Spurs Faithful Address - 2018-19 Season in Review
Jul 3, 2019 16:20:58 GMT
Ian Noble, Walt Frazier, and 4 more like this
Post by George Gervin on Jul 3, 2019 16:20:58 GMT
To our passionate fanbase,
The 2018-19 season is in the history books for the Spurs, and it was a pleasant surprise for our rebuilding franchise to finish the season with a 38-44 record and fighting for the last playoff spot in the Western Conference down to the last week of the regular season. We saw tremendous development from our two star rookies, Luka Doncic and Shai Gilegous-Alexander, who shouldered the scoring and play making load for our roster and played beyond their years. We also got great contributions from players up and down the roster, including strong and consistent rebounding from Mason Plumlee, our main free agent acquisition, and bench players like Yogi Ferrell, Moritz Wagner, and Cody Zeller.
Much like the end of last season, we were incredibly active during the regular season on the trade front, executing six trades involving a lot of moving pieces. Some sent out last vestiges of the legacy Spurs, such as Derrick Rose, and others relative newcomers, like Danny Green and Patrick Patterson, were dealt away to set up future moves. After the flurry, we were left with a stockpile of dead money contracts that, coupled with Fancy Boy Parsons expiring $25 MM next season, will put our organization in the position to clear up to $96 MM from books. This will set us up to have significant cap space next offseason, and the ability to surround our two young backcourt partners with a solid supporting cast.
We have also continued, in the Spurs spirit, of dipping into the international pool for talent. In addition to our current imports from Slovenia, Canada, and Germany, we have added the first player drafted in Round 1 from Japan, Rui Hachimura. We are excited to bring him and Jaylen Nowell, who both played their college years in the Pacific Northwest, to our burgeoning young core from the 2018 draft.
We have also added to our management ranks, bringing in Spurs legend Tim Duncan as our Assistant GM. We share a similar draft philosophy, as well as organic team development, that should prove well as we ascend in future seasons in the ranks of both the Western Conference and the League.
However, none of this would be possible without the continued support from you, the fans, in all of this. We had hedged our bets in our season preview that it may be a rough year compared to previous seasons, and the team responded with an exciting campaign that went down to the wire for a surprise playoff berth. We can only hope, with continued offseason development from our young core and use of the Mid-level exception in FA this offseason to add a player or two, that we will break through into the playoff picture and show that our rebuild is transitioning to contention sooner than anyone could predict.
Stay strong, Spurs faithful— the best is yet to come.
—G. Gervin
The 2018-19 season is in the history books for the Spurs, and it was a pleasant surprise for our rebuilding franchise to finish the season with a 38-44 record and fighting for the last playoff spot in the Western Conference down to the last week of the regular season. We saw tremendous development from our two star rookies, Luka Doncic and Shai Gilegous-Alexander, who shouldered the scoring and play making load for our roster and played beyond their years. We also got great contributions from players up and down the roster, including strong and consistent rebounding from Mason Plumlee, our main free agent acquisition, and bench players like Yogi Ferrell, Moritz Wagner, and Cody Zeller.
Much like the end of last season, we were incredibly active during the regular season on the trade front, executing six trades involving a lot of moving pieces. Some sent out last vestiges of the legacy Spurs, such as Derrick Rose, and others relative newcomers, like Danny Green and Patrick Patterson, were dealt away to set up future moves. After the flurry, we were left with a stockpile of dead money contracts that, coupled with Fancy Boy Parsons expiring $25 MM next season, will put our organization in the position to clear up to $96 MM from books. This will set us up to have significant cap space next offseason, and the ability to surround our two young backcourt partners with a solid supporting cast.
We have also continued, in the Spurs spirit, of dipping into the international pool for talent. In addition to our current imports from Slovenia, Canada, and Germany, we have added the first player drafted in Round 1 from Japan, Rui Hachimura. We are excited to bring him and Jaylen Nowell, who both played their college years in the Pacific Northwest, to our burgeoning young core from the 2018 draft.
We have also added to our management ranks, bringing in Spurs legend Tim Duncan as our Assistant GM. We share a similar draft philosophy, as well as organic team development, that should prove well as we ascend in future seasons in the ranks of both the Western Conference and the League.
However, none of this would be possible without the continued support from you, the fans, in all of this. We had hedged our bets in our season preview that it may be a rough year compared to previous seasons, and the team responded with an exciting campaign that went down to the wire for a surprise playoff berth. We can only hope, with continued offseason development from our young core and use of the Mid-level exception in FA this offseason to add a player or two, that we will break through into the playoff picture and show that our rebuild is transitioning to contention sooner than anyone could predict.
Stay strong, Spurs faithful— the best is yet to come.
—G. Gervin