SB Nation User Blog: BlaseE

The Hunt: 12/21/09

BlaseE — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:09:23 -0000

This started as a comment to the Clippers game preview tonight, but thought I'd save myself from LatinD complaining it was long enough to just be a FanPost. I added more content once it became a FanPost as well.

I don't know how often I'll write these, but here is a look at the Spurs hunt for a better seed/standing. I'm going to start with important games of the week. For now, my concerns are Western Conference seeding and the Division lead. Rooting against Boston, Atlanta, Cleveland, and Orlando against a Western playoff team because of Finals home court is jumping the gun. We currently sit at 8th in the West, but that is a deceptive position. I'm also going to take a look at the Lakers schedule to see if and when they will fall back into the pack.

Important Games This Week

Monday

Jazz @ Magic
Cavs @ Suns

Tuesday

Blazers @ Mavericks
Thunder @ Lakers

Wednesday

Rockets @ Magic
Jazz @ Heat
Hawks @ Nuggets
Thunder @ Suns

Thursday

No Games on Christmas Eve

Friday

Cavs @ Lakers
Clippers @ Suns
Nuggets @ Blazers : We win either way though.

Saturday

Grizzlies @ Mavericks
Lakers @ Kings (great home team so far)

Sunday

Rockets @ Cavs
~~Mavericks~~ @ ~~Nuggets~~ : Since both can't lose, I'll be an optimist and say, at least one has to lose. Since both teams are over .500, that is beating the night in-night out odds. Maybe you give the slight edge to Nuggets since Mavericks are in our division. I'd also rather our opponents to not have any impressive road victories.

Where We Stand (Loss Column)

Right now, we are 2 losses back on Dallas and 1 loss back on Denver and Phoenix. Phoenix is going for their 10th loss tonight. The Spurs are shown as the 8th seed in the standings, but that is just because we've played the least amount of games. The Lakers rule the West with only 4 losses.

A Cursory Look at the Lakers

This seems like a good place to look at the Lakers and hopefully trash talk them as well. They obviously lead the West with only 4 losses. I've heard their schedule is easy so I ask, "how have they done against playoff teams?" I'm not counting Detroit, Milwaukee or Toronto as playoff teams for the East, but I'll count OKC as a 9th playoff team in the West. I'm giving overtime games a 0 margin of victory.

Without Pau

* Loss, Dallas, -14
* Win, Atlanta, +8
* WIn, @ OKC, 0, FIGABABA
* Win, @ Houston, 0, SEGABABA
* Win, Phoenix, +19, FIGABABA
* Loss, @ Denver, -26, SEGABABA
* Loss, Houston, -10

With Pau

* Win, OKC, +16
* Win, Miami, +1
* Win, Phoenix, +20
* Win, Utah, +24
* Loss, @ Utah, -8, SEGABABA

Those Phoenix wins look less impressive as time goes by (especially since both were in LA), but I'm incredibly jealous of that 24 point win against Utah. Without Pau, the Lakers could have easily dropped the two overtime games and started 2-5 (how the Spurs started) instead of 4-3 against playoff teams.

Obviously, with Pau, they have been more impressive going 4-1 with an awesome 10.6 margin of victory, but the only loss was their only road game of the 5. By the time we get a crack at them on January 13th, the Lakers will have played Phoenix and Portland on the road and Dallas, Houston, OKC, and Cleveland in LA. They play @ Dallas the night after our game. That is 9 playoff teams in the next 4 weeks. In that same timespan, we only play Portland, Miami, Dallas, Lakers, and @ OKC. If they drop 4-5 of their tough games, and we win at least 3 of our 5, the hunt for #1 could be on.

Other Tough Stretches for LA

They have 8 road games in a row from January 21st to Feb. 1st. It starts with an @ Cleveland and has @ Boston as a FOGAFINI. Their February is tough with home games against Boston, Denver (twice) and us and road games against Portland, Utah, and Dallas. The Portland and Dallas games are both SEGABABAs.

Their March is rough with 11 road games to 4 home games and 3 SEGABABAs. By comparison, the Spurs go 7 home, 10 away, and 6 SEGABABA's. 9 of our 17 games are against the teams I used earlier as playoff teams compared to the Lakers 7 of 15 games. 6 of our 9 tough games are away vs. all 7 of the Lakers good games.

I didn't end up talking much trash, but I definitely could see the Lakers dropping back into the Spurs, Mavericks, and Nuggets pack. I think the Suns overachieved to start the season and overachieved when they beat us.

