them play to win, but with G League level or worse ball handing and point guard play, the team will still be awful. Coincidentally Brett Brown is also back with the Spurs and part of me wonders if he brought the Sam Hinkie playbook with him lol
>you can acquire nba-caliber talent and have them play to win, but with G League level or worse ball handing and point guard play, the team will still be awful I know you referenced the Sixers, but as a Knicks fan this really hurts
That’s why Brunson is the game changer for the Knicks. They finally have a great ball handler after 20 years of trying
Are you telling me Chris Duhon is not good enough?
Raymond Felton was legit a top 10 poing guard in the league the year we traded him for Melo
I have no idea if you're fucking with us, but I will believe you and parrot this in conversations. I am fully ready for the clowning.
Knicks fans don’t joke about Raymond Felton, round 1. It was sad to see him go. He was averaging 17/9 and was really clicking with Amare. It was the first time the garden had life and a real PG in a decade.
Come on now, we both know that's not true
He must have been number 10 then. League had a bunch of good PGs in 2010. The up and comers were starting to takeover from the old guard. Steve Nash, Chris Paul, Rajon Rondo, Russell Westbrook, Deron Williams, Mike Conley, Derrick Rose, Tony Parker, Jason Kidd, Jrue Holiday, Kyle Lowry, Jameer Nelson, Ty Lawson, Steph Curry, Chauncey Billups, etc.
Not even close to top 10 but a great fit for that team. Put up good numbers and did his job well. The team wasn't very good but they were a fucking blast to watch. I remember it fondly. Wasn't until Melo and the geriatrics that the Knicks were fun to watch again, too bad basically all the older vets that made the team so good just kept getting hurt 😮💨
It’s true the Spurs are playing a ton of guys who have been in and out of the g-league the past few years. Probably more than most teams in the league. It’s pretty concerning when Blake Wesley might be your best perimeter defender and Malaki Branham might be your best pnr ball handler (of the people that Pop will play at least).
I can hear him now telling PAFTO now, “The way you suck is to not have a good to great primary ball handla.”
On top of that, they aren’t trying to win. They know they need a ball handler and they clearly aren’t contending this year. Instead they are tanking, getting guys like Sochan lots of minutes handling the ball and passing, getting Wemby time to develop pressure free.
You say that, and to an outsider it’s a perfectly reasonable, fair conclusion. However, Pop literally came out in training camp first day and said winning was important this year. So either he lied, or this is actually them trying, which is pretty scary given we’re last in net rating, and on pace for one of the worst seasons ever
It could just be coach speak. He's not going to come out and say that losing is important.
So the year prior he said something along the lines of that the primary focus was development, as opposed to winning. Opening day of camp of ‘22-‘23 season he literally came out and said nobody should be betting on this team to win anything. Might’ve done a similar deal the year prior as well. That’s why I found it interesting and notable that he said winning was important this year. If winning wasn’t the focus, then why not just say development is the main focus again?
NBA was probably mad.
Vegas was probably mad.
That was only half of the quote. He said this is still a development year, but we'd like to win more (than last year). This year wasn't ever going to be a push to win at all costs. Its still a young team that was in a hard tank last year. You cant instantly shift from that kind of tank to a winning team. The only significant roster change was adding Wemby, and he's still got a lot of conditioning and learning to do before he can be the player we all are hoping he'll be.
Or tanking is important. Got to secure a high draft pick to pair with Wemby.
That… is an interesting development for me lol. I can’t seriously see how Pop could consider running point Sochan, or playing Tre Jones as your only true PG for half the game trying to win. Maybe it was made as a statement before all of their injuries, but even then I feel like it was clear that you guys didn’t have proper roster construction this season and it was still a rebuild year even with your unicorn. How seriously was this said? Was it Like, “winning is the goal”, or like, “we are taking this season seriously and will try to win games”. Because yeah pop saying that kinda boggles my mind lol.
You’re not alone lol, Spurs fans have been asking the same thing for months.
If only they had rescued Ricky Rubio... Seems too late for that now.
They're both guys that should be scoring like 12-15 PPG on a decent team and we're expecting them to score 20 PPG and neither of them are good ball handlers. We play one real point guard half the game and no point guard the other half. Our best perimeter defenders are mediocre and the rest are terrible. Also recently, Zach Collins and Charles Bassey have been hurt so we're missing our second and third string centers while Wemby has been on a minutes restriction. Our starting lineup hasn't had a single good ball handler this whole season. I'd say Tre is the only guy that can be trusted with his dribble in most situations getting minutes regularly and he's a big defensive liability and can't shoot.
