Spurs-Grizzlies Game 2 - Part 1

Introduction

As part of Pearls of Mystery's ongoing commitment to "stretch the game out; etch your [own] name out," we're going to be deconstructing the heck out of the Spurs-Grizzlies series.  The goals here are several, most of them federal:

1. Improve my ability to analyze basketball on a strategic level
2. Improve my knowledge of various star players and their actual contributions to basketball games, and 
3. Improve my communication and research apparatus of the above

So we're going to do look at every single possession of Game 2.  Some of these are going to be forgettable, especially in garbage time (after one rotation I eminently understand how the old saw "right way to play the game" has quite a bit of evidence), but even when a possession itself is broken or boring, oftentimes a string of possessions will be interesting and coherent.  So part of the challenge for me is to break it up into "possessions" at some times and "flows" at other times.  Will it drag on?  Yes, but after the first game or two like this, I'm going to switch this mode of analysis into 3-8 minute sequences deconstructing incredible runs or incredible breakdowns, or just basketball at its starkest and most stylistically interesting (for example, the Miami collapse in Game 2).

12:00, First Quarter, 0-0

The first possession of Game 2 is a startlingly elegant set play by the Spurs. Sebastian Pruiti shows perfectly a more extreme (and decisive) example of this play, but this more workaday possession is still a beaut.

After Duncan wins the tip, the Spurs and Grizzlies start with an insultingly simple defensive and offensive set-up reminiscent of a tic-tac-toe game gone wrong. I am insulted by this simplicity, Tim! Antonio McDyess stands in the high post (guarded by Zach Randolph) while Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Richard Jefferson, and Manu Ginobili stand around the perimeter. This is straightforward in every sense except that Tim Duncan has the ball.

Jefferson runs down the baseline on a McDyess screen to change the inside-outside balance and force his man (Sam Young) to react. Young easily fights through the McDyess screen and Dice and RJ are on the low blocks, guarded tightly by Randolph and Young respectively, as you can see below:

While this is happening, Duncan hands the ball off to Parker who dribbles it left, to the top of the arc. Duncan (guarded by seven-footer Marc Gasol) heads to the right. His location above (around the elbow and wing 17 or 18 feet away) is one of his favorite shots, of course, especially with his famous use of the glass. Also, Jefferson's cut has opened a fairly sparse backcourt, perfect for a pick and roll. So Gasol saunters over to cover him at the elbow. Tony passes to Manu, who rotates to the right wing.

But, instead of staying around for a midrange assisted jumper or a pick and roll, Duncan keeps running to the baseline, and Marc Gasol, at first oblivious to the cluster of Spurs and Grizzlies near the basket, gets caught up in a McDyess flare screen (a trademark of Popovich's set plays).

Here is what you might call "checkmate". As Duncan keeps running along the baseline, behind the four players clustered at the basket, Gasol (who has fought past the McDyess flare screen) still has to run around two Spurs and two Grizzlies in order to get back to his man Duncan. To further aggravate the Grizzlies, Jefferson uses the Spurs' second flare-screen of the possession against Randolph. Now at best the Grizzlies have Sam Young (supreme mismatch) or a trailing Marc Gasol to defend Duncan right at the basket. Manu throws an easy pass to Duncan.

Duncan smartly makes a pump fake. Gasol smartly uses his height to contest the pump fake without fouling, but the play is basically over: Duncan finishes easily. The Grizzlies - just like the Bucks in the Pruiti analysis above - didn't really make any mistakes as far as I can tell. In retrospect, with perfect knowledge, sure, but as solid defensive players reacting to the game around them? No, the Grizzlies just fell victim to a good, solid play, almost reminiscent of football with an "offensive line".

11:43 0-2

I'm pretty new to this so I can't really speculate too much about options, but this next possession ended up being a pretty clear Z-Bo iso.

Everyone in the AT&T Center and everyone watching knew this would be another Randolph drive or shot over McDyess: As an aside, probably the enduring systematic image of this series is of Z-Bo again and again shooting over perfect man defense by Dice. For Spurs fans this was frustrating and ironic. Indeed, the Grizzlies looked like a vintage Spurs team in this series, basketball-wise. Anyway, you see Manu above, standing near the left elbow? Keep that in mind.

