Pretty sure I lost the rest of my hair. Not that I had much to begin with...

Yup

Much like game 1 of the rockets series, a lot of y'all are reading way too much into this game. Does it suck that we lost? Yes, but one game doesn't make the series. The thing everyone should be freaking out about is if Kawhi can play and how healthy he'll be.

With Kawhi in the game, GS has no answer defensively. Their best bet was putting Draymond on Kawhi, which leaves a lesser defender on Aldridge inside. When Leonard went out, they were able to put their best defender on our best offensive player and it really slowed us down. It also allowed GS to play smaller (along with Pau and Aldridge getting in foul trouble) because they could take out an inside presence like Zaza and put in another scorer. Lots of things go into motion when you take the guy who was the best two way player on the floor out of the game.

Just seems like we are channeling our former early/mid 2000's teams.

Missing free throws. (Last couple of games against Rockets).

Blowing big leads.

Losing game ones.

Winning championships. (Hopefully).

West Texan said:

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Much like game 1 of the rockets series, a lot of y'all are reading way too much into this game. Does it suck that we lost? Yes, but one game doesn't make the series. The thing everyone should be freaking out about is if Kawhi can play and how healthy he'll be.

With Kawhi in the game, GS has no answer defensively. Their best bet was putting Draymond on Kawhi, which leaves a lesser defender on Aldridge inside. When Leonard went out, they were able to put their best defender on our best offensive player and it really slowed us down. It also allowed GS to play smaller (along with Pau and Aldridge getting in foul trouble) because they could take out an inside presence like Zaza and put in another scorer. Lots of things go into motion when you take the guy who was the best two way player on the floor out of the game.

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I'm concerned because I wonder what this means for Leonard going forward. With him, we may have a fighter's chance. But I don't see how he plays game 2, and if he doesn't we are likely going home down 2 games. I don't like our chances of winning 4 in a row (because I doubt we win a game 7 at Oracle).

In some ways I think our best performances this postseason have come on the road. I don't think that really matters. At least not with this Spurs team.

Pop made a huge mistake allowing Kawhi back in the game so quickly with a double digit lead if he allows him to play Tuesday the Pop has gone full on BSC.

Sit him until Saturday is the only chance the SPURS have at this point.

The longer he sits the tighter his ankle would get. So you either sit him for the rest of the game or play him IMO. This doesn't fall on Pop. It's a freak occurrence and just plain bad luck.

After watching replays and calming down some, while I don't think there was 100% intent to injure, I do think Zaza knew exactly what he was doing, and if Kawhi had to sit, then oh well. He wasn't looking at Kawhi, so no way to know his foot was placed just right, but he's been in the league for how long now? He knew what he was doing.

So while it may have not been intentional as in, he didn't make damn sure his foot was perfectly placed, it was a dirty play. That wasn't a hard basketball foul or a hard basketball play. It was dirty. Everyone knew Kawhi just tweaked it, and Zaza knew what he was doing when he stepped that far into a close out.

I'm disappointed we weren't able to close yesterday out. That felt like our shot. But ultimately, the expectation I always had for this team was the WCF. I won't be happy with that after watching what could have been* in game 1, but I won't be disappointed in this team. They've played through a lot of adversity in this playoffs. Here's to hoping they can make it through some more, because I freaking hate this Warriors team.

I will say, though, if we were 100% healthy - TP and a perfectly healthy Kawhi - I think we actually take this. This Warrior team is definitely vulnerable against a team with sound defense and offense.



*this assumes Kawhi is iffy the rest of the series and we don't pull this one out.

That was an awful turn of events. If you rest Kawhi tomorrow, which is likely the smart play, then you basically concede game 2 and now need to win 4 out of the next 5. That's a tall order. If Spurs could have just hung on, then the whole script is flipped. So agonizingly close.

Enzo The Baker said:

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The longer he sits the tighter his ankle would get. So you either sit him for the rest of the game or play him IMO.

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Kawhi sitting on the bench with a tight ankle is a whole lot more comforting to the SPURS team than a Kawhi sitting in the locker room for the remainder of the game.

We all saw how that worked out first hand.

