It felt hard to log back into the Spurs for this one. I was still carrying the weight of that double dip with the Warriors, the kind of sports hangover that lingers longer than it should. Close the blinds. Sip a blue Gatorade. Accept, with a quiet wince, that the words “slight calf injury” are among the worst things you can hear about Victor Wembanyama. Drift back toward the safety of bed. That was the plan.
But the NBA schedule cares not for my metaphysical malaise. The gears of commerce and entertainment
must forever grind forward with no concern for pain, joy, fear, or anything remotely human. At best, they offer a temporary distraction from “the horrors,” a passing comfort and nothing more. So, with the reluctant duty of a hamster crawling back onto the wheel, I turned my attention to the TV at 3:00 PM on an otherwise gorgeous Sunday afternoon to watch the Spurs face the Kings.
Did stomping around on a bad team help my feelings? More than I thought, but less than I wanted. I mean, it’s the Kings. What is even happening over there? I kept looking at each player and thinking that, sure, in a vacuum, I like the concept of this. Sabonis? He’s a real NBA player with, like, a good reputation and stuff. DeMar? Will probably still be a bucket long after we’re gone. Schröder? He’s like the Michael Jordan of the German national team. Russell Westbrook??? He’s Russell Westbrook! All that said, once you stop unfocusing your eyes you remember what a mess you’re looking at. It almost makes you mad that the Spurs aren’t blowing them off the court even more.
Look, it was a nice win. It was nice to see that the team wasn’t feeling quite as hung up on the Warriors games as I was. It was nice to see them look competent without their tall French safety blanket. It was nice to see De’Aaron Fox grab the car keys and really run the show for a bit. Truly! It was all very nice, and I’m pleased with the result. It’s the kind of game that needs to be an automatic W, and the guys treated it as such. Very businesslike. Very professional. I will finish writing this and hopefully never think about this game again. Well done everyone!
It’s my own problem that I didn’t enjoy this more. I know that. We’ve spent a long time around here getting fed a steady diet of games that were “interesting” but ultimately didn’t matter. We’re developing talent and we’re growing, incrementally, into a real team that matters. We’ve been teaching and learning. We’ve been not feeling bad about losses because they didn’t really affect anything yet. We’ve been grinding. We’ve been “pounding the rock.” We’ve been turning and turning in the widening gyre and slouching our way toward the Bethlehem that is “being relevant.”
Those Warriors games felt real to me, though. The intensity, the stakes, the level of basketball on display, it was operating at a frequency that Spurs games haven’t touched in a really long time. Watching games like that is why we do this. They make you feel the passion and fervor that you felt in the heyday of Tim, Tony and Manu. They make you shout, scream and hug strangers when you win, and they make you walk around for a week like you were punched in the gut when you lose. Those games were electric. They devastated me in a way a regular season Spurs game has not had the capacity to do in a while. I’m cold and I am shamed, lying naked on the floor. Sports, man! They’ve really got the goods when they’ve the goods, you know?
This Kings game, though. Well. Like I said, it was nice.
Takeaways
- Hey! This is a guy who isn’t panicking about Steph Castle’s hip! Nope, none of that here. Reporters saying he was moving a little stiffly with it before the game too? I pretend I do not see it. It’s a bump. A scratch. A slight bruise. This is a guy who isn’t worried about it becoming some lingering, festering wound that derails what could have been a promising season. While we’re at it, this is also a guy who feels fine that Dylan Harper is still just “out.” We love to hear about “ramping up basketball activities,” and we know exactly what that means. Everything is cool and groovy. Did the Spurs accidentally choose the scary “calf injury” option for Victor when what they really meant was “a cheeky little rest?” Haha, what jokesters. We love to joke. We’re not panicking.
- I know my whole bit in this thing was about the game not feeling like it mattered, but it definitely mattered to De’Aaron Fox, and he certainly played like it. I don’t mean to be dismissive of it. He was really good. He pushed the pace and got the team into a real flowing motion that feels like what the Spurs might look like in a universe where things don’t always revolve around where Wembanyama is at all times. I’m sure there’s a vision for the Spurs looking like that even with Vic in the lineup, so it’s probably good that everyone is getting some reps in playing this way. Not panicking!
- I don’t know when, where or how I will ever find the time to do it, but I feel like Keldon Johnson deserves a book written about him that just sort of sings his praises. He doesn’t get enough credit for the load he shouldered during the weird limbo years between DeMar’s departure and Vic’s arrival. Watching him struggle a bit in the 1A role probably hurt his stock league-wide and, frankly, internally with Spurs fans more than we acknowledge, because we couldn’t help but focus on what he wasn’t capable of doing. He’s now in the role he was destined for. He’s overflowing with energy and he does all the little things that glue this roster together. I’m excited every time he checks in because I know he’s just going to get out there and do stuff. He loves San Antonio and he loves being a Spur. He’s perfect and I hope he plays here forever.
- Always really happy to see DeMar. I have so much affection for that dude, and I feel like I don’t have enough genuine ways to show it. You know that feeling where you just want to give someone a hug so they know they meant something to you? But then you remember he’s a very famous basketball player who is also very much a stranger to you, and he might get weirded out if you came up and hugged him out of nowhere? Anyone? Does anyone else get that?
WWL Post Game Press Conference
– How many recap columns out there this season do you think reference W.B. Yeats and Natalie Imbruglia to get across how they feel about a basketball team?
– Not enough of them, I’ll tell you that much. In general, I think if you aren’t associating watching sports with the world spinning out of control into a frightening and uncertain future, where the façade of everything you thought was true collapses around you and leaves you emotionally exposed and unsure how to go on, then you’re not doing it right.
– And you think Yeats and Imbruglia are the two artists who tap into that for you?
– I can feel you being patronizing, but I’m almost positive that the end of the world, a devastating breakup and a really tough sports loss exist on the same plane of emotional resonance for most people.
– That seems unhealthy. Those three things don’t represent the same level of threat to your well-being. Why would you react emotionally to them in the same manner? It’s like having the same cortisol spike to a butterfly attack and a bear attack.
– You seem like the type of guy who is trying to apply logic to the realm of human emotion, and that feels like a mission that is doomed from the start. It’s not about logic. It’s about saying, “wow, the Spurs blowing that lead made me feel bad. I’m going to process it by imagining how I would react if the apocalypse commenced on the same day my wife filed for divorce.”
– So you just exaggerate the extent of your pain to make your irrational emotions match up accordingly?
– I still don’t like your tone, but, uh, yea that’s about the gist of it.