Poll

Have the Lakers already won the #1 seed for the West with a little over a quarter of the season played?

Spurs at Warriors: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:35:57 -0000

Fred and I took a two game hiatus, but I'm back to bring you some interesting stats on the game....promise.

No music. Anyone else get the new 30 Seconds to Mars album? I'm so disappointed in it. It just flat-out sucks.

Stats/Talking Points

1. Rebounding Domination: We out-rebounded them 54 to 34. After bleeding offensive boards to the Suns, we out-rebounded them on the offensive glass 12 to 6 while shooting a higher percentage (8 less missed shots). Of their 6 offensive boards, only one was made by a big, Randolph. The other 5 were all to 1's and 2's.

2. Points in the Paint minus Fast Break Points: I need a name for this stat. I know it isn't an exact number, but I think it is a great approximation of half court offensive efficiency in terms of getting high percentage close range shots. I guess in reverse it would be a measure of defensive efficiency in the half court. Golden State had 32 points in the paint and 18 fast break points. The Spurs had 48 points in the paint and 8 fast break points. That is a 40 to 14 advantage Spurs.

3. Sharing the Ball: Not only did we have 9 players with assists and 6 different players with at least 3, but our bench had 14 assists vs our starters' 12. They had less turnovers as well (7 to 13). Overall, a good night with 26 total assists on 39 FGM for a very nice 67% assist ratio. If Bonner and Mason weren't so cold then those numbers could have even been more bloated. This was a road game as well where the scorekeepers don't have to be generous with away team assists.

4. The Lucky: We won this game by 12 and got to rest Duncan the last minute or two, but keep these things in mind:

A. No Moore, Biedrins, or Turiaf probably helped out Duncan and Blair's offensive nights and our team rebounding.

B. They shot 1 of 10 for three and not all of those were contested. That is some real luck against GS. We also, by some FSM miracle, made 20 of 23 free throws to their 16 of 22.

C. 20 turnovers....The Spurs need to make this the top priority. I don't think I've ever seen so many lazy passes by the Spurs. Even in spite of our +20 rebounding advantage, the Warriors were still +6 FGA's on at -10 turnover advantage.

Spurs vs Kings: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 04:38:08 -0000

More photos » by Darren Abate - AP

Browse more photos »

Ever since they lost Kevin Martin, they've really been a team. I was impressed with the Kings' effort last night. They are a scrappy bunch. We could learn a thing or two from them. Oh yeah, Casspi was meant to be a Spur. I'm praying it still happens someday. Come inside for a couple stats....

Here is your song. It's the Beatles' Good Night off the White Album for anyone stuck behind a firewall who is curious what the song was.

1. Manu had an outstanding game.

Exhibit A: 20 points...in 26 minutes!!! Most of them were pretty timely too.

Exhibit B: 8 FTA's on 11 FGA's and he made all 8 of them

Exhibit C: 3 assists and 2 steals to 1 turnover

Exhibit D: Tell me you saw that fake out and then the dunk he had in fourth. If that didn't get you up out of your seat (computer chair, couch, or AT&T center fold out), then you are crazy and/or stupid and/or lame.

I think that is like 8 fingers around the rim. Pretty nice.

2. We got our turnovers down to 13 this game from those disgusting atrocities we'd been forced to witness. At the end of the 3rd and beginning of the 4th, there a particularly terrible stretch though. To go all ATS on you, Bonner turned it over to Evans on a bad pass with 1:38 left in the 4th. That lead to Tony fouling Evans. We missed our next two shots, Bonner and Manu. Tony Parker has the ball stolen with 4 seconds left in the 3rd and Evans gets another layup. Manu misses to start us off in the 4th.

RJ comes through with some points finally and makes his 3. Manu misses another shot. Dejuan Blair gets loose ball foul. Richard Jefferson gets called for an illegal defense. Bonner misses another shot with 9:53 left in the 4th. The lead was still 8 at this point because the Kings failed to capitalize on our poor shooting and execution over this period.

Finally after all of that Hill and Mason come in and score 7 points over the next minute to get our lead up to 13. We then let them back into it again with a missed Mason 3, George Hill turnover, and then a Blair defensive 3 seconds. Just like that, we are up by only 6 with 6:33 to play. The Spurs failed twice to end this game early and send the Kings packing.

3. The Kings had 62 points in the paint to our 48. They left 7 points on the charity stripe (7 of 15 FT's). They played an aggressive game and if they had made a few of their free throws and had one or two less turnovers themselves, then they could have really made this game interesting. I mean they were within 3 with 4:00 minutes to play. Yes, Manu and Parker took it over and Duncan had an EPIC BLOCK, but the Kings really showed something to me.