GatorAg03 said:

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That was an awful turn of events. If you rest Kawhi tomorrow, which is likely the smart play, then you basically concede game 2 and now need to win 4 out of the next 5. That's a tall order. If Spurs could have just hung on, then the whole script is flipped. So agonizingly close.

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The Spurs have to win Game 2 IMO or the series is essentially over.

Not that I don't think they couldn't still win at least one game. What they did yesterday before Leonard got injured was VERY impressive.

But hoping that a team is able to win 4 out of 5 games versus an opponent with that much talent that would be 10-0 in the playoffs at that point and 24-1 in their last 25 games would be hoping for the epic comebacks of all playoff series comebacks.

Even more epic than Cavs overcoming a 3-1 series lead by the GSW last year. Which took a Green 1-game suspension plus fantastic play by Irving and one of the greatest playoff series performances ever by LeBron James to (just barely by the skin of their teeth) pull off.

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Kawhi sitting on the bench with a tight ankle is a whole lot more comforting to the SPURS team than a Kawhi sitting in the locker room for the remainder of the game.

We all saw how that worked out first hand.

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So Pop is supposed to see into the future and account for the morale of professional athletes?

Golden State had cut the lead down to 14 in the third. They were showing signs of making a push even with Kawhi in the game. If you have a chance to win game 1 against a team like GS on the road, you damn well do it. It's easy to say now that it wasn't the wise thing to do, but Pop made the right call putting Kawhi back into the game.

Pumpkinhead said:

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GatorAg03 said:

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That was an awful turn of events. If you rest Kawhi tomorrow, which is likely the smart play, then you basically concede game 2 and now need to win 4 out of the next 5. That's a tall order. If Spurs could have just hung on, then the whole script is flipped. So agonizingly close.

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The Spurs have to win Game 2 IMO or the series is essentially over.

Not that I don't think they couldn't still win at least one game. What they did yesterday before Leonard got injured was VERY impressive.

But hoping that a team is able to win 4 out of 5 games versus an opponent with that much talent that would be 10-0 in the playoffs at that point and 24-1 in their last 25 games would be hoping for the epic comebacks of all playoff series comebacks.

Even more epic than Cavs overcoming a 3-1 series lead by the GSW last year. Which took a Green 1-game suspension plus fantastic play by Irving and one of the greatest playoff series performances ever by LeBron James to (just barely by the skin of their teeth) pull off.

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Man, anyone remember the Spurs series in 2012 vs. the Thunder? 20 game winning streak and we lost 4 in a row. Pretty *********hard to believe that happened.

Enzo The Baker said:

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Kawhi sitting on the bench with a tight ankle is a whole lot more comforting to the SPURS team than a Kawhi sitting in the locker room for the remainder of the game.

We all saw how that worked out first hand.

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So Pop is supposed to see into the future and account for the morale of professional athletes?

Golden State had cut the lead down to 14 in the third. They were showing signs of making a push even with Kawhi in the game. If you have a chance to win game 1 against a team like GS on the road, you damn well do it. It's easy to say now that it wasn't the wise thing to do, but Pop made the right call putting Kawhi back into the game.

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Agreed. I had the thought earlier that Pop should have sat him, but at that point, I'm sure Pop just wanted to get to < 2 left in the 3rd with a 20ish point lead, then sit Kawhi. His best chance of doing that would be let Kawhi try and go because if he sat right after the Lee tweak, he would have tightened up and been done.

It was a tough situation. Win, and you can rest Kawhi and go back to SA split 1-1...which is all we could have asked for. I think Pop did the right thing with the information he had at the time.

GatorAg03 said:

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That was an awful turn of events. If you rest Kawhi tomorrow, which is likely the smart play, then you basically concede game 2 and now need to win 4 out of the next 5. That's a tall order. If Spurs could have just hung on, then the whole script is flipped. So agonizingly close.

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Yeah, it was a huge missed opportunity. Catch them while they're a little rusty and take game 1, and then with a healthy Kawhi you have a solid chance to win three more and the series.

As it is, really, really tall task.

As someone else said above, after watching game 1, I feel like with a healthy Kawhi and Parker the Spurs would have had a really good shot to win it all. Too bad.

