Even Without Tim Duncan, Small-Ball Still Doesn’t Appeal to San Antonio Spurs

In an NBA that seems obsessed with the long ball, the Spurs stick out as a throwback to a bygone era.

Tim Duncan may have retired but his replacement Pau Gasol is both taller and longer. With LaMarcus Aldridge joining Gasol in the low post, the Spurs are the closest thing the NBA has to an old school, inside-out offensive attack. Last season’s leading scorer, small forward Kawhi Leonard, says he is committed to getting more of his offense this season from drives into the paint, rather than focusing even more on the 3-point line, where he was the team’s most accurate long-distance shooter.

“I’m going to have to get to the lane more to make plays for my team this year, more than trying to stay out at the 3-point line,” Leonard said.

Simply stated, this Spurs team is built for an inside-out game. If Aldridge, Gasol and Leonard aren’t the Spurs’ top three scorers it will mean at least one of them suffered a serious injury.

This is not to suggest Gregg Popovich is mired in the past, though one could hardly blame if he were. After all, his run to the third-best winning percentage among those who have coached at least 500 NBA games (68.5 percent, trailing only Phil Jackson and Billy Cunningham) began because he was able to pair David Robinson and Tim Duncan in the low post. But he also learned the small ball concept from its originator, Don Nelson, and adapted early to strategic use of the long ball, including tactical use of stretch fours like Robert Horry and Matt Bonner.

Popovich knows his re-constructed Spurs lineup won’t thrive without giving his post players the space they need to operate by maintaining a credible deep threat.

“Pretty honest, I don’t think we are the only team with two big guys that can score,” Popovich said. “But the three is still important. You have to make threes to win in this league. You can’t win without threes. You throw it to a big guy and let him shoot twos all night long, you lose. That’s the way it is.”

Check Western Conference lineups and it is evident that only the Grizzlies figure to be as post-centric as the Spurs.

The Hawks have had a Spurs look to them since hiring Mike Budenholzer away from Popovich in 2013 and may play more of an inside-out game this season after signing Dwight Howard to team with Paul Millsap on the front line. But Budenholzer believes the Spurs will be more committed to post offense than any team this season.

“I think it is possible,” Budenholzer said. “Between Kawhi and LaMarcus and Pau, they’ve got three great post-up options. I think Pau, especially, is such a unique passer. He can leave the post and facilitate offense and get other people involved in opportunities. He’s just a natural there, so I can definitely see where they could trend that way.”

It’s hard to argue with the Spurs’ dedication to low post scoring, even when the analytics that have driven the ascendancy of the long ball suggest the interior game is archaic.

“They’ve won multiple championships here being who they are,” said Aldridge, the 6-foot-11 power forward who signed the biggest free agent contract in Spurs history to join the team in July of 2015. “Why change it now? We have some guys who can play the way they want to play here, so let’s go do it.”

Playing on one of the league’s tallest and most …

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