I like their chemistry with this group. I think they should trade Kevin Martin and try to get another big man to move Hawes to the bench. Kevin Martin had 1 assist, 29 points and a +/- of -28 the first time we played them. Hawes was the only other player to score over 7 points. He had 22 off the bench. I'm not saying they are a playoff team yet, but they sure are way better than last year's travesty.

Spurs vs Celtics: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 05:22:44 -0000

I can't blame the Bavetta and the Corpsettes for the loss entirely, but I didn't want this to be so serious. The refs were terrible. Duncan getting taken out at half court with a no call. Parker going into the teeth of the enemy at the end of the game and the refs calling it as an out of bounds on Parker. Way to not let the players play the game. Even the scab refs in preseason understood aggressive offensives should be rewarded. They just took it a little far. Okay since the corpse didn't get beamed back up to the Enterprise, I'll put a stat or two after the jump with some music.

Your music is a real old one for me as its probably the oldest CD I own that still gets played: Tonic's Celtic Aggression off of Lemon Parade. It's a cool song.

1. Wow, George Hill really gets it. In a tough game against a tough defense, you attack, attack, attack. 7 free throw attempts on 4 shots for 9 points in only 14 minutes. 1 of his attempts was even a three pointer that he missed. His other miss was the behind the back dribble jump shot that he missed. Seriously, wow. He had 5.833% of our minutes and 41.1% of our free throw attempts. Sure he got bloodied up which reduced his minutes, but I loved his game.

2. Manu and Mason don't look 100% to me. Manu hit both of our 3's on 4 attempts. Finley should have made another. Bonner, Mason, and Jefferson combined for a terrible 0-10 from beyond the arc. They had good looks for the most part (especially Bonner) so I'm not sure if I should be upset that the missed on good shot selections or that I should happy that we hung in a game with everyone shooting terrible from three. I lean towards the happy part. I think a couple of those fall on any other day and that lead never gets to 10 in the second quarter.

3. Defense. Garnett shot a good 9 of 16 (56.3%) and the Celtics shot a fair 46.2% compared to their 49.5% on the season. Other than Garnett, here is a look player by player with tonight's average vs season (attempts per game):

Allen: 40% (6/15) vs 47.3% (12.2)
Rondo: 54.5% (6/11) vs 53.9% (9.3)
Pierce: 22.2% (2/9) vs 50.2% (12.4)
Perkins: 57.1% (4/7) vs 64.3% (7.2)
Wallace: 44.4% (4/9) vs 37.3% (8.9)
Scalabrine: 33.3% (1/3) vs 80.0% (0.8)
House: 33.3% (1/3) vs 40.4% (6.1)
Daniels: 50.0% (3/6) vs 47.2% (5.2)

So there are a few key things I see from these numbers. First, Rondo shot average on a few more attempts than he averages....with Hill only getting 14 minutes. You think you'd see that if this game was for real. Rondo lead his team in +/- by the way. Second, RJ limited Pierce's shots and he was terrible. Ray Allen didn't exact light it up either. Perkins was about average. He was right at his attempts and if he had one more FG, he would have been the same difference he is below his average above it instead. I think we can do a better job on Perkins and Rondo (only other players to shoot over 50%) with more minutes for Dice, Manu and Hill.

Spurs vs Sixers: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:10:08 -0000

There was something very weird about this game. I think ATS was pretty close about the game feeling in control even when it got close. I was excited for the big plays, but I wasn't super excited for the gritty stuff like usual. I think I've come up with a few culprits:

* A Sunday game

* During football season

* Against the Sixers (AI2, Dalembert, and who? I've heard of Holiday but, yeah...sorry Ivey, but I didn't even know you were on the roster until I looked at the boxscore. Shame on me.)

* Where the main event is actually post game.

Another list after the jump....

I don't listen to much Green Day anymore, but this is a great one for me.

STATS OF THE GAME

* We "live and die" by the 3 so anytime we shoot over 50% behind the arc is worth noting, 55.6% to be exact. So without Mason; Bonner, Finley, Manu, and RJ combine for 9 of 13 for 69.2%. Where were the other 5 attempts? K-Boges was 1 of 5....In his defense, I think most of them were fair attempts. You can't make them all.

