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For those of you San Antonio people who were looking forward to your “java-fix” tomorrow morning, you will have to dish out the cash. In case you don’t know, Valero loves the San Antonio Spurs and their customers so much, that with each win the people of San Antonio get free coffee. I fear my workday in this town tomorrow, due to this loss. I don’t drink coffee but the Spurs fans around me do. Being a Heat fan does not help my case either. The Miami Heat came out on a mission with a brilliant performance to cap off game-2 of the NBA Finals with a 98-96 win over the San Antonio Spurs. The series is now tied 1-1. The story of the evening was of course LeBron James putting up 35, as he went to town on the Spurs but lets look deeper. Manu Ginobli is too old to be called on to carry the Spurs coming from the bench.
19 of the Spurs’ 96 points came from the Argentina Native. 20 percent of a team’s production should be coming from the starters not one player from the bench. Is it nice to know the Spurs can get that type of production out of him? Sure, but the problem with that is San Antonio could not get into a rhythm, as they went 44% from the field. Manu had to step up because of the poor ball movement by his team. As a Heat fan, I am excited to know he’s on the court, because 36-years-old in the NBA is ancient and I know he will burn out somewhere in the second half, especially with him playing 28 minutes a game. This is not the norm in San Antonio and I’ll prove it.
We know that players show up more, when the game is on the line but when you have a player who normally averages 22 minutes per game, add an additional 6 minutes onto his playing time, there might be an issue. Greg Popovich even mentioned in his post game press conference “we didn’t take advantage…we made bad decisions”. Of course you did Sir’, of course you did. Poor ball movement to key players is the reason the series is now tied.
Had the Spurs moved the ball around more and given Danny Green more playing time, he would have had more opportunities to get open for the “three” and we might be looking at a completely different game outcome. However, I must thank you San Antonio, because that did not happen and now you have to listen to me sing “The Heat is on!!!”, while I tease you all about not getting your free coffee in the morning.
Jermaine Lockett is a writer for CouchRiderReport.net. Follow him on Twitter, like him on Facebook, or add him to your network on Google.