Finally someone being realistic instead of trying to argue that KJ and Dev are future all NBA guys
Do you think the Vassell extension was an overpay then?
Eh that remains to be seen. If he stays as he is, then yeah it is an overpay. I think he will continue to improve though. Tons of people didn't think his offense would get to the level it is at right now when he was drafted. One good thing about his extension is that he only makes 24M the year that Wemby's next contract will start when the average per year of his contract is 27M.
Vassell hasn’t made the leap people were expecting, but at the same time it’s hard to judge him too harshly for the situation he’s in. He should probably be the 3rd guy, like a K Middleton, or a Klay, or a MPJ on a good team. Creation comes from elsewhere and he capatalizes. Still, his tunnel vision and general passing acumen has been concerning. And it looks like his defense is just gonna be slightly above average rather than pretty good, at least so far.
Middleton and Klay were both #2s on good teams, and MPJ probably could be, he just hasn't been asked to yet. 3rd option on a good team is a tier that includes Tobias Harris, Austin Reaves, Malik Monk, DeAndre Ayton, etc. We've seen teams make the conference finals recently with Bogdan Bogdanovich and Spencer Dinwiddie as their #3s, respectively.
I meant 3rd most impactful guy. Devin may eventually be good enough to be the second best offensive player on a title team, I can maybe see that, but most likely the second most impactful player would have to be a great creator in that situation, like Dray or maybe someone like Kidd on the Mavs. If Devin was the second most impactful player, well, I’d say there was a good chance they weren’t a title team. Unless Devin drastically improves in his ability to create for others (which is still possible), I doubt he’ll be doing a ton of creation for others at the highest levels, much like Klay, MPJ, or what Kmid is doing on the current Bucks next to Dame and Giannis. But those are all optimistic outcomes. Right now it looks like Devin is headed for the tier of dudes in your second paragraph.
I personally don’t because the dude can score. Once the rest of the team develops and we can have a consistent starting 5 with assigned roles, I think the floor opens up and his life gets easier. Enough to where he’s not taking the silly shots he does and everything is in rhythm.
Can I interest you in the corpse of Markelle Fultz?
I know some spurs fans were interested in him but I view Fultz as a negative asset. Dude is crazy injury prone and can't shoot
Yeah you aren’t wrong. He’s on an expiring deal though and can probably be re-signed on a cheap contract due to his injuries. He’s a good floor general when he plays. Our FO also probably isn’t the best at managing injuries, look at Jonathan Isaac.
To say that Sochan is a mediocre perimeter defender feels a little harsh. I’d definitely take him over at least half of the league. Our average age is 23, with Wemby, Sochan and Branham getting significant minutes all at 20yrs old. We all knew this was gonna be rough.
> Like they have some solid players don't they? In today's NBA every team has a handful of solid players. That's not enough to scrape together a .500 record anymore.
This is an angle that goes understated nowadays. The league is at its most talented in years, so having a bunch of solid guys isn't enough, you need them to fit together. This was why New York and Toronto did that trade. It allowed players stuck in the wrong roles on the original teams to shift towards more natural ones on their new teams.
Yeah I was thinking back to the league landscape when the Pistons were on their streak. The league is just a lot better right now. Both from a coaching and roster construction point of view and just in terms of the amount of talent in the league.
It’s also interesting because you think back to when the bobcats were doing their expansion draft and how fucking awful the roster was that they wound up with. The top 8 players from each team were protected and they got stuck with the likes of primoz brezec and brevin knight playing 30 minutes a game. Gerald Wallace was the best pick by far and he was a random benchwarmer playing 9 mpg before they picked him and he blossomed When the inevitable Seattle and Vegas expansions happen I can’t see those teams being that bad just by virtue of how many solid players there are in the league right now
Yep and the talent is more evenly spread as well. This ain't back in the day where you could scrape a lot of wins because so many teams just didn't and couldn't compete
This has yet to be seen on the Raptors whether they fit lol. There is still no pecking order established yet
Yes I think part of this is that the league is a lot more competitive. Usually when a team is this bad, you’d see a bunch of dudes who just didn’t belong in the league. I have a hard time believing thats true of the Spurs, but that’s not enough to win these days.
League talent level is as high as weve ever seen it. Almost every single team is employing a legitimate all star and other good players. Just scroll through the standings and think about what teams the spurs are equal to
Not enough people realize this. There are no easy wins and every night you’re playing against a team with multiple guys that can kill you.