* The Spurs have been doing a good job of making opposing leaders into being poor leaders. Jennings looked not so great against us. The Wizards, a veteran team, looked completely leaderless. Ariza chucked away to get his points. Iguodala 21 points and is an awesome athlete, but please don't tell him that. He was 1 of 6 from 3. If I was the Sixers coach, the first thing I would do is sit him down and say, "you are an average 3 point shooter at best, but you can rock the paint and get to line at will so if you don't drive the ball, I will bench you!" Once again, an opponents best player finishes the game with the worst +/- on the team. AI Jr. was -15.

* Dejuan Blair had a disgusting line (11 points, 10 rebounds, and 3 blocks).....in 16 minutes of play! A note from watching the Spurs this season: Manu likes passing to Blair more than anyone else. Watch for it. Manu forced at least 3 crazy passes in this game alone at Blair. The first I remember was a turnover because Blair wasn't ready. The second was a turnover because Manu's pass went too crazy for any human or Beast. The third was an easy score. I'm not sure if Manu and him just have a a connection, Manu wants to see Blair dominate the opponent, or Manu trusts Blair's wingspan and low body center to the person guarding him to prevail, but watch when they are on the court together. As the season goes along, expect Manu to Blair, points for Blair, assist for Manu to be a very common and efficient sight.

* Duncan and Parker were monsters of efficiency. For the sake of this being a triumvirate of power, I'll include Manu who wasn't half bad either in his limited role and coming off an injury. So your Cerberus of All the is Holy has a combined stat line of 84 minutes, 46 points on 17 of 30 shooting and 11 of 11 from the line, 15 assists, 9 rebounds (in spite of Blair's night and then Bonner, Finley, and Bogans combining for another 16 rebounds), 2 steals, and 5 blocks. What turnovers? I don't see that column.....

Finally, here is the man of the night!!! Thank God every Spursday or those ones in between that we can claim this guy to our franchise so I leave you with this last stat of the night: +1 Spurs with their retired jersey saying "Hall of Fame".

Spurs vs Warriors: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 18:11:37 -0000

I guess this would be considered the Thanksgiving edition. I am thankful the Spurs have won 3 straight games and are over .500 finally. I'm also thankful for all the awesome people here on PTR who I can share my Spurs love for. I'm glad enough of you enjoy reading my posts to let me do this for fun. Thanks.

I've got about an hour until I have to take off to my parents for Thanksgiving. After the jump, the stats I am thankful for....

Your music pick is just a song I picked from typing "thank" in my iTunes. Enjoy.

Alright let's get into the stats. See Davis's recap for some more great ones and your three stars.

* Monta Ellis scored how many? Oh yeah, he also lead his team with a -21. We won by 14 points. His team was +7 in the 3:40 he was actually on the bench.

* Parker was blocked 5 times. He also got 17 FTA's on 18 FGA's!!! WHAT!?!?! I'm reassembling my head on that one. After Tony was mediocre against the Bucks, he really gave us 110% effort tonight and full aggression mode. I loved it. I'm stealing this from Hirschof, but teams foul when they are tired, so it was smart to be aggressive early.

* Duncan, 10 of 12 from the floor. I know Moore and Radmanovic can't guard you but hot damn! At least they weren't dumb enough to foul you.

* They made three 3 point shots all game. 2 of them were in the first 3 minutes of play. The last one was off the embarrassing Blair missed dunk late in the 4th. We did a great job not letting Curry, Morrow, Ellis, or Radmanovic get going from 3. They settled for a lot of 2's inside the line.

* George Hill had a rough night shooting at 3 of 12. Looking at the boxscores recently, it seems like he has been having these a lot and its always surprising. Watching the games, it always feels like he is going 4 of 5. It doesn't seem like he is taking that many shots and it definitely doesn't seem like he is missing that many. He did have 6 FT's so maybe that's part of it. Guarding Jennings and then Ellis has to be one of the hardest stretches so far this season for him though and I think he did an admirable job. Gold star.

* Manu played 0 minutes. On offense. And on defense. I'm predicting he'll be back for the Philly game (where Duncan will get a triple double in honor of Robinson HoF night).

*RJ with 4 assists. He has had at least 4 assists in 5 of our 7 wins. Sacramento and Washington are the 2. His only 4 assist game we didn't win was OKC. His assists should be down a little with Manu. Or maybe they should go up if he has Manu to pass to and Manu as a defensive distraction on the court. Either way, I like RJ contributing this way so quickly.

Have a great Thanksgiving, and I hope the stats are interesting enough.

