Lottery balls took a great bounce for Duncan, too

["Stephen Beauregard" <sb@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Lottery balls took a great bounce for Duncan, too


By Peter May, Globe Staff, 6/3/2003

ix years into a career that has produced one NBA championship, a Rookie of the
Year award, two Most Valuable Player awards, five All-Star Game appearances,
and six straight spots on the All-NBA first team, don't you think it's time to
restate the obvious?



Tim Duncan and San Antonio have been an ideal fit.

To those of you still wondering how the Ping-Pong balls managed to deliver
Duncan to San Antonio on that fateful May afternoon in 1997, be advised that
there was some sagacious, external, basketball-savvy force at work. Almost any
place else would have been either a disaster (Denver) or a temporary stay
(Boston, Clippers).

The Spurs' good fortune that day is evident: They're going for their second
NBA title in Duncan's tenure. Game 1 of the NBA Finals against the Nets is
tomorrow night in San Antonio. The Spurs would be still looking for No. 1 had
he gone elsewhere.

But Duncan is just as blessed. He arrived on a team with a superstar already
in place and a no-nonsense coach whose style meshes perfectly with his own
no-nonsense approach.

And he arrived on a team that was your basic lottery fluke -- one that isn't
going back to Secaucus soon. That was the cherry on the sundae for Duncan. His
idea of rebuilding is going from 50 to 60 wins.

The Spurs won 20 games during the 1996-97 season. It remains the worst record
(20-62) in the history of the franchise. To say that was at variance with the
norm is to understate the obvious. The year before, they won 59 games. The
year before that, they won 62. But in 1996-97, David Robinson missed 76 games,
Charles Smith (the reasonably accomplished one from Pitt) missed 63 games, and
Sean Elliott missed 43. Their leading scorer that season: 37-year-old
Dominique Wilkins, who averaged 18.2 points a game.

Only the Celtics (15-67) and Grizzlies (14-68) had worse records. But the
20-win season quickly became an aberration with the arrival of Duncan. The
cerebral rookie from Wake Forest found himself joining a playoff-ready team
led by one of the most admired and skilled big men to play the position.

So not only did Duncan join a good team, he also joined a good team in a city
with no media vultures (Shea Hillenbrand's kind of place) and one with a Hall
of Famer ready to take him under his wing. Think that would have happened in
Boston? Rick Pitino would have driven Duncan nuts with his incessant carping.
Can't you just hear him: ''Tim, son, you've got to box out.''

Had Duncan come to Boston, we would have enjoyed him for three years, then he
would have hightailed it to Orlando, not San Antonio. The Magic might even
have won an NBA title.

You may remember that Duncan went into the lottery that year hoping two teams
would not get the No. 1 pick: Boston and the Clippers. He didn't make that
known until well after the fact. But he could not have planned it any better
than the way it turned out.

''I don't think he could have come to a better situation,'' says Spurs
assistant P.J. Carlesimo. ''To [not only] play with another superstar, but to
be welcomed by him and then, when the time was appropriate, to step aside so
that it became Tim's team. Their relationship is just unbelievable.

''There are not a lot of players who have achieved what David has achieved who
would welcome another guy with open arms, teach him the ropes, and is there,
day in and day out, to teach him that this is the way to play basketball, and
this is the way you act in the NBA. Tim has come in and taken it to a whole
new level.''

But Duncan's success also says something about who he is and what he brought
to the Spurs. And how Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, himself an NBA rookie as the
main man, was smart enough to figure out he didn't have a work-in-progress
coming aboard. He had a guy who already knew how to play and, almost as
important, came in unaffected by the hideous culture that now envelops almost
every young basketball star in the country.

''He is lucky,'' Popovich said. ''He grew up with no one kissing his butt his
whole life and giving him things from age 8. So he learned. He went to
college, and in four years, Dave Odom taught him all the fundamentals. He
wanted to learn, and he learned, and he came into the league ready and
unspoiled.

''A lot of guys come in here and can't be coached. They don't really want to
get better. They're not able to understand that criticism is not negative but
it's to make you better. They're not able to handle criticism. Tim didn't have
any of that. It was huge.''

The Spurs do things a certain way, and in this day and age, that way is at
odds with most of the Jumbotron/wiggling/chest thumping sense of entitlement
that defines today's NBA.

Carlesimo ventured that no two All-Stars, with the possible exception of John
Stockton and Karl Malone, get more daily criticism than Duncan and Robinson.

''They practice hard. They get yelled at. Nobody says boo. It's just the way
we do things around here,'' Carlesimo said. ''You can be a dumb rookie and
come in here and, by the second day, you know how it is.''

Popovich said the team has deliberately stayed away from certain players over
the years because of character issues, although he did concede it would be
hard to win with 12 social workers. Needless to say, Duncan embodies the way
the Spurs do things: without fanfare, with success.

His relationship with Popovich is a strong one; Duncan never forgot that Pop
sat him during the 2000 playoffs when Duncan had a sore knee. The Spurs lost
in the first round. Duncan fended off a serious wooing from the Magic that
summer and stayed put. He's a San Antonio lifer now.

''I like where we stand and I like our position for the future,'' said Duncan.
''We'll have an opportunity to add some talent to our team and, at the same
time, we continue to win. It's a situation you can't beat.''

It's the San Antonio Way, preached by Popovich and personified by Duncan. It's
not for everyone. But this is a match made in hoop heaven.

Thanks,

Steve
sb@maine.rr.com

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