Spurs, Victor Wembanyama are drawing eyeballs, but need to lure more talent | Bohls
Michael Malone wondered aloud what probably a lot of NBA observers were thinking.
“I really don’t know why we’re here,” the head coach of the reigning NBA champion Denver Nuggets said Friday. “I’m still trying to figure that out.”
The San Antonio Spurs might be just as curious.
Not so much why they’re playing two games at Austin’s Moody Center, but why they’re sitting at 15-53 and mired in the Western Conference basement. Some cynics would say they’re only too familiar with that neighborhood. They’re accustomed to the zip code of the NBA cellar and will miss the playoffs this season for the fifth year in a row.
While Malone didn’t understand why his Nuggets were playing in a non-NBA city during the regular season in a game that “has a preseason feel to it,” the Spurs weren’t doing it to lull Denver into a false sense of confidence. They were here for the second straight year to grow their Austin fan base and maybe for a bit of leverage as the franchise lobbies for a new downtown arena in San Antonio.
Never hurts to have options, and San Antonians certainly noticed their team drew a sellout 32,280 fans to the two games at Moody.
That said, the Spurs didn’t build a $500 million practice facility so they can uproot and move up I-35 to play all their home games at the University of Texas’ home gym. Maybe they wouldn’t mind, given the glut of Fortune 500 companies based here and a connection to one of this country’s most robust cities. And not just because Willie and Elon live here.
And the Spurs executives, players and even coach Gregg Popovich positively gushed about the welcome they’ve received the last two years in the 512. They're looking for more fans. And wins.
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“You could hear it in warmups,” Spurs backup center Zach Collins said. “Every section of the crowd was getting exciting. It was a lot of love.”
A whole lot of love. Austin has embraced the Spurs like they are its very own, and if the latest homecoming away from home was any indication, it should open the league’s eyes when their adopted city greets them with such a fervor.
Expansion team, anyone?
Austin went 2-for-2 as the Spurs' guests
The decibel level was by far the loudest these ears have heard for any event, any team since the Moody Center opened in 2022. Popovich said the crowd was “helpful” in inspiring the Spurs to victory on Sunday, a win that snapped a three-game losing streak.
And when I asked, he confirmed the Spurs will play a game in Paris next season. Their French national will appreciate playing in his homeland, but no one’s suggesting the Spurs will relocate there, either.
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Victor Wembanyama obviously was a very large reason for the throng at Moody. The 7-foot-4 rookie is the biggest export from France this country has seen since the Statue of Liberty and with similar reach to the sky. And the crowd was entranced with every reverse dunk or spectacular block or 3-pointer he showcased in a 122-115 overtime win over the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday.
“Most teams have four or five guys on the court that can shoot it, so, we’ve been a little bit behind the curve on that probably,” Popovich said. “But to have Keldon (Johnson) do that for a period of time really buoyed us and kept us in the game.”
Johnson contributed 24 points while the team’s chief gunslinger, Devin Vassell, added 25 points with eight assists. Vassell shoots a lot, but isn’t always selective. Baylor ex Jeremy Sochan, the would-be Draymond Green, can guard anybody on the floor and brings a Patrick Beverley edginess every team needs, but he's a challenged shooter.
It’s just an incomplete roster that definitely needs more firepower.
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Victor Wembanyama's a great piece to build around
Nobody fills up a box score quite like Wemby, who scored 31 points and had seven blocks and seven assists. He did everything but change the light bulbs in the place.
Austin would probably love to have the Spurs here full time, but they’re bound to San Antonio for quite some time and wouldn’t be pushing for new digs maybe at Hemisfair in the Alamo’s shadow if it wanted to relocate elsewhere permanently.
First things first.
Their bigger priority is restocking a franchise that became the league’s gold standard after five championships between 1999 and 2014, whether through trades or draft picks. The problem is this doesn’t figure to be a great assemblage of talent in the draft and the Spurs don’t exactly have a plethora of desirable players to offer as bait.
The Spurs raised their last banner in 2014, thanks to Tim Duncan and Tony Parker and Kawhi Leonard and Manu Ginobili. Yeah, star power. The team was dripping in it.
This year’s bunch, not so much.
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The Spurs front office is acutely aware it needs to replenish the talent that has long flourished 80 miles down the road. But this year’s team has regressed to a degree for the third year in a row. The Spurs have won seven fewer games than the 22 victories a year ago, despite the addition of the Eiffel Tower from France. Or Eyeful Tower, if you will.
San Antonio does have a pair of ones and two second-round picks this year and is clearly in need of a dynamic point guard like a Reed Sheppard of Kentucky or 6-foot-6 Serbian guard Nikola Topic or a high-flying scorer on the wing. But those don’t grow on trees. Just in France.
A sidekick for Wembanyama would be nice.
Or two of them.
“As I learned throughout the year more and more about how it actually works, it’s a big challenge for the front office to not screw everything up and to build something for the future,” Wembanyama said. “Of course I'm eager to win, but at the same time we have to be patient and trust the process.”
Spurs need to be lucky and good again to strike gold
Oklahoma City sure represents a good blueprint. The Thunder once swapped Paul George to the Los Angeles Clippers back in 2018 and came up with a young superstar guard in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who can drive, defend and score 30 on you a night, an emerging star in 7-foot rookie Chet Holmgren and plenty of depth and 3-point shooters.
Golden: Victor Wembanyama looks like he's going to be the real deal for the Spurs
Still, the Thunder, a club that grooms or brings in top players like Kevin Durant, James Harden and George all the time, hasn’t won anything yet.
SGA’s exactly the type of security blanket Wemby needs if the Spurs are to ever snap out of their postseason funk and evolve into the playoff contenders they were for more than two decades.
But you’ve got to be lucky and good, something the Spurs were since 1998 as the rulers of the lottery pick with No. 1's David Robinson and Tim Duncan and now Wemby and a franchise coached by the game’s greatest and now the grayest in Popovich.
San Antonio’s comeback win over the Nets, a fringe playoff contender, showed signs that the team is learning how to close out games. Still, they rank 25th in the league defensively. Wemby can’t block every shot.
"No one wants to lose this many games," Collins said. "We definitely saw this year going different, but here we are. There's no choice but to keep pushing and keep trying to get better. Losing this much hurts, and we're not trying to get used to it.”
The win Sunday was a modest step, but the Spurs will take it. History awaits, and not the good kind. They have to go at least 6-8 just to avoid duplicating the worst record in club history, the 20-62 mark set in 1997.
“Every win is important,” Popovich said. “I don’t care if it’s in Timbuktu.”
Just don’t tell Malone he might have to play there, too.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Spurs need a talent infusion to give Victor Wembanyama needed help