Spurs vs Wizards: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 05:00:33 -0000

Sorry for the lateness on this, but Sunday is a slow day for all of us to catch up on our NFL (I think). The Cowboys are really playing ugly right now and the Titans (and VY) get a MNF game to conflict with a Spurs home game. Cedric Benson is hurt so I rooted against the Bengals today and they lost! To the Raiders! Ricky Williams dominates for the Dolphins on the Thursday night game, but I'm stuck watching our Spurs lose to the Jazz.

So yesterday, I skipped watching the UT game live on TV to go see our Spurs in person. UT ate the Jayhawks' dinners (night game) without my mojo from watching and wearing my burnt orange. The Spurs treated me to what I've needed whether they needed my mojo or not: a dominating beatdown of an opponent to end this misery streak. Stats and a song after the jump.

Your song sounds sad but it is optimistic. I'm breaking out my favorite band for this one Copeland's "When Finally Set Free". We are "finally set free" of this losing streak. Not only that, but I think we are just starting a winning streak. I posted a couple of weeks ago that if we could make it past the Wizards game over .500 we'd stay that way for the rest of the season. At 5-6, we're just going to have to wait until after Golden State on Wednesday and then @ Houston on Friday to cement it.

1. You think Pop was pleased with our defense holding them to 33.3% shooting for the game? They averaged less than 20 points for the first 3 quarters. We only had one more offensive rebound, but if you factor in that they missed 56 shots, holding them to less than 20% offensive boards is damn impressive. The league's worst offensive rebounding teams are Cleveland at 20.6% and New York at 20.7%.

2. I worship at the shrine of TD. Tim Duncan was just shy of a triple double at half. We were dominating them so bad, he only had to play 27 minutes which is probably the only reason he didn't get it. He didn't even get a double double finishing with 9 rebounds and 7 assists. TIM DUNCAN DOMINATES!!!

3. Our bench, without Manu, shot 17 of 40 (43%) compared to their 10 of 37 (27%). Hill was not good at 3 of 10 and no FTA's which I'll take as room for improvement. Finley didn't help with his 2 of 7 either, but 2 of 7 is good for a zombie. Without those guys having coldish shooting nights, this game could have been ugly.... If Bonner can get 12 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists, and 1 block after every Fred Silva bashing of him, I think Fred might need to make his analysis more regular.

4. Oberto co-lead their team in +/- at +1.

5. Mike Miller has been having a great season and his 7 minutes were really disappointing. I mean he wasn't disappointing. The fact that he got injured and had to leave was really disappointing. I like the Wizards, mostly because I think they have the talent (if healthy) to challenge one of the Eastern powers in the playoffs. Many people will throw this game away as beating a bottom dweller fodder team. The Spurs wanted this game more. Parker and Duncan's aggression was amazing so if this is your only time watching the Wizards, know they are better than this. I hope this team can get healthy and makes this win look even more impressive in hindsight. They did just beat Cleveland last week in Jamison's first game of the season. I think that is the Wizards team we should expect on a nightly basis.

6. Bonus: I just noticed this and had to add it. Parker lead all Spurs with a +/- of +31. The next closest was Duncan at +19. Oh, Parker, we missed you so...

This is the win I think we all needed. Enjoy it and I'm predicting it right here: The Spurs are going to go into that Boston game with a 9-6 record.

Spurs @ Mavs: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:23:46 -0000

I really don't want to write this. Let's all swallow our medicine after the jump....

Here is the full boxscore.

The Spurs were:

-22 FG attempts (78 to 100). I don't know how we got to overtime with that stat alone. It's not like we were sharpshooting out there (43.6 %).
-9 offensive boards (8 to 17). Percentage-wise, it isn't as bad as it seems in the same way that our defensive boards aren't as impressive. We had 16 more opportunities to get defensive boards (42 to 32, advantage Spurs), and they had 16 more opportunities to get offensive boards in turn.
-7 steals (1 to 8) and +14 turnovers (19 to 5). These ,combined with the offensive boards, explain the shot attempt differential. Some of those traveling calls (and others) were absolute garbage though. They did let Timmy offensive goal tend though....
-11 fastbreak points (7 to 18) which is likely because of the turnovers.
-24 points in the paint (22 to 46) or P in the P, as my girlfriend says. I like to come up with other things it could mean like Pee in the Pool. Our interior defense gave up too many second chance points which usually are from the paint. We settled way too often on jumpshots as well. We didn't even have that many 3's (only 15 of our 78 shots).

