It’s the end of the Spurs as we know it
After 22 immaculate years with a postseason berth, the San Antonio Spurs are in danger of stepping onto the treadmill of mediocrity for the first time in memory.
San Antonio’s summer of 2015 was supposed to represent a rare duality in today’s NBA; contention in the moment and contention beyond it. When the Spurs snagged LaMarcus Aldridge from Portland, he was slated to energise their aging core and propel them towards one last title run.
The move was lauded at the time. Aldridge would be a fine addition to one of the best teams in the league, and, along with burgeoning superstar Kawhi Leonard, would usher in a new, post-Duncan era of Spurs excellence.
The move was an instant success, with the Spurs posting a 67–15 record and steamrolling the Grizzlies in the first round of the 2016 playoffs, before falling to Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook’s Oklahoma City in the second. A disappointing way to end a dominant season, to be sure, but the Spurs bounced back the following year, tallying 61 wins and a Conference Finals berth that was only foiled by Zaza Pachulia’s outstretched foot.
The acquisition of Aldridge had proven to be a boon. He was durable, consistent and the consummate Spur, showing his readiness to continue the organisation’s excellence alongside his partner in Leonard.
That was the high-point of Aldridge’s tenure before events transpired that revealed his arrival as a false dawn.
Last week, the Spurs announced that Aldridge will miss the rest of the 2019/20 season with an injured shoulder. The move likely seals San Antonio’s first season without a playoff berth since Gregg Popovich took over. This is the end of an almost unparalleled streak of organisational excellence, but there’s no clear roadmap for the Spurs to chart a path back to relevance.
Aldridge was reliable this year but will be 35 by the time he scores his next basket, and the team’s other pseudo-star, Demar DeRozan, seems more a relic of a past era than a number-one option.
The duo represents the sting of missed opportunity and plans gone awry. Aldridge was supposed to helm a new age of Spurs dominance alongside Kawhi, but instead, he has slipped outside mainstream relevance, taking the court with DeRozan, the living, breathing reminder of the superstar that got away.
They could be in real trouble.
Outside of Aldridge and DeRozan, the Spurs’ four highest minutes totals belong to a cadre of guards. Dejounte Murray, Derrick White, Bryn Forbes and the ageless Patty Mills all played between 22.7 and 25.1 minutes per game this season, and that’s a problem.
Mills and Forbes are exclusively shooters who offer little else on either end of the court. Specialists like these are important for teams with other, well-rounded players, but the Spurs are laden with one-skill stars.
Murray became the youngest player to make an All-Defensive team in 2018 but has failed to make an impact on the other end of the floor, averaging only 10.7 points per game and posting an assist percentage in the 33rd percentile this season, according to Cleaning The Glass. The Spurs were also markedly better with him off the court this season. While Murray might develop into a stable starting point guard in the near future he currently forecasts as a defensive stopper and not much else.
Completing the crew of underwhelming guards is Derrick White, the 2019 playoffs’ breakout star, who never quite put it together this season. White’s numbers remained almost entirely in line with his previous year’s production, and a far cry away from his playoff production, where he poured in 15 points per night, shot 54 percent from the field and baptised Paul Millsap.
Popovich also almost never played White and Murray together, which is puzzling because, in theory, this is their backcourt tandem of the future.
White, and Murray in particular, are the type of player that most teams covet, an athletic, intelligent role player with hyper-specific skills. When looking at the roster going forward, they’re the players who make the most sense when looking for the next ‘guy’. The issue is that as time goes on, both players flash more as reliable role players than they do potential franchise cornerstone.
Elsewhere on the roster, Jakob Poeltl, included in the Kawhi trade, has developed into a steady defensive big, but not the NBA Valanciunas-esque low block monster many hoped he would become.
Lonnie Walker IV, a first-round pick in 2018, has flashed scary scoring potential but has spent most of his young career in Popovich’s dog house, averaging just 12.6 minutes per game through his first two seasons. The most puzzling part of Walker IV’s career is the lack of opportunity he’s received in the wake of some impressive outings. His big scoring nights haven’t yielded more opportunities, which suggests that the coaching staff has their reservations about him.
The team’s most recent first-round picks, Keldon Johnson and Luka Samanic, have combined to play ten games in their rookie years. Time will tell how these prospects pan out — plenty of NBA studs had slow starts to their careers — but when looking up and down this roster, the lack of promising young talent is concerning.
The current iteration of this team, centred around Aldridge and DeRozan, is good enough to compete for the eighth seed next season, but in the face of the youth movements going in New Orleans, Memphis and Sacramento, the chances of them snagging that lucrative playoff spot don’t look good.
When perennial contenders fall out of the upper echelon of the league, the results are usually dire. Think about the Celtics and Lakers of the mid-decade, the Cavaliers after Lebron left (both times) or the Warriors this season. The fact that the Spurs lost one of the best five players in the league and remained competitive for two full seasons after that is a team-building and coaching triumph.
Every action has its consequence, and the consequence of the Spurs’ successful retooling around two aging stars is the imminent appearance of a vacuum at the top of the team’s pecking order.
DeRozan is almost certain to pick up his $27 million player option for next season, which is the last year of Aldridge’s deal. Both will likely contribute strong if slightly diminished play next season, and the result will likely be similar to this season, which begs the question, where to from here?
The Spurs won’t be able to rely on the youth movement with the way their team is currently constituted. They do, however, have a few different paths laid out before them.
The most conventionally appealing option is to keep Aldridge and DeRozan around next season in the hope that their salaries can be used in a trade, should the right deal become available. Failing that, the team can keep the skeleton of this roster together and look to go big fish hunting in the loaded 2021 free agency class.
The Spurs might reap the benefits of two decades of excellence and the cache they’ve acquired within league circles, but the wildcard could be the way they’re perceived by certain stars after the Kawhi saga. There’s a chance, however small, that some stars won’t be as attracted to San Antonio and their infrastructure after the schism that led to Leonard departing.
This knowledge leaves one, slightly unsavoury approach open to the Spurs. Blow it up.
Trading one or both of their aging stars would restock the asset cupboard and take them out of contention, allowing them to see what they really have in their young core.
DeRozan and Aldridge may not have much appeal to teams around the league right now, but it won’t be hard for a team to talk themselves into a few months of either on their expiring deals next season. Unloading such hefty contracts and on-court presences could see the Spurs unmoored, for better or for worse, and it’s unlikely that Gregg Popovich, the architect of Spurs excellence, would want to hang around for a multi-year rebuild, making this a fraught option. It would be a complete break from the recent history of the club and a commitment to the future. Might we see a passing of the torch from Pop to Tim Duncan as coach, with the Big Fundamental ushering in the next generation of Spurs basketball?
It’s a nice thought, but it seems counter to San Antonio’s practice. Big-picture discussions can wait for the offseason, though. For now, we can look forward to the Orlando bubble as this may be the closest we see the Spurs to the playoffs for years to come.
