The San Antonio Spurs have lost 14 consecutive games (two shy of the franchise record set last season), are the owners of a 3-16 record, and have four full days off to sit in the muck. So I figured this would be a good time to toss it to y’all as the newsletter and podcast get back into a normal flow this week. I certainly have some questions, which means I’m sure everyone reading this has many.
Please leave your submissions in the comment section or in the Substack chat once I’ve posted there. You can also hit me on Twitter/X (@)Matthew_Tynan, though there’s always the possibility anything sent through that website flies under my radar. Responses will likely be split up between an article here and the podcast later in the week, but we’ll get to as many as we can.
Struggles were to be expected this season, but this has been extra rough even considering the difficult schedule. Let’s talk through the ugliness and see where it takes us.
Thank you to everyone for the thoughtful submissions thus far, but to Cory and Chris: I might have to break y’all’s up a little bit haha. Just a heads up if I don’t get to all of them between the newsletter and pod. I will try though!
I feel bad for even broaching this but I can’t stop thinking about it. On a recent Spurs Insider pod with the Express News beat guys, they discussed Pop telling the crowd to stop booing Kawhi. They also briefly made a comment to the effect of “I think Pop expected the team to be better than they are.”
It’s just so perplexing they’ve lost 14 straight. I didn’t expect them to be good but I kinda thought they’d win a game every 6-8 games or so. The defense is bad despite what on paper seems like some good individual defenders. They also make loads of mental mistakes and consistently come out flat in 3rd quarters.
I get the team is young but I guess what I’m wondering, is there a point where we need to think about the coaching? We’re many years into the defense being bad, this season feels off, and Pop grabbing the PA mic was bizarre. I love Pop but are we seeing signs that maybe he shouldn’t be the coach much longer past this season? I don’t have anything specific to point to beyond the booing incident but things just feel weird...