THE DUDE BRANCH
OAKLAND, Calif. — Dejounte Murray glanced over his shoulder late Thursday and did a double-take. For the first time all night, he looked confused.
“You’re not waiting for me, are you?” he asked the cameraman standing next to his locker and holding a microphone. “You’re a star now,” a reporter told him. “Nah,” Murray said. “I’m still just a regular dude.”
Maybe the next week will make that all too obvious. Against a team awash in basketball celebrities with no doubts about their superstardom, maybe Murray and the rest of the Spurs will learn just how much difference there is between first place in the Western Conference and second.
The Warriors, after all, make a lot of good players look like regular dudes.
But if the Spurs have a chance, it’s partly because of two guys with the potential and the pedigree to be more than that. Golden State can handle Kawhi Leonard if he doesn’t get help.
Murray and LaMarcus Aldridge, though, might turn this into a real series after all.
This will be the first conference finals appearance for each, although the Murray has a better excuse. He entered the NBA a decade after Aldridge did.
So one of them is unseasoned and the other is past his historical depth, but both could make the Warriors sweat.
If Golden State has a weakness, it’s interior defense, something Aldridge exploited way back in the regular-season opener.
And while no rookie guard figures to worry Steph Curry or Klay Thompson, Murray’s 6-foot-5 frame and cartoon-level athleticism might help the Spurs keep up even when the Warriors push the pace.
In Thursday’s emphatic elimination of Houston, Murray showed why many believe the Spurs used the 29th overall selection to pull off the biggest coup of last year’s draft. Continuing to fill in for the injured Tony Parker, he scored 11 points, grabbed 10 rebounds and dished out five assists.
The only other rookies in Spurs history with postseason double-doubles?
David Robinson, Tim Duncan and Kawhi Leonard.
That’s heady stuff for a 20-year-old, but it’s also what he expects. While he’s quick to point out he is nothing even resembling an NBA All-Star, he also is adamant about his desire to become one.
“I don’t want to be an average player,” Murray said. “I want to separate myself. Some dudes get satisfied by just making it to the NBA, I want people to look back and say, ‘He was a hell of a player.’” 9-to-1 underdogs
A couple of years ago, that’s exactly what people said about Aldridge. He was the most coveted free agent of the 2015 offseason, and when he signed with the Spurs it prompted stories about how the juggernaut Warriors had found a new juggernaut rival.
How did that work out? Well, in their long-awaited playoff showdown Sunday, the vaunted Spurs will take the court as 9-to-1 series underdogs, according to at least one Las Vegas sports book.
Kevin Durant’s presence in Golden State has something to do with that, but so does the underwhelming tenure of another former Longhorn in San Antonio. Although Aldridge got out of his own head long enough to deliver his first dominant performance of the postseason Thursday, he hasn’t provided much evidence he can keep it up.
If he doesn’t, the Spurs might as well make their vacation plans for 10 days from now, because they have no chance. Every time he touches the ball in this series, he will have a matchup edge against someone either shorter or slower, and he knows what people will expect.
“The whole gym feels like it should be easy,” he said last week, before explaining, “it’s not that simple.” Must step up
Sometimes it is, though. The way Aldridge has tried to fit into the Spurs’ system and proved willing to defer to teammates is admirable, but Spurs won’t win a series against Curry, Thompson, Durant and Draymond Green with Aldridge merely being a complementary piece.
They need him to be the star they signed, and they need someone like Murray to prove he might become one.
Regular dudes are great. But this isn’t the series for them.