Media day is usually pretty boring. It’s hours of PR-gated answers that don’t say much about what will happen when the regular season games start. But this year, something was different at the San Antonio Spurs media day. If you read all the tea leaves, it sure would seem like San Antonio will have a new starter in their first five.
All comments from the day indicated that Dylan Harper will start this year, despite the expectation that he would come off the bench again in year two.
It started with
a GQ article featuring Stephon Castle and Harper. Here is the full back-and-forth with Castle and Harper (edited for language):
Harper and Castle are discussing how short this offseason has felt for the pair when a smile erupts across Harper’s face.
“I’m going to win Sixth Man of the Year this year,” he says.
“No you’re not, bro,” Castle scoffs.
The reference—to the prize awarded to the best player who comes off the bench—is surprising; only a month earlier at a press conference after the Finals, teammate Devin Vassell suggested that Harper had been frustrated with “playing time and different roles that he was in.”
“I’m going to win Sixth Man of the Year,” Harper insists.
“You’re not going to be Sixth Man,” Castle says. “Who are you going to be Sixth Man for?”
“I don’t f-ing know—God?” Harper answers.
You don’t actually think you’re going to come off the bench, do you? I cut in.
“What’s the political answer here?” Harper says, looking down at my recorder again. He calibrates his voice into its cheeriest pitch: “I’m going to do whatever the team needs me to do, man. If that’s come off the bench….”
He stops. “That’s crazy. F- no. I ain’t coming off no bench.”
“Bro, all you got to know is you going to be in the starting lineup,” Castle says, ending the discussion. “Be ready to hoop.” (Later in the conversation, Harper walks the Sixth Man thing back: “I was lying,” he says. “I had a smile on my face.”)
Now that mostly seems like playful banter between two young teammates. But Castle’s insistence that Harper will be a starter is interesting. It doesn’t sound like an uninformed thing for him to say, knowing very well his teammates would likely hear it, too. Could the Spurs all be on the same page about Harper’s role? This doesn’t provide enough information on its own.
But when you pair it with head coach Mitch Johnson’s comments, it sure seems like the Spurs know who will be in the starting five to begin the season.
“I see all three of them playing together”, Johnson said when asked about playing De’Aaron Fox, Castle and Harper together. “I don’t know the definition of a lot more, but more than we did in the regular season, for sure.”
He also said he wants them to have more opportunities to play with each other and grow the chemistry that only comes with reps and time. What is the best way for them to get that time? Starting the season in the first unit and figuring it out before the rotation starts to solidify ahead of the playoffs.
Even Fox had something to say about the trio playing together.
“I think we had some success when us three were on the court,” Fox said. “It didn’t happen a lot, but I definitely expect to see it more, and for us to continue to grow both offensively and defensively.”
What’s funny is that Harper, of all people, downplayed the conversation at media day.
“The biggest thing for me is whatever I can do, just like last year, to help the team win, in whatever position all of the coaches think is best for me to be in; that’s the position I’m happily going,” Harper said.
It seems like Harper will be happily going into the starting lineup alongside Fox, Castle, Victor Wembanyama, and one of Tobias Harris, Julian Champagnie, or Devin Vassell. We won’t have to wait long to find out, as the Spurs start their preseason schedule next week on October 8th.