Manu lithely runs to contest the drive and blocks Zach Randolph's shot out of bounds with 9 seconds left on the shot clock. Spurs fans know that Manu has a tendency towards the impossible, and so even the slightest possibility of a perfect play is easy money for Manu.

11:27

Now the Grizzlies have a clipped possession that ends badly.

Manu covers Tony Allen's inbounds pass extremely well, even preventing a chipshot to Mike Conley in the corner, so Allen has to send the ball sailing back to Gasol at halfcourt, who passes to Mike Conley.

At this point Conley and Gasol have a kind of abortive pick and roll against Parker and Duncan that actually ends with Gasol getting a reasonable open shot with :02 on the shot clock which Gasol (under marginal pressure from the rotating wing Jefferson) passes off to Sam Young (mismatched horribly against McDyess) for some reason. Shot clock violation.

11:17

This next possession shows how a very well-executing Spurs offense managed to come up short pretty frequently against the Grizz. For the first twelve seconds of this possession the Grizzlies stopped all the gaps and passing lanes that the Spurs were looking for.

The setup at this point is kind of clustered for both teams. Parker has the ball on the left wing, Duncan and McDyess are both at about the same point near the elbow. Ginobili is rotating towards his frontcourt, and you can also see Richard Jefferson moving across the paint. Parker will pass to Jefferson with his back to the basket, as McDyess signals to Ginobili to move behind the arc on his screen of Tony Allen.

Jefferson now competently penetrates to the basket and neatly kicks the ball out to Manu:

Quick quiz just for Spurs fans: The ball is moving quickly and accurately towards Manu Ginobili. What should happen here?

Give up? The answer is: Manu makes a catch-and-shoot three, of course! Or, rather, the answer would be, in a sane universe, one in which Tony Allen isn't one of the single best defenders in the league at the guard position. Allen gets in Manu's face just enough that Manu has to ball-fake and start penetrating.

So Allen forces Manu left with :06 on the shot clock. In the ensuing chaos, Manu turns it over on a botched pass. And...Z-Bo pokes Tim Duncan in the eyes (unintentionally, I presume). Just one of those series.

10:57

I'll spare you the visual atrocity of this possession: Mike Conley uses a Marc Gasol screen at the left wing to jack up (that is, off the dribble, not from a good base) a long, kind of open two. And that's it. The other Grizzlies do nothing. It doesn't go in.

10:47

Obviously getting hit in the eye on the Spurs' last possession temporarily enraged or blinded Tim Duncan, because Tim straight-up runs right through little Mike Conley in the paint as Duncan passes to McDyess in the corner. Maybe Duncan was just disappointed in Conley's 22-foot two-pointer just before. Maybe it's just that Mike Conley is relatively tiny, and even without the visual impairment, Tim Duncan would have run him over anyway. Offensive foul. Oh, gosh.

10:40

Now we actually get a few possessions in a row that actually work. Fancy that.

For the first twelve seconds of this possession Memphis was trying to do some interior screening and misdirection on the right side, but it wasn't really working: When Duncan broke up a pass from Sam Young to Gasol, the Grizzlies finally gave up and swung it out to Tony Allen in a 1-on-1 against Manu at the left wing.

I think Tony Allen is a decent offensive player. He's not Ray or anything, but considering what he gives Memphis on defense, he really deserved to be the starter in this series. Here, Allen crosses Ginobili up and makes a decent drive into the lane.

Unfortunately for Allen, to the right of the two shooting guards is a player that is good at guarding shots: Tim Duncan contests Allen's shot from the circle and it is an airball.

Fortunately for Allen, Z-Bo is in the lane. Randolph correctly predicts the airball and uses his wide body to establish position. Z-Bo catches it in the middle of Jefferson and McDyess and finishes for an easy two.

10:19 2-2

After Tim Duncan feeds him from the elbow, Tony Parker is at the right wing dribbling. Richard Jefferson is at the hash marks. Duncan flare-screens his man Gasol as Jefferson runs back to the top of the key. As Jefferson's man (Sam Young) tries to cover him, Duncan puts a hand out to force Sam Young to take a convoluted route to Jefferson, giving ample time and space for Jefferson to dribble once set up and step into a midrange jumper from the elbow. Money.

