First step in Orlando: getting back in shape
As part of his coronavirus self-isolation and self-improvement plan during the NBA shutdown, Spurs forward Rudy Gay picked up a book.
According to its promotional website, James Clear’s “Atomic Habits” is a “comprehensive guide on how to change your habits and get 1 percent better every day.”
With the Spurs having entered the NBA’s bubble in Orlando to begin the strangest playoff push in team history, Gay figures now is as good a time as any to put what he learned into practice.
“This is a time I’m going to be away from my family, be away from everybody, be away from normal life,” Gay said. “But what is normal life right now? (The book) helps me redesign my mind about how to think and how to prepare myself for what’s to come.”
The Spurs arrived in Central Florida on Thursday afternoon, with their first full-squad practice since March scheduled for today.
Between now and at least Aug. 13 — when the playoff seeding portion of the NBA reboot concludes — the Spurs will be on their own to answer Gay’s unanswerable question: What is normal life right now?
Getting back on the practice floor will be one way to approximate normalcy. Over the past two weeks, the Spurs have been holding mandatory individual workouts at their practice facility in San Antonio.
Under league edict, these one-on-none sessions have been limited to three or four players in the gym at a time, with an assistant coach assigned to each.
The first time the Spurs’ roster assembled in full was to catch Thursday’s flight to Orlando. For the Spurs, the first step in training camp 2.0 will be to get everyone in basketball shape again.
For much of the shutdown, team facilities were shuttered and players were barred from using public gyms.
Some had not taken a jumper on a regulation hoop until the practice gym was reopened in late June.
“It’s hard to be in basketball shape without actually playing basketball,” said guard Derrick White, who remained in San Antonio during the hiatus. “We had a bike at home, so I did that. I tried to do anything I could to stay in shape, eat right or whatever it takes.”
Once the doors to the Spurs’ practice site were unlocked, White began to ease his way back.
His return began with a focus on the rudimentary.
“The first week or so, it was just form shooting, feeling the ball, feeling the basics,” White said. “Just getting the feel for everything.”
“Now we’ve been moving it back, doing normal workout stuff,” he said. “Shooting 3
s off the dribble and doing things like that.”
In a sense, DeMar DeRozan was one of the lucky ones.
While players across the NBA searched for novel ways to keep sharp during the league’s coronavirus-inspired hiatus, DeRozan had to look no further than his backyard.
Having returned home to Los Angeles, DeRozan said he spent much of the NBA lockdown shooting on his hoop at home.
Still, he admits something was missing from his at-home workouts.
“My whole life I’ve been playing basketball, every single day since I was 7 or 8 years old,” DeRozan said. “Not being able to play 5-on-5 five the last three months would take a toll on anybody.”
Though the team likely will ease into things beginning with today’s practice, 5-on-5 is no longer verboten as players ramp up toward playing games that count.
The Spurs’ first seeding game is July 31 against Sacramento.
“It will probably take about a week or so to get the feel back,” forward Trey Lyles said, perhaps optimistically. “But everyone is going to be excited to play again, so I don’t see it being a problem for too long.”
In Orlando, the Spurs likely will find players at varying levels of fitness and readiness. Lyles spent most of his time during the NBA pause at home in Indianapolis, where he had access to two personal gyms.
“I was in the gym every day, playing basketball, weight lifting and stuff like that,” Lyles said. “I definitely stayed on top of everything.”
Newly signed center Tyler Zeller was not as fortunate. He worked out with the University of North Carolina team until the NCAA season was scrapped.
With a newborn daughter in the house and a 3-year-old son wreaking havoc, Zeller found workouts to be challenging by the end of the shutdown.
“I just tried to do as much as possible,” Zeller said. “Even if that meant pushups with our son running all over me and stuff like that.”
For his part, the 33-year-old Gay said he wasn’t able to participate in many basketball activities until the Spurs’ gym reopened.
Even so, he believes he kept himself in good enough shape during the shutdown.
To hear Gay tell it, some of those “Atomic Habits” took root long before the pandemic hit.
“I’m into fitness and staying healthy and my diet,” Gay said. “As you get older and longer in the league, you never want to get out of shape. As far as being in shape and being able to snap back, I kept a good handle on that.”