To be upfront, I root for Dallas teams and hate San Antonio/Houston teams.

Championship teams are fragile and need some luck. For example, Jimmy Johnson wanted James Francis in the draft but he was taken so he took Emmitt. The Cowboys of the early 90's might not have won any titles if Francis had been there.

Similarly, the spurs have been in the lottery twice and won both times, the year a once in a generation player comes out. If the ping pong ball for Duncan hadn't come out in their favor, would the spurs have any titles? I say probably not.

Question: How many super bowls would the cowboys have won without emmitt and how many titles would the spurs have if the ping pong ball for Duncan didn't fall their way?

Impossible to know. Duncan was obviously the centerpiece of the team for 19 years and to compound that, that draft was extraordinarily weak. So winning the lottery that year was significantly more important than winning it in other years.

The only other player in the draft you could build around was TMac and he really wasn't a great player for 4 years, which would be closing the door on Robinson. #2 picked was Keith Van Horne, 3 was Billups, 4 Antonio Daniels and 5 Tony Battie. Then it gets really sketchy.

Other drafts weren't so imperative to win as the 97 won. Like if you didn't get Webber, at least you could get Penny or Mashburn. Didn't get Iverson, but you could still get Kobe, Peja, or Nash. After Joe Smith (LOL) was McDyess, Garnett, Stack, Sheed. Didn't get Kandi (LOOL) but there is still Vinsanity, Dirk, Pierce.


Beyond Duncan, Pop has been consistently better than anyone in the league at finding talent and diamonds in the rough and getting them to work in the system. Parker, Kawhi, Manu, Scola, George Hill, Tiago, Bowen, Danny Green, etc. Lots of late picks and guys that bounced around the league before Pop took them and made them something.

Maybe Pop would have wheeled and dealed more and built another way. Hard to say because there are simply too many variables. But I think most will agree the Spurs don't have their 5 titles without Duncan. Whether they would have ever won one would remain to be seen. We saw the Pistons, Heat and Mavs win a title between Kobe and LeBron so anything is possible.

Good on the Spurs for tanking on purpose...***********************************8

Pop is a great coach, but it's hard to say whether it would have happened. After all, if would have meant that Duncan was on another team, which means that Pop would have been trying to beat not just the Jordan Bulls, Shaq-Kobe Lakers, Nash Suns, Kobe-Gasol Lakers, Lebron Heat, and Lebron Cavs x2, but in all likelihood the Duncan Celtics. I doubt Pop would have coached past Robinson's retirement.

Sidebar: the Spurs actually won 5 more games than the Celtics and 2 more than the Grizzlies that year even with their top two players out for the season, so if it was a tank it was the worst tank ever.

I was at the heat game when robinsons season ended

Later that year an ol Dominique wilkins was the star player

Boston vs san antonio late in the year and the spurs won handily

Spurs did not tank to get duncan
I just think the nba didnt think he was that good or he would have been gifted to boston

Spurs won seven games in March including vs Boston.

Boston won two games in March.

Spurs did a pretty terrible job of tanking down the stretch.

Cowboys would have won 1 or 2 Super Bowls w/out Emmitt. Spurs would have maybe 1 title w/out Duncan.

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How many super bowls would the cowboys have won without emmitt

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same. best OL ever...

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how many titles would the spurs have if the ping pong ball for Duncan didn't fall their way?

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same. best franchise ever....[/and here we go.gif]