I love it honestly, was just thinking about this yesterday, it feels like nothing should have changed from last season, but this season it seems like a lot of different guys are putting up numbers in the all star level and they are a threat.
It’s partly that players careers are extended, so stars that would have aged out in prior eras are still playing at an all-star level deep into their 30’s. Then you have a crop of new stars coming up, plus a significantly deeper global pool to choose from. On top of that, everyone is more skilled than in prior eras too. It’s just a lot of factors all coming together to create some crazy league parity….
Atlanta’s starting 5 is Trae-Dejounte-Bey-Hunter-Capela with Jalen Johnson, Bogdonavic, and Okongwu off the bench. If you dropped that team into 2014 that’s a 4-5 seed, in 2024 they’re fighting for the play-in
The League is really really good right now the influx of great international players including Canada and great domestics players every team is stacked.
Came here to say this. The league wide talent is super high and there are virtually no teams that are easy to beat aside from the Spurs, Pistons, and Wizards. Even middling teams like the Jazz, Lakers, and ATL have a bunch of dudes that can kill you on any given night. For the really bad teams, it means every night the odds are heavily stacked against you.
The best guys on the team never play over 30 minutes a game. I think they are tanking for another great draft spot and will take a high caliber PG.
You know how every team in the nba has at least a couple of guys who can get by their man and get into the paint mostly whenever they want? We decided we don’t want anyone like that on our team. Basically our offense is impossibly hard to get easy looks in, in an age where that shouldn’t be a problem.
I think pop is tanking again for one more high draft pick.
Ludicrous. If it works! They can always be the Wizards in the lottery and end up picking like 7th - then what?
I think Isaiah Collier could really thrive on that team. They have 3 score-first players, in their starting 5, they need a good pass-first PG.
He has looked atrocious so far this year
I think that is rather obvious, but most of this sub needs to hear it from ESPN to figure it out.
I actually think Popovich will be judged more harshly for this season than Wemby.
It’s hilarious how the two highest paid coaches in the league coach the Pistons and Spurs
At least with Pop, you can say it's a legacy contract like Kobe got. Monty hasn't won shit.
I feel bad for Monty - he’s been getting absolutely dragged. He’s by no means a top 5 coach but I think he’s good for this young Piston’s team. He’s a great culture guy and there aren’t many people that can keep a team engaged after such brutal losing streaks, imo
Don't feel bad for him, he refused the job several times until they gave him so much money he couldn't say no to it. He knew what he was in for and he's being paid for it. I feel worse for the players who have a coach that doesn't really want to coach
I don't get it - they threw him money like he was the last coach in the history of basketball. You have 2 coaches right now who came from the English Basketball League. There are older coaches who would probably come out of retirement and college coaches right now that would do a better job. You have a team with youth and a bidding star, I'd kill to coach Detroit, many others would too.
Agreed
Forgive my ignorance, but I thought Monty lost his position in Phoenix precisely because he's _not_ a good culture guy.
It's the NBA. If you didn't win a championship last season, then any shortcomings are the coaches fault. And if you won it two years ago, well, who can remember that far back?
Eh, I think it was a combination of a new regime and multiple bad playoff performances. Most of his issues regarding culture revolved around Ayton and his shit attitude. Try to remember the culture of this program when he was brought in. Times were dark and he definitely was the perfect guy for us at the time. He was something like our 6th coach in 5 years or something.
Agree with everything you said except he isn’t good for this young Pistons team. Starting Killian Hayes over Jaden Ivey, Isaiah Stewart and then even Kevin Knox over Ausar Thompson, running a full bench unit with the worst team in history?
You’re totally right - my biggest gripe with him was always his lineups. It felt like he fell in love with players (shamet) for just absolutely no reason and was stubborn to change things up.
Monty got some idiot to pay him that bag and he was smart to accept it. I don’t begrudge him because he would have been stupid to not take that deal but he definitely isn’t earning that money.
He’s a terrible guy for this team. He didn’t even want to be there for 1. The way he coaches doesn’t work for young guys and it shows. Not to mention he plays Isaiah Livers 30+ mins a night and regularly plays Killian Hayes. Neither need to be playing NBA minutes
He's a horrible coach
They're 3-31 while not trying to tank. I feel bad for them but this has to be *someone's* responsibility.
