Spurs Forecast: February 15
As expected, the Spurs went 1-1 during an abbreviated week heading into the All-Star break. Although the Spurs lost a disappointing game against a Kobe-less Lakers team, they bounced back with a thrashing of the Denver Nuggets to wrap up the week. The Spurs hope to ride that momentum coupled with a nice rest thanks to the All-Star break into this week.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010 6:00 PM @ Indiana Pacers (18-34)
While the Pacers have a wealth of talent, they have been unable to connect the dots this season. There have been times when you see what this team is capable of but these times of encouragement have been grossly outweighed by their deficiencies. The Pacers have struggled at the PG position all season. With TJ Ford being moved from starter to bench to banishment and now back to bench, his status from game to game has been a paradigm as to the confusion of this franchise. Their guard-play outside of Danny Granger has been shaky at best. The Spurs need to expose their weakness in the backcourt and let Duncan go at Roy Hibbert. Hibbert is very Oden-esque in his ability to pick up fouls early. Sidelining HIbbert because of foul trouble would effectively paralyze what little semblance they have of a post game.
Friday, February 19, 2010, 6:00 PM @ Philadelphia 76ers (20-32)
The 76ers have a similar story as the Pacers. They thought they had found a three-headed monster between Dalembert, Brand and Speights early on in the season, but since, the performance of that trio has been wildly inconsistent. Having two shoot-first guards in Louis Williams and Allen Iverson doesn’t help matters either. The 76ers are desperately in need of some personnel changes in order to have more complimentary pieces. As it stands now, they have a wealth of talent, but just not the right pieces to fit together into a cohesive unit. The Sixers are very much a team that will look to get up and down the court. They managed to win five of their last six heading into this past weekend and in all but one of those wins they eclipsed the century mark. If the boys play ‘Spurs basketball’ and control the tempo, this won’t even be a contest.
Sunday, February 21, 2010, 5:00 PM @ Detroit Pistons (18-33)
The Pistons are another team plagued by syndrome that has come to be known as ‘ex-players ill-equipped to be good General Managers”. It’s truly ironic how a man such as Joe Dumars could manage to so flippantly spend money this summer for a team that resides in arguably the most the city most-devastated by the current state of the economy. This past summer, he went out and got himself both Ben Gordon (at $50 million of five years) and Charlie Villanueva ($35 million over five years). These two guys are completely redundant with the personnel they already have in place and this has shown. In the past seven games, these two player shave tallied a just under thirty-three minutes per game. We’re not saying each of them played just about three quarters apiece but collectively they have registered that amount of playing time. With a shoot-first point guard in Rodney Stuckey, acquiring Ben Gordon isn’t the best choice. Furthermore, having a long and athletic SF/PF in Tayshaun Prince negates the need for a Charlie Villanueva-type of player. If the Spurs keep the Pistons’ guards from going off offensively and they feed Duncan (whom the Pistons have absolutely no answer for) early and often, the Spurs ought to cruise to victory.
Prediction: 3-0
Something each of these three opponents has in common besides being bad is that they are all strong candidates to be involved in a trade this week. There have been whispers in Detroit about Rip Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince being moved; in Philly, Iguodala and the Haitian big-man Samuel Dalembert have heard their names often swirling around the trade buzz; Indiana’s Troy Murphy appears to be plan B for the Cavaliers if they are unable to land Amar’e Stoudemire.
That being said, each one of these teams could have a significant player moved this week, thus altering the dynamic of their match-up against the Spurs. Will all of these teams make a deal? Probably not. Will any deal that takes place make any of these teams more a threat to beat the Spurs this week? Probably not.
I expect a 3-0 sweep this week. This week will set the tone for the second half of the season and with the Mavericks getting stronger and the Rockets most-likely moving McGrady, the Spurs must have a solid second half.
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