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Must Reads
With the season about to start most publications are posting their season previews. And since we know you are too busy to search the web for every piece of Spurs-related content, we did it for you. Let's begin
The SBNation NBA preview went live yesterday and it's not only informative but also pretty. The Spurs preview can be found here. An excerpt:
The best illustration of the Spurs’ brilliance: 28 other teams talk about playing more like them every preseason. The greater sports world saw San Antonio’s style on display in the Finals and hopefully fell in love. If not, it’s only because the Spurs are so good that they remove any drama of a close game.
Blazer's Edge asked me some questions for their preview. You should go over there and read the whole thing because they are friends of the site and because it will give you a chance to get mad at me for picking apart Kawhi Leonard's game. Here's what I responded to their question about Tim Duncan and whether he can still play at a high level:
One of the weirdest statistical years in recent history has to be Tim Duncan's 2012/13 season. He was as good as his best years, at least from a per minute basis. I don't expect that kind of production again but if he can do what he did last season, the Spurs should be fine.
Pro Basketball Talk predicts 59 wins:
They could win more but Popovich will be willing to sacrifice a couple wins to keep guys rested. That will be enough to be one of the top two seeds in the West (likely the top seed) and they will set the bar to win a title. The Spurs are not coming back to the pack, if another team is going to take the title away from them that team is going to have to improve enough to outright beat them. Not sure any team can do that if the Spurs are at their peak.
Rob Mahoney from SI thinks the Spurs need to evolve in order to repeat as champions and thinks Kawhi Leonard is the key to that evolution:
Kawhi Leonard, as the Spur with the most latent capability, is an obvious avenue. Year four of Leonard's career will assuredly put him at his highest usage yet. He'll be trusted to do more and be thrust into a variety of situations demanding creativity with the ball. Yet San Antonio also walks a line with Leonard, who for all his talent doesn't boast the skill set of a conventional star.
The crew over at Ball Don't Lie explores the Spurs in depth on a very complete preview. In their "glaring weakness" section, this is what Dan Devine says about the Spurs:
None. That tends to be the case when you return 97.5 percent of the minutes from a 62-win champion that ranked sixth in the league in points scored per possession and fourth in points allowed per possession, that was nearly as good on the road (an NBA-best 30-11, outscoring opponents by 6.5 points per 100 possessions) as at home (32-9, +9.7-per-100), and that's still led by the NBA's best coach.
Fran Blinebury from NBA.com focuses on Kawhi Leonard's next step:
He averaged 12.8 points and 6.2 rebounds last season, both career highs and was voted to the All-Defensive second team. But he played - as did every other member of the Spurs - less than 30 minutes per game and Leonard feels it's playing time that will boost his production nightly.
"In the Finals, I'm playing 35 minutes a game, so I'm on the floor more and able to score the ball more and get more rebounds," Leonard said. "I'm going to have to get consistent minutes to play at a consistent level like that."
The annual GM survey was also recently posted on NBA.com by John Schumann. You should read the whole thing since it's full of great nuggets. But this is the prediction that matters the most:
Which team will win the 2015 NBA Finals?
1. San Antonio -- 46.2%
2. Cleveland -- 15.4%
3. Chicago -- 11.5%
L.A. Clippers -- 11.5%
Oklahoma City -- 11.5%
6. Golden State -- 3.8%
Last year: Miami -- 75.9%
ESPN Rank is done ranking Spurs. San Antonio has seven of the league's best 100 players and three of the top 25.
Finally, we have the thoughts of our fellow Spurs bloggers.
Project Spurs talks about the Spurs' chances this season in an interview with Sean Elliot. Spoiler alert: Sean think the Spurs have what it takes to win the title.
Wayne Vore from The Big Fundamental does an extensive breakdown of the schedule and concludes that the Spurs will win 61 games.
Over at 48MoH Trevor Zickgraf and Caleb Saenz answer Matthew Tynan's burning questions, including "Which would you rather: Spurs repeat and Duncan/Ginobili retire, or Spurs fall short but Duncan/Ginobili return?"
George Middleton from Air Alamo thinks the worse case scenario is the Spurs winning 54 games. That's a bit optimistic in my eyes.
Are there any previews I missed? Have you read a cool Spurs' article you want to share with us? Mention it in the comments.