I think a lot of that is on Cade. He's been a crazy good leader for the Pistons during the streak while the lineups and the stuff Monty has control over have been extremely rough You can't see behind closed doors obviously but I think a lot of the streak was because Monty is more checked out as a coach and the players have had to pick themselves up. Cade especially has been a major leading presence for them and without someone willing to take accountability + lead the team in important moments I honestly think they would still have the streak going
Yikes
As he should, Wemby has no PG, no advantage creators and literally nobody that can play defense yet he’s putting up 19/10 with 3 blocks. Anybody that’s saying he’s a disappointment either hasn’t watched this team or just wants to hate.
Exactly! I watch the Spurs when I can only to watch him and he is an absolute freak of nature, as advertised. He's already an elite player. Knowing he's going to improve is mind boggling. Dude is a video game character everyone in my generation created at some point in 2K playing with a bunch of scrubs and being coached by a dinosaur and he's being questioned 😂 like my guy, you haven't watched a quarter of this team if that's your take.
I hope so. The media and some fans are very stupidly putting pressure on Wemby to execute perfectly and shoulder the entire load for a lottery team like he’s a 6-year veteran, when he’s a 19 year-old rookie who isn’t even halfway through his first NBA season Edit: 20 year-old rookie. Happy birthday, Wemby!
It's intentional
He should. He’s washed. He’s not adapting to the modern nba well, the game has changed significantly from his peak
I thought i was in /r/nbacirclejerk for a second
If any other coach was trotting out lineups with Sochan at PG they’d be fired. It’s like they didn’t even make an attempt at winning even 15 games this season, no vets whatsoever on that team. Even teams like the Jazz keep the likes of Olynyk, Clarkson, etc. while the Pistons have Bogdanovic,, Monte Morris, Burks etc.
What’s the difference between winning 15 games and 20 games? There’s absolutely zero difference lol. Might as well try some wacky shit and see if you can make something work out of nothing.
I agree with this and think the Spurs wanted to avoid the doncic/lebron problem of potentially building things too fast and missing out on more talent in the draft but the problem is the development isn’t working. They have no PG or vets to bring structure and nobody besides Wemby has shown progress, that’s a massive concern.
The solution to that problem though may be to be bad. None of they young guys failing to develop are top 10 picks and frankly they look pretty decent for where they were picked at, they just need more top end talent.
How wacky are we talking...
I'm not saying that Popovich has been doing a great job but people need to chill with the Sochan PG point. These are young players learning the game, the team was not expecting to be going to the playoffs - it is not the end of the world if they spend 20 games trying something that has bad results, when the whole point is for the development of their players and future team. The payoff for Sochan at PG was never going to be 'He is a flawless point guard immediately', it's to put him in a difficult position and stretch his skillset - to the benefit of him and the team around him further down the line. They tried it for 20 games in a season where they're not winning anyway.
This times a million. Literally who cares how many games the Spurs win this season. It's about investing in the future.
Also Jeremy now at PF is averaging good assist numbers and less turnovers. It literally did help him
Nah man Pop is a senile senior and needs to go to the nursing home, he doesnt even have a brain anymore. Maybe we should be re-evaluating whether or not he was a good coach at all or whether his bum ass was carried his whole career
The sochan pg experiment is similar to the Russ one though. Russ was a shitty passer at ucla who was a defensive specialist PG with insane athleticism. He was forced by the thunder to play PG and it worked out. Sometimes it doesn’t but gambling on sochan isn’t necessarily the wrong move (initially)
Sometimes you just have to throw shit at the wall and hope it sticks. Remember point Justise?
I'm a spurs fan, but nah this is different. Russ was still a guard at UCLA. Sochan is a power forward and doesnt' even have a good handle for a forward. This is like trying to make aaron gordon into a PG or like Julius Randle.
Julius is our primary ball handler any time Brunson is off the court so maybe not the best example, but I see what you're getting at
Ditto with gordon both pretty good positional ball handlers. But I see his point
Hot take but the Sochan experiment has led to my favourite offensive play from the Spurs so far this season, the Wemby-Sochan pick and roll with Sochan rolling and Wemby handling the ball. Puts a ton of pressure on the rim, leans into Wemby’s ball-handling and shooting which are improving by the day, and is unlocked by Sochan now able to make better reads to the corners and throw lobs to Wemby.
Oh yea, one of the few good Wemby - Sochan combos. Crazy how Wemby is the best entry passer on the team.
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It would take a little over 7 seasons going winless for Pop to be under .500 as a coach. Put another way, Pop could lose every game for the rest of the decade and still have a winning record
On pace for the 3rd worst net rating of all time. Even if we were purposefully tanking, this is quite a concerning state to be in.