What an ugly game.... I can't believe we got to overtime looking at these numbers. Our offense is supposedly one of the most effiicient in the league, but if we play like this and give the opposing team 22 more opportunities on offense, I don't think our defense even matters. We just flat out don't deserve to win. Tonight, we play Utah, and hopefully we see a low turnover-high rebounding effort tonight with some aggressive scoring in the paint. I'm looking at you, RJ, and you, Hill, and you, Hairston, and you, Blair to score in the paint and not settle for anything. Duncan and Dice, you guys can shoot from wherever.

Yeah, Duncan, that says it all....that...says...it...all.
(Photo taken as he leaves the court after OT according to AP. Photo by Tony Gutierrez)

Spurs vs. Mavericks: Stats of the Game

BlaseE — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 05:38:21 -0000

I love the Spurs. I was at our elimination game last year and needed this so bad. Thank you Pop for not playing around with the starting lineup and setting the tone for the whole game. The substitutions were predictable and made tons of sense.

Stats? After the jump....

I got a good song for you this time. It's Dredg's Savior. I know Tim likes them too and put one of their songs on a TWSS awhile back. Some of the lyrics fit tonight. Our savior tonight was RJ. Clearly he picked up some of the FSM gospel from watching Manu go crazy against the Raptors. It mentions some stuff about revenge (There's no need for forgiveness, It's already said and done, But don't let revenge consume and take hold of you, Cause it will blind you) which I'm sure a lot of us were craving tonight; not that a Spurs fan should openly admit that a regular season game is revenge for a playoff defeat.

1. Dirk had 29 points on 9 of 27 shooting. Sure he got to the line 10 times and made them all but he looked out of rhythm for 90% of the game. He seemed to be preventing anyone else from finding a real great streak too. This stat was my girlfriend's pick.

2. RJ had 10 FTA's. I don't care that he missed 5. FTA's are a measure of being aggressive and getting into the paint. Even if one player is missing them, they can speed up the opponent going into the penalty so other players can get opportunities. RJ had more than every other player on the team combined, 10 to 9 and Bonner's 2 were just a forced foul at the end by the Mavs. Usually Duncan takes contact in the paint and gets to the foul line for us. Without him, it was great to see RJ step up...

3. ...which leads me to RJ stepping up in terms of minutes. We knew going into this season that Parker, Duncan, and Manu were likely to see reduced minutes because of injuries or playing in the summer for Parker. We brought in RJ to carry some load. If we played this game last year, how many minutes do Manu and Hill play and we still probably lose. RJ played 41 minutes. Bogans shared the load and finished second with 34.

Hill had a respectable 33, and Manu was able to play an efficient 29. Sure, you can say Blair saw limited minutes because of foul trouble or being a risk on defense, but I think 20 minutes and his first career start is pretty damn good for the rookie (playing for Pop). He finished with a +6 and some decent rebounding numbers and had one of the top highlights of the night, his block on Dirk. We shouldn't have to ask Blair to play any more than 20 minutes a night and last night, we were able to limit him with a shallow rotation.

4. This is just a funny stat line to me. James Singleton played 1 minute with 1 foul and a -10 plus/minus.

Spurs @ Blazers: Stat of the Game: 17

BlaseE — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 17:42:00 -0000

My first Stat of the Game post was 17, but that was margin of victor. This time it is FGA differential in the second half. More on that with an awesome song after the jump....

So here is your very awesome song.

Doves - Kingdom Of Rust (via dovesofficial)

We got dominated in the first quarter (by 15 points), won the second and third (by a combined 5), and then would have won the 4th (by 2) without the free throw gimmes for Portland at the end (which put it by 2 the other way).

At half, we were down 43 to 31 in FGA's (-12 Spurs). We were allowing them to shoot 44.2% and were only able to shoot 38.7% ourselves. When you're shooting that cold, the only way to get back into the game is to limit their opportunities and to take as many as you can get. We finished the game 79 to 74 FGA's (+5 Spurs). We increased our own second chance opportunities with 7 second half offensive boards compared to only 2 in the first half. The main thing was on defense though. We were limiting their opportunities with shot clock violations, reducing their offensive boards from 7 in the first half to 4 in the second half, and forcing the Blazers to create their own shots. Portland only had 11 assists for the entire game on 32 shots. The assists were pretty balanced with 5 in the first half and 6 in the second for them though. If a few more of our shots, especially 3's, had gone in or the Blazers didn't have a lucky string of events to end the game ending with Blake's clutch 3, we could have had a successful comeback.

Manu and Tony both said it was important to start strong with our home heavy schedule so I'm curious if they meant "at home" with our 0-3 road start.