Defense takes priority
Silver and Black seek to rebound after bottoming out from two-year slide
Tuning into the NBA playoffs while growing up in a Minneapolis suburb, Tre Jones figured watching the Spurs would provide him with a master class in how to defend.
“They were always winning those close games, and it was always on the defensive end,” said Jones, 20.
Drafted in the second round by the Spurs last month, Jones discovered on the first day of training camp that defense remains coach Gregg Popovich’s top priority.
“We weren’t talking about offense a lot,” said Jones, the Atlantic Coast Conference defensive player of the year last season as a sophomore point guard at Duke.
With the Spurs coming off a two-season defensive slide, the coaching staff ’s emphasis on defense is even greater this year.
After finishing the 2017-18 season third in the league in defensive rating (104.8 points per 100 possessions), the Spurs dipped to 19th in 2018-19 (111.2 points) and then 25th last season (113.5 points).
“Since the start of preseason, defense has been our focus,” center Jakob Poeltl said.
Unfortunately for the Spurs, it hasn’t yielded positive results yet. In losing all three of their exhibition games, the Spurs gave up an average of 120.3 points per game after twice surrendering 121 or more.
“We have been pretty poor on defense,” Poeltl said.
They do have an excuse, though. Guard Derrick White, arguably the team’s top defensive player, and swingman Keldon Johnson, whose high-energy play during the seeding games this past summer led Popovich to compare him to a “mustang,” missed the preseason with toe and foot injuries, respectively.
“Not having them has impacted us drastically,” forward Rudy Gay said. “Derrick — he had what, 20 charges in eight (restart games) or something like that? His activity and Keldon’s energy — not having them has really hurt us.”
The Spurs are set to start the regular season against the Grizzlies on Wednesday night in Memphis without White, who actually drew11 charges in seven games in Orlando, and Johnson. But Gay believes the defense will tighten up without them.
“We had a mix of veterans and young guys playing with different lineups in the preseason,” Gay said. “I believe the best defensive lineups will be out there. You can’t really base our season on the preseason.” Poeltl offered a different view.
“I don’t think it’s a personnel question,” Poeltl said. “Obviously, guys like Derrick and Keldon, who are good perimeter de
fenders, help. But I don’t think we have a lack of defensive talent out there. It’s about wanting to guard. It’s about guarding together.”
Poeltl suggested that a lack of mental toughness and some blown assignments were factors in the poor preseason defense.
“We got down on ourselves when we got scored on a couple of times, and we stopped doing what we do on defense, stopped playing together,” he said. “There was always one person nobody was covering ... one person that took a possession off, that wasn’t focused enough.”
Point guard Dejounte Murray said it boils down to effort.
“Some dudes want to play defense, some dudes don’t want to play defense,” he said. “But when you just give a full effort on the defensive end, offensive end, you never know what you are capable of doing. If we give a lot of effort and have trust that your teammate has your back, that will go a long way.”
Guard DeMar DeRozan said the Spurs need to “play with a sense of urgency, aggressiveness” from the start.
“We have a tendency throughout the game to have moments where we pick up our defensive intensity and we play extremely hard,” he said. “We got to do that right out the gate.”
One thing that could spark a defensive turnaround is the absence of guards Bryn Forbes, who signed with Milwaukee, and Marco Belinelli, who is ending his career in his native Italy.
Despite ranking as one of the league’s worst defensive players last season, Forbes finished fourth on the team in minutes per game, ahead of White and Lonnie Walker IV, who, like Gay, believes the defensive intensity will increase Wednesday.
“It’s regular season now,” Walker said. “Everyone is focused on defense and playing the right way. I am not too concerned about the defensive end.”
Drafting two defensiveminded players should also help. Guard Devin Vassell, the 11th pick, could immediately contribute after tying for the league lead in preseason steals with 3.0 per game.
Jones is viewed as a project, albeit one that was considered the best defensive point guard in his class.
“He’s a great defender,” Walker said. “He picks (the ball) up full court, day in and day out.”