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STATEMENT FROM SAN ANTONIO SPURS HEAD COACH GREGG POPOVICH:
“I’ve decided not to return to the sidelines this season. Mitch Johnson and his staff have done a wonderful job and the resolve and professionalism the players have shown, sticking together during a challenging season, has been outstanding. I will continue to focus on my health with the hope that I can return to coaching in the future.”
The San Antonio Spurs have been rebuilding in recent seasons. But for those who have followed coach Gregg Popovich’s entire tenure with the team, recent seasons, and especially this one, have been a different kind of time. Via the San Antonio Express-News:
From Day 1 of this season built to lose, Popovich’s positivity has not waned.
It is a feature not lost on Spurs players, who are trying to ride out a developmental season as best they can.
“I’m sure it’s frustrating, coming from a lot of success and winning a bunch of championships,” center Zach Collins said. “He doesn’t show that to us, though. He’s always very positive. He’s always telling us how to get better.”
For a coach who has won more NBA games than anyone in history, the past four Spurs seasons must have felt like something of an out-of-body experience.
From 1997-98 through 2016-17, Popovich’s Spurs never won fewer than 50 games or the prorated equivalent. The 1998-99 squad won 37 games in a season shortened to 50 because of a labor dispute.
The Spurs are 14-35 this season, which is the 14th best record in the Western conference.
Their leading scorers so far in 2022-23 are Keldon Johnson at 21.5 PPG and Devin Vassell, who has played in just 29 games due to injury, at 19.4 PPG. Other Spurs are all scoring below 14 PPG.
It’s always fun to hear how NBA players and coaches talk about guys on other teams. Here’s the Denver Post reporting Gregg Popovich’s words about Nuggets start center Nikola Jokic:
Legendary Spurs coach Gregg Popovich is more ornery than complimentary and more evasive than honest.
That’s why, even after Nikola Jokic’s 25-point, 11-assist clinic against the Spurs on Aug. 6, his postgame testimonial came as such a shock.
“He’s like a reincarnation of Larry Bird,” said Popovich, who two years ago scoffed at the suggestion Jokic was revolutionary.
“When I think of revolutions, I think of people like Che Guevara, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin,” he said in December 2018. “I don’t really think of Jokic as revolutionary, so I think you’re a bit hyperbolic there. But he is one heck of a player.”
The Nuggets in the first round will face a short-handed Jazz team that will be without forward Bojan Bogdanovic for the duration of the the playoffs due to injury, and point guard Mike Conley for at least a game or so, as the team waits for him to return from Ohio following the birth of his son.