Fun and frustration at the 'four' in San Antonio
The Spurs are starting to branch out a little more with certain players offensively, but the defense is trying to find a stronger limb.
Photo credit: Jason Miller/Getty
Growing pains were always going to be a factor in San Antonio this season. With a to-do list longer than a CVS receipt, changes in players’ job responsibilities, an integration of new faces and a rotation to solve, finding consistency within the tumult meant the inevitability of a struggle. But progress has been obvious, and little by little Gregg Popovich and the coaching staff have given more opportunities to individuals outside of the baseline structure of the offensive scheme.
One of those players is Doug McDermott. A movement shooter and scorer who thrives dancing around off-ball screens and flowing through dribble hand-off actions, he was signed last summer to give the Spurs some much-needed range and breathing room for the offense. His gravitational pull from the 3-point line and ability to stir up a defense with his constant motion is not just good for San Antonio’s attack on a basic basketball level, but it gives its young guards a chance to operate and develop their games in space. Whether he’s the focus of a specific action or merely a decoy, McDermott’s presence keeps both primary and help defenders on their toes and prevents them from being able to settle in and load up.
Much of what the Spurs do offensively is based on the principles of a system and scheme rather than a vast array of set plays and actions. Not even the Beautiful Game Spurs ran anything too complicated — it was always about a quick half-court pace, constant side-to-side movement and putting the defense in compromising situations at the point of attack. And while San Antonio clearly doesn’t have the type of talent those teams did, the “point-five” concept remains fully intact as its young roster learns how to stay competitive on the fly in the star-driven world of the NBA.
Gregg Popovich said during media day prior to the start of the season he wasn’t going to overcomplicate things for this group. He didn’t want to rein in the energy and athleticism of the youngest team he’s ever coached by micromanaging and causing them to overthink. And he’s stayed true to his word, as the Spurs’ 14.07 seconds per offensive possession is tied with Charlotte for fastest in the league, per PBP Stats. They just read, react and go.
But little by little, as familiarity between teammates has grown and half-court execution has become more of a focus (particularly late in close games), Pop has sprinkled in more and more designed sets to free up his guys in an effort to get them going or to simply stay with the hot hand.
McDermott has steadily seen his usage rate rise from month to month since the start of the season, and while the majority of his shots still come within the natural flow of the team’s motion offense, there have clearly been a few fun little wrinkles added to the equation recently for the 44-percent 3-point shooter.
A lot of this is second nature for McDermott, as he loops around defenses with his man on a leash, pops off pin-downs and brushes past staggered picks. He sets up his defenders beautifully, makes great reads coming off screens, and can shoot or put the ball on the floor and attack once he’s free. But it can take a little time for these types of players to settle into a new offense, and teammates need time to learn his timing and tendencies, where he likes the ball on fades, curls and flares, and which direction he prefers to move when stepping into a shot. So it’s not a surprise his impact has been felt more as the season has unfolded, especially following the departures of Bryn Forbes (a similar type of player) and Derrick White.
But much like Forbes and White, the future for McDermott in San Antonio could be viewed as uncertain. The 30-year-old is absolutely ancient by Spurs standards, and his skill set is one that’s coveted by contenders every year without fail. With two seasons left on his reasonable three-year, $42-million contract, you can bet his value as an asset isn’t lost on San Antonio at this point of its rebuilding process either.
Still, while analyzing roster construction and asset management is something of a tedious inevitability when covering a rebuilding team, the Spurs are rolling out of the All-Star break with eyes on a push for the playoffs. The monotony of commerce talk and trade speculation can wait for now. In the meantime, as San Antonio heads out this afternoon for the back end of the Rodeo Road Trip, squeezing as much juice as it can from the fruit in its basket is the primary focus over the next month and a half.
Defensive solutions seem scarce
As the Spurs’ offense has continued to find its footing and inch its way up the efficiency rankings, the defense has struggled to elevate itself to a dependable position. And while there have been nice developments at the ‘four’ position offensively, the same can’t be said on the other side of the ball.