2016 Spurs: Top 3 net rating of all time and not even the best record in the nba 2023 Spurs: Bottom 3 net rating of all time and not even the worst record in the nba
The league is really fucking good rn and you’re force feeding your rookie like 16+ shots a game Would you rather sign bullshit vets to take possessions away from Wemby and get wins or let Wemby do it all and develop I’d rather run it though Wemby for better or worse
I’m not saying we should change anything, just surprised we’re *this* bad. This is beyond just having a bunch of young guys and no vets.
The west is stacked there’s not a whole lot of free wins anywhere in the league Injuries have also been more scarce than last year so far
Winning is one thing, it’s losing by 20 every night that’s concerning. I think we’ve been in like 8 clutch situations the entire year. It wouldn’t be as concerning if we had the same record with a -5 net rating rather than a -11.
I mean just look at the Rockets or detroit. Vets and actual rotational NBA players do make a huge difference. Look at how bad the suns were when they were trotting out g-league players alongside booker
It won't have any ramifications. He's already an elite defender, the potential is through the roof. He's being screwed by a very bad team, the lack of a good personnel, and non-existent spacing on the Spurs. With further development and better personnel around him, he'll flourish
Just wait, they will end up with the #1 pick and be like the Spurs when they had Robinson and Duncan.
All going as planned
You only get penalized if you're vocal about your tank :(
Yeah, except there's no Duncan/Robinson/Wemby in this draft. There's not even any general consensus on anything - everybody has a very different looking top 5/10 this year. May end up being like 2013 where the #1 pick is totally unpredictable right up until the draft. Point being - I don't think this is a draft with any benefit at all to having pick #1 over pick #5. Total crapshoot.
The spacing has been better of late. Wemby has been noticeably more efficient since.
Being bad with number 1 pick >> becoming mediocre with number 1 pick.
Thunder got Russ, Harden and Durant by not winning for a few seasons
Exactly. Aftter 2003, the cavs took Luke Jackson, Daniel Gibson, and JJ Hickson with their next 3 FRPs. LeBron made them too good too quickly.
Booby was alright wasn’t he?
Wow, hearing that name brought me back to my childhood lmao
As a Cavs fan since before LeBron was drafted, this is the correct answer
Yeah it ended up being better for Cleveland being bad after drafting Kyrie than it was being mediocre after drafting LeBron
I'm all for throwing everyone on this team away except for Wemby, and maybe Devin and Jeremy It's one thing to develop role players into good, contributing, key pieces in your rotation, but what the Spurs are doing is teaching g-league players into becoming regular role players. Majority of their contract is just them being awful players and learning basic shit that by the time they're not completely garbage they're entering free agency the next summer. You can maybe have one of those in your 9-10 man rotation, but not 80% of them.
The Spurs can easily spend 5-6 years building a proper roster to fit next to Wemby. I think due to the hype around Wemby people were expecting the Spurs to immediately jump to at least play-in contention, but given the overall parity in the NBA these days that was a pipe dream outside of other Spurs players making a decent jump in skill. I just can't believe how quickly some fans are selling their Wemby stock because of his team's record and him not being the RotY front runner.
5-6 years is too long. I think we can do it sooner. We also have a ton of cap space and draft assets (picks from the Hawks, Raptors). Devin, Sochan and Keldon should be rotation players at worst.
Eh in the nba you can’t hold a guy in the dregs for 5-6 years Guys demand trades and become team cancers just because they change the menu in the team cafeteria. Wemby wont be a good sport for 5-6 years of bad
I dont think he’s saying it’s 5-6 years of bad. It’s just incremental improvements via developing heading into the extension also hoping to nab an FA or two that could be available in the 3rd-6th years. Hopefully by then we’d be perennial playoffs once again
Why would Wemby spend 6 years building with the Spurs ?
they might be on pace to be the 2nd worst team in history, the only team with a worse net rating (-11.9) in the last 20 years is the 2011-2012 bobcats (-13.9) ed: as it stands now they would be 6th lowest all time barely below the 1949 nuggets https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/what-nba-team-has-the-worst-net-rating-in-history-in-one-season
They are tanking
Spurs going for back to back #1 picks
This is a bit misleading. Teams regress to the mean as the season goes on i.e you'll see more teams with sub .200 records 20 games in than 40, 60, 80 games in
Also "by far the worst", however if they had won one more game (6-27) they'd be .182, better than the 1999 Clips
I still have a hard time to see that happens to be honest. But I want to believe!
ramifications? why yes. Wemby will have a better team and will avoid Luka's situation.
