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It’s been a busy summer for the Spurs even if it hasn’t exactly been the most exciting, at least post-draft. Selecting Victor Wembanyama (and Summer League standout Sidy Cissoko) basically gave them an A+ as an offseason grade on its own, because in doing so they’ve accomplished one of the most difficult things to do in sports by drafting a generational basketball player and lining up a future full of incredible potential for the franchise.
But outside of that, San Antonio has mostly been trimming the hedges and making them look tidy, not ripping through an entire landscaping project. It’s brought back players like Tre Jones, Julian Champagnie, Sandro Mamukelashvili and Dominick Barlow, and traded for Cameron Payne, Reggie Bullock and Cedi Osman — all role players, all on short or partially guaranteed deals. This team is clearly setting itself up for future offseasons, giving itself time to figure out how to use Wemby, and figuring out which members of the supporting cast will be coming along for the ride.
The only other leaf that hasn’t been clipped is officially extending Devin Vassell, something that could happen tomorrow, a couple of days before the season starts or, in an extreme case, next summer if their goal is to maximize cap space ahead of next offseason. I don’t think they’ll be dragging it out to that point though, mostly because players and agents understandably don’t like it, but also because it seems prudent to lock down core pieces as the Wemby era begins.
But a lot of that stuff has been covered ad nauseam, and the DEAD days of August are meant for the hypotheticals and random questions. Oh and hey, there’s a certain Hall of Fame induction ceremony happening on Saturday night. These events have been Spurs-heavy in recent years, and with Gregg Popovich, Tony Parker and Becky Hammon taking the dais in a few days, you’re gonna get your fill of feel-good.
So let’s get to it. Shoot me your questions in the comment section or in the chat and I’ll get to as many as I can. There have been quite a few in recent mailbags, and the last one I sent out actually pushed the word-count limit on Substack, which I did not even know existed. So, to help address the overflow if there is one, I’ll also be answering some questions on the podcast, which gives me the opportunity to say please subscribe to “Small Market Bias” on Spotify, Apple, Stitcher and iHeart Radio!
As always, paid subscribers will get first dibs, but I will address as many of the questions as I can and the mailbag will be free for all to read.
Fun hypothetical one:
Let's just say Wemby reaches his "best player in the league" potential and hits the reasonably common markers of "first MVP at about ~25 years old" and "first championship at ~27 years old". That's in about 6 and 8 years, respectively.
The question: who from the current Spurs line-up is still on those teams?
Matt - The current discussion seems to be on who is starting and who is going to the bench, but it seems predicated on Point Forward Jeremy Sochan. Is that a thing, or are we all getting ahead of ourselves?