Quote:
Originally Posted by trainwreckog
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i would stop far short of putting this spurs team anywhere near the utah teams.
the utah teams were pretty game-theory optimal, despite not shooting as many 3's.
they had the #1 offense in the league with a 112.7 offensive rating, higher than the spurs this year who had 108.3.
and utah's pace was only 89.3 (21st of 29), so they were really grinding it out but still maintained elite efficiency on offense.
and in 1998 utah drubbed a 56-win pop/drob/duncan team 4-1 in ecsf, (when drob was still really good), so duncan/pop is not somehow unbeatable by utah - worth a mention so as to not get the perceptions warped by recency....
then after beating the pop/drob/duncan 56-win spurs 4-1, the 1998 jazz SWEPT the loaded lakers (shaq, kobe, eddie jones, van exel, elden campbell, rick fox, derek fisher, robert horry !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).
i HIGHLY doubt this 2013 spurs team would do that well against a team like that.
then the rosters compare in utah's favor.
prime malone (28 PER, 27ppg) > current duncan
stockton (22 PER) more of less = parker 23 PER
hornacek 19 PER = ginobili 19
the supporting casts are a wash (i.e. danny green < shandon anderson even without the 3's - anderson had higher offensive rating and ows) and supporting casts as we know are in large part fillers/placeholders around the guys dictating the action.
just based on this post and especially the bolded, should have let me know that these 2013 spurs would not contest the heat in this Finals.
like many other posters, my first instinct was that everything would look so much easier vs the spurs, and sure enough, the heat are making it look easy in the first quarter of game 1.
heat in 5. wade doesn't even matter. spurs are decent, but far from an all-time team. very far.
took the heat 6 minutes to figure out the spurs.
last year i said the spurs were super-overrated and would get beat by someone in the western conference, maybe the clips, maybe the griz, it ended up being the thunder.
they are still overrated. not watching the rest of the series.
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Last edited by trainwreckog; 06-06-2013 at 10:06 PM.