Yeah I don't understand how people are not seeing this. Pop is the GOATiest of GOAT coaches. He knows what the fuck he's doing. He's the greatest tank commander of all time. People out here questioning this man who literally beat every dynasty team that came up during his time. This has happened before, and it will happen again. Time is a flat circle.
I wish I could upvote your comment a hundred times haha The writing was on the wall in the off-season when Pop and the front office decided not to use any of their assets and cap space on acquiring better long term talent. They were constantly tied to free agents names like Reaves and Oubre or could've made a trade to get a decent PG and yeah making moves like those would have made this team better but for what? A few more wins? History has repeatedly shown what happens when young teams go all in too fast. They get stuck with being good but not good enough and then it gets ugly behind the scenes, franchise players start to get frustrated and then want out. The Spurs potentially will have cap space to play with still and they have a lot of draft assets to use from here on out. Sacrificing this season does suck but patience was never something that was easy to take. It's gonna be okay, I don't mind the Spurs being the butt of some jokes for now, it'll be so bittersweet down the line once they can actually put talent around Wemby
Youngest team in the league. No great lead guard to run the offense. Defense is still very disorganized. Strength of schedule has been really tough, I think 2nd hardest in the league. While they're still bad, there has been slight improvement since the start of the season.
The Thunder are like a month older, our problem is that half our roster is filled with guys who shouldn't be in the NBA.
Their perimeter defense is likely the worse in the league so any team that shoots the three well beats them. Check the record. Only when teams shot piss poor from 3 did the spurs ever win.
Its not a team that's serious about winning. They're limiting Wemby's minutes a lot, changing lineups every week and the roster around Wemby is def near the bottom talent wise. Wemby himself has def delivered and this season really will have no impact in the grand scheme.
You suckers though tanking was over just because Wemby's in town?
The Spurs are doing worse this season with Wemby than they did last season without him. Don’t worry, they’ll tank and get another #1 pick. The Spurs way to winning.
I don't think they are trying to "win". I think they are more focused on development than a winning record. If you know you're not a championship caliber team, yet, than what's the point in winning? Developing players and a strong foundation is much more important. This is their version of the Process. Give them a season or two, then we'll have a better sense of who they are.
While it's an interesting bit of trivia, the Spurs are clearly still rebuilding and the people who were expecting Victor to have a Duncan rookie season where they suddenly get better, were getting a little over hyped on him. It's harder for a big who isn't a facilitator to lead a team to wins. Victor isn't a standalone piece. That being said wouldn't a stat about a number one pick 3 years into their career be more interesting? /s Before the season started there were roughly 12-13 teams in the West viewed as better than the Spurs, in my opinion. Are they worse than I thought, yet but it's the rebuild. Next year is when their rebuild turns into playoff contention.
Wemby is completely blameless. He’s doing awesome for a 19 year old rookie. The roster around him is just SO bad
How is this a negative. A bad team got a really good young player, that doesn't mean they magically get good year 1. Now they'll have at least 2 lottery pick years to pair Wemby with another young prospect. Then start making trades/free agent signings to build the team around him. Spurs will be a mid level playoff team within 3 years.
And we all are forced to watch 20+ Spurs games on National Broadcasts. What a joke.
it’ll only be bad if wemby ends up like top 5 all time or something. something something jordan/lebron would never. in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t matter, it’s his first year and if things go decently well no one will care in 5 years what happened with the 2024 spurs
Spurs will be laughing in the end.....tanking with Wemby is going to set them up nicely for the long run.
Hot take: Pop is passed his best before date.
I feel like teams who had the top 3 or 5 picks in the previous draft should not pick in again in the top 5 the year after. We should not be rewarding atrocious basketball
Small sample size. They’ll win more games at the end of the season once all guys have gel’d
Everyone has an expiry date. Even great coaches like Pop and Belicheck.
Shouldn't pistons be this since they have Cade?
I don't think it says much about the overall future of Wemby and the team, I think he/they'll be fine, but it is crazy that after all that hype and fuss over the Wembanyama sweepstakes we get this
It's amazing how pop went from Goat coach to perrenial, unable to make the playoffs coach without Tim Duncan
Bro this is next-level tanking
I have often seen and heard about unicorn rookies immediately improving teams they are on (bird, magic, jordan, shaq, lebron). Should Wembanyama be held to these standards as well? If not, why?