On the surface there’s a lot to like. San Antonio allows the second- and eighth-lowest frequencies of open and wide-open 3-point attempts, respectively, and gives up the third-lowest frequency of 3-point attempts by an opponent overall, per the NBA’s tracking data. Inside, opponents are posting a meager 55.7 effective field-goal percentage on all shots less than 10 feet from the basket against the Spurs (the third lowest in the league) and Jakob Poeltl is contesting more shots per game than any other player in the league.
But the problem lies beneath that surface. Teams are pelting San Antonio inside with a league-leading 32.8 field-goal attempts per game inside of five feet, and they’re attacking specifically with a feverish barrage of pick-and-rolls in an effort to mitigate the impact of the Spurs’ athleticism off the ball and activity in the passing lanes. Overall, 27.4 percent of the shots taken by San Antonio’s opponents are coming from ball-handlers and roll men out of the pick-and-roll, per Synergy data. And while initiators have largely been kept at bay by Poeltl’s presence in drop coverage and Dejounte Murray and Co. chasing over the top of screens (just .85 points per possession), bigs have been feasting on 1.14 points per possession on such play types.
But the issue is twofold: Teams understand philosophically the Spurs want to stick to shooters, which means the defense is unlikely to completely collapse around them on their forays into the paint; they also understand Poeltl (and whichever center plays behind him in the rotation) is the last line of defense for a unit that possesses very little size at the other frontcourt positions. Once he’s engaged and compromised by incoming guards, big men stepping in from the dunker spot, rolling to the rim or popping out on the perimeter will have a brief opening to capitalize. But the problem is compounded once the shot goes up, even as San Antonio generally does well in thwarting the initial attack. Once Poeltl is occupied as a shot-blocker, opportunities will present themselves on the offensive boards. And it’s killing the Spurs.
Opponents are rebounding 28.9 percent of all their misses in half-court sets and adding 19.4 plays per 100 missed attempts, the highest numbers across the league in both categories, per Cleaning the Glass. San Antonio’s initial wave of defense has been solid — the team’s 110.6 defensive rating ranks 18th in the league, which isn’t terrible — but the extra chances have been eating away at them all season.
This entire section could’ve probably been two paragraphs long, if not two sentences. No amount of good initial defense matters very much if you can’t secure the rebound; if you’re giving up second and third chances with regularity, it all goes out the window.
Context is important, however, and when viewing this team’s incompleteness from a roster perspective, it’s easy to see there are holes that simply haven’t been filled by the proper personnel yet. McDermott, Keldon Johnson and Keita Bates-Diop have contributed admirably at the ‘four’ this season, but these are not players ideally equipped to fight the physicality of the NBA’s best interior scrappers.
The addition of size going forward will go a long way in assuaging the pain that’s been inflicted upon them on the glass, but until then, the Spurs are going to have to figure out a way to improve upon their situation if they truly want to make a push toward the play-in tournament. But unless they commit to bringing more bodies from the perimeter at the risk of opening up the 3-point line — which would open up a whole different can of worms — I’m not sure what the answer is beyond the not-so-helpful suggestion to just rebound better individually. I think it’s safe to assume they’re trying to do that.
On the whole, there’s plenty of defensive potential for this group going forward. San Antonio is contesting a high percentage of shots around the rim, limiting attempts from the perimeter, and funneling opponents into the mid-range area. It’s even been a little unlucky, as teams are hitting 40 percent of their wide-open 3-pointers against the Spurs, the second-highest number in the league on such shots. For reference, teams are shooting just 34.7 percent on wide-open 3s against the Milwaukee Bucks, the lowest number in the league. Shit happens, as they say.
There may not be anything in the basketball world that frustrates Pop more than poor defensive rebounding. If you isolated only his angry postgame press conferences over the years and applied a filter for specific words, I’d bet good money “rebounding” would top of the list. And as long as we’re gambling, I’d bet even more money addressing this issue will be the top priority in San Antonio this offseason.