10:05 2-4

As you can see, Dice and Z-Bo are fighting for position at the low block. Dice essentially wins, and so Mike Conley begins to penetrate, ending up on the right side.

Here's a good example of how the Grizzlies' frontcourt depth really hurt the Spurs in subtle ways. Conley is going to kick it out to an open Tony Allen for a long (but with a low degree of difficulty) two. Tony Parker, Conley's man, is a sieve, so Manu - rather than covering Allen at the right wing, shades instead against Conley. Normally this would be Duncan's assignment to help TP out, but if Duncan moves to cover Conley's drive, he leaves Marc Gasol open for an easy catch-and-shoot from the elbow.

Granted, when the kick-out comes, Manu makes an admirable attempt at covering Allen, but Allen has a high enough release that it doesn't matter. The basket is good and Tony Allen kind of looks like how I picture the devil.

9:50 4-4

This play actually ends in a miss, but it does show how throughout the season the Spurs were often able to use the speed and penetration of Tony Parker and Richard Jefferson to get them out of dead-end possessions and get open shots.

Tony (if you can even see him through the tight nest of blue bodies) is dribbling out from the left corner. No one knows how or why he got there in the first place. Well, anyway, Tim Duncan is going to screen Parker's man Conley off him as Parker darts along the arc and finally passes from the elbow to RJ, who is waiting at the wing.

RJ B RJ. No, seriously, RJ, do it: Be RJ; drive the ball. Take the ball from Tony, and dribble penetrate. Then kick it out to Manu.

Nice. Except probably don't bowl over Sam Young like that next time. That will often be called as an offensive foul. Good. Now Manu just has to make a wide-open shot and we're good.

Oh, wait, that's right. You literally broke and strained your arm, Manu, so that you had to miss Game 1, and you are wearing a gigantic elbow brace that (as the sideline correspondent colorfully reports at one point) "would make Barry Bonds jealous". Despite being central to and highly successful in almost every possession on offense and defense so far, it is still pretty hard to shoot a basketball 25 feet with a broken arm, isn't it, Manu. Huh. Too bad.

9:38

I'm no comedian, but, just like Turner cable TV, I "know funny". This possession is quite funny.

Notice #4 (Sam Young) chilling way to the right (of the image) of all the other players? Notice how every Spurs player is basically helping to defend Zach Randolph on some level?

Well...the Spurs somehow shade even more towards Z-Bo in the next second. Luckily, Z-Bo has dependable old Sam Young just hanging out there for the pass:

Whoops. Angering Lionel Hollins and theologians everywhere, Sam Young flubs a perfect pass and loses all the ground the Spurs have been giving him the entire possession. He falls on the ground and passes it to Mike Conley. I think the funniest part here is that he has time to drop a pass, fall on the ground to retrieve it, and still have the nearest open player be three feet from him.

Now Young gets up and swings the ball out to Tony Allen at the corner. Allen drives baseline and misses a tricky shot. The possession is almost over, but not before both Duncan and Gasol flub the ball.

Oh, Game 2 humor. It never gets old. At least I hope so because we're barely 3 minutes in!

9:18

This is kind of an awesome possession, actually. At the 9:50 possession how I speculated about why Tony Parker and Antonio McDyess were on the baseline near the corner in a thick tangle of defenders. Well, on the very next Spurs possession, we have our answer. They run a decent pick and roll together with a couple of weird throws.

Above you can see Tony gets the ball from a high Manu pass. Sam Young neatly covers the baseline.

Dice screens Sam Young and Marc Gasol switches to pick up Tony. So there is a mismatch in the frontcourt.

At this point, Sam Young can choose between a positive mismatch if he leaves to guard Parker's pass and a negative mismatch if he stays with McDyess - who can shoot right over him. So Sam Young plays the odds and rather smartly tries to trap Parker. Parker sees it and leaps to throw the ball right over the arms of Sam Young - himself leaping - to Dice.

Z-Bo sees the high-arcing pass and runs to cover McDyess while the pass is still in the air.

But Z-Bo isn't enough. Dice - the old head - still has some legs and buries the jump shot (as high arcing as Parker's pass) over Randolph. He turns the tables on Z-Bo.

And so it is that the first rotation of Game 2 comes to a---halfway point. Heh. Spurs 6, Grizzlies 4 - after 3 minutes.