DTP02 said:

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GatorAg03 said:

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That was an awful turn of events. If you rest Kawhi tomorrow, which is likely the smart play, then you basically concede game 2 and now need to win 4 out of the next 5. That's a tall order. If Spurs could have just hung on, then the whole script is flipped. So agonizingly close.

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Yeah, it was a huge missed opportunity. Catch them while they're a little rusty and take game 1, and then with a healthy Kawhi you have a solid chance to win three more and the series.

As it is, really, really tall task.

As someone else said above, after watching game 1, I feel like with a healthy Kawhi and Parker the Spurs would have had a really good shot to win it all. Too bad.

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I had felt going into the playoffs that only the Cavs (because of LeBron plus a really good roster including multiple other All-Stars) or Spurs (because of Pop, their system and disciplined defense, and Kawhi) had a legit chance to beat the Warriors in a 4-game series.

If Pop rests Kawhi this game, I think Dejounte Murray needs to split the minutes with Simmons. Murray had a number of steals in the game and he does a lot to disrupt Golden State's passing game. JMO.

No surprise but Kawhi is 'likely' sitting out tomorrow. And Pop is fuming.

Hopefully we can at least make it a respectable game and score 70 points.

Pop fuming makes me nervous. I wonder if Kawhi is done for the season. We don't normally see him that emotional.

That many tweaks in such a short span of time can't be good.

Pop rarely accuses a player of being dirty or reckless. My guess is this should never happen when a guy is shooting a fade away jumper and he's livI'd that it did. Maybe Pop will have Dedmon take out Curry.

I sprained the same ankle twice within one week when I was 22. It was probably the most pain i've ever been in.

If Aldridge doesn't figure out how to score on Draymond Green (half his size), Pachulia (not very good), and McGee (notably dumb), it's going to be an embarrassing blowout without Leonard. He can't play scared in the second half like he did Sunday.

He also needs to make quick decisions and figure out how to pass out of double teams without turning the ball over. Damn I miss Duncan.

Pendragon12 said:

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Pop fuming makes me nervous. I wonder if Kawhi is done for the season. We don't normally see him that emotional.

That many tweaks in such a short span of time can't be good.

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Unfortunately, once you tweak it the first time, the second is more likely and does more damage.

On a fully healthy ankle he barely would have noticed stepping on Lee's foot after the baseline three. With the weakened ankle it left him with a noticeable limp. Then a third time, probably because Pachulia knew he was favoring it and wanted to at least scare him if not knock him out? Game over.

Tape can only do so much. How he can play again, but I bet he takes tomorrow off and hope he can come back mostly better in game 3.

Enzo The Baker said:

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He also needs to make quick decisions and figure out how to pass out of double teams without turning the ball over. Damn I miss Duncan.

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Every time the warriors doubled from the baseline he pivoted inside and tried to pass across the defense. Rookie mistakes. Look where the double came from to attack instead of trying to kick it out to reset the possession.

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Rookie mistakes.

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But he's an eleven year veteran.

Pop knows what he's doing. He is firing up the team.

FWIW Kawhi's MRI came back clean and he has been 'upgraded' to doubtful tomorrow. Still won't play I'm sure. But great to hear there's no structural damage.

Anyone think Dedmon could give us good minutes in this series? I really don't see Pau being able to keep up. He hasn't played that well in the post season in general. I just remember Dedmon having a great opening season game against GS. He would be quicker to the boards and would be a much better P&R defender. He might commit a lot of fouls but I think it's worth a shot.

Enzo The Baker said:

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Anyone think Dedmon could give us good minutes in this series? I really don't see Pau being able to keep up. He hasn't played that well in the post season in general. I just remember Dedmon having a great opening season game against GS. He would be quicker to the boards and would be a much better P&R defender. He might commit a lot of fouls but I think it's worth a shot.

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possibly but I doubt it, could see him getting into foul trouble early

Then issue with Dedmon is we desperately need offense with Kawhi and Parker out. Dedmon doesn't give you much there. I think you ride with Pau, LMA and Lee. Need a huge game from Patty and Green to even have a chance. Odds are heavily stacked against the Spurs.