SAN ANTONIO (AP) -- The San Antonio Spurs had just finished a
dreary homestand with another loss when Manu Ginobili was asked:
Might he or Tony Parker be traded to turn things around?
A reporter didn't ask. It was a season-ticket holder.
Limping into an three-week road trip starting Wednesday that Tim
Duncan says is the most important one yet, this is the Spurs: so
inconsistent that the once-absurd idea of trading two of the Big
Three is sounding plausible to some of their most loyal fans.
Ginobili doesn't think he or Parker are going anywhere. But
where the Spurs are ultimately headed may be determined in the next
eight games.
The Rodeo Road Trip -- the annual get-it-together moment for the
Spurs -- has arrived.
"We really need to get this bunker mentality together more than
before," Ginobili said after the Spurs went 2-4 at home in 12
days. "If we're going to be the contenders we know we can be, this
is the time we've got to show up."
Mostly because time is running out.
The Spurs are 27-19 -- a bottom seed in the Western Conference if
the playoffs began today, and certainly worse than most expected
after the Spurs got healthy this summer and went on a spending
spree to keep the window open for a fifth NBA title.
The record is the lowest winning percentage San Antonio has
carried into Feb. 1 in the Duncan era. The Spurs also better get
used to the road, because thanks to a frontloaded home schedule,
they have just 12 games in San Antonio the rest of the season.
Panic is not a Spurs custom. Winning streaks or losing skids,
coach Gregg Popovich and his veteran core keep the Spurs
even-keeled and always mindful of perspective. They play for April
and May, not December and January.
But February is a traditional turning point. Since the Spurs
moved into the AT&T Center in 2002, they're left homeless each year
about this time by the annual San Antonio Livestock Show and Rodeo.
Popovich has seized on the trip as an inimitable bonding
opportunity -- no families, no distractions -- and with great
success.
The Spurs are 40-16 in seven rodeo toad trips. The trek has
traditionally propelled their final burst to the playoffs, and with
San Antonio struggling to find traction, Duncan declared this trip
crucial for the Spurs.
"We hope the results of the past are what we get now," Duncan
said. "Because we need to turn that corner. We've always used this
trip to kind of get on a roll. Hopefully we can do just that and
come back a better team than we're leaving."
What the Spurs want to leave behind is sloppy defense and
unreliable shooting. Popovich began a season-long, six-game
homestand last month flustered that "we're scoring more points
than we've ever scored in our lives, but our defense is really
sub-par and it's killing us."
That much is true: the Spurs average nearly 101 points a game, a
record pace under Popovich. But so is allowing 96.2 points to
opponents.
When the homestand ended Sunday with a loss to Denver, Popovich
turned his frustration toward the offense, even though the Nuggets
were still allowed to shoot 54 percent. He criticized the team's
inability to make a basket at big moments.
"We can't expect to shoot like this two out of every four games
and expect to get anywhere," Popovich said. "People got to step
up and make some .... shots."
The road trip begins against the Kings, followed by Portland on
Thursday before heading to Los Angeles. San Antonio plays the
Lakers on Monday and will face a team expected to be much more
healthy than the team the Spurs blew out last month.
San Antonio may be the short-handed one this time. The Spurs
have not said when they'll get back Parker, who has missed the last
two games with an ankle sprain.
"If we beat Sacramento or Portland it doesn't make us all the
sudden feel excited about the way we're playing," swingman Richard
Jefferson said. "We're looking for consistency over a 10, 12,
15-game stretch."
