Spurs bounced by Clippers, dealt 9th loss in last 10 games

Towards the end of Saturday’s first quarter, the Spurs mishandled an uncontested defensive board, returning the ball to the team and having no business handling additional possessions. More specifically, Charles Bassey and Isaiah Robbie appeared to have slightly different ideas on the free defensive his rebounding, with the ball pinged out of bounds.

There’s likely a common reaction to seeing both names as part of the team’s early-game rotation — somewhere along the way into the night, things weren’t going as planned in San Antonio. — and the cynical one: Could things be going according to plan? Anyway, the Spurs ultimately lost to the Clippers 119-97 after a shocking 5-2 start to the world. , 9 losses in their last 10 games.

Even with most of the losses, it was objectively a flatter effort from the Spurs than we’d seen. It may remain in the player. His partner in the pick-and-roll, Tre his Jones (6 points, 10 assists, last year’s floater still trying to find his touch) continues to pocket his passes his dime. You can get silver lining.

For the most part, though, this felt like it was written after the first quarter when the Clippers stole nine 3-pointers (on 16 attempts). First he beat San Antonio 40-22, LA surgically ripped apart the Spurs’ defense, which rarely seemed to settle down, and has one of the deepest rosters in the league (Robert Covington is somehow not It showed the talent gap between the Spurs and the Spurs. Devin Vassell (left ankle pain), Romeo Langford (returning to conditioning after going into health and safety protocol), and a small group that also had no long-term injuries.

Game notes:

• When the Spurs aren’t shooting in the foot, you can hang out with most teams. This is true if the ball is kept close and not overturned, as in the first half of the first quarter.
• The Clippers were playing Kawhi Leonard, who was clearly trying to find his feet. We also lost Paul George early on to a knee injury after a heated 15 minutes of play, but Reggie Jackson (20 points), Norm Powell (26) and John Wall (15 assists, 4 steals, 5 points) were all in the game. ) contributed enough. .
• The Spurs entered this game in November with some pretty terrible numbers, but not much has changed since then.

• Sorry to be so harsh, but Jakob Poeltl is good at what he does, even if he’s not playing his best hands. Even though he doesn’t have a jumper, he forced players to make the tricky decision of how aggressively to play when he caught the ball 20 feet from the basket. He dropped his coverage and popped his shot or opened him a mid-ranger spring. We also took advantage of it when it opened. some long strides. He also made all four free throws!
• Sou-chan was awarded slightly more points this time, but the results were less positive than in previous games. He had seven turnovers and looked more tentative than usual with the ball in his hands. Better shows will come.

next:

The Spurs will do this all over again in tomorrow’s ‘Crypto’. This time against the much worse (probably LeBron James-less) Los Angeles Lakers, it will be the first of his three meetings between the two teams within a week.