The Spurs Are Becoming the Next NBA Superpower

The Spurs Are Becoming the Next NBA Superpower

After nearly three decades of highly dominant, exceptional basketball underneath the Greg Popkovich era, this San Antonio Spurs organization has officially moved in a different direction as they are now under a brand new regime under the leadership of Mitch Johnson. They have a generational prospect in talent in Victor Webbyama. And this is an organization that is now not only building from the ground up, but they have one of the best promising young futures in the entirety of the NBA. This is a team and an organization that I believe in from top to bottom. And I do believe that this Spurs team in the next three years can win an NBA championship and I believe that they are going to only continue to ascend. Now, before I go ahead and I dive deep into talking about this San Antonio Spurs team, the things that I like, the things that I don’t like, some of their offseason moves, I will say that I had a very special moment that I want to share with you guys with Greg Pkovich a couple of years ago. So, I will leave a timestamp down below if you guys just want to go ahead and skip to it or you can just see it at the end of the video. Now, the San Antonio Spurs last season finished with a record of 34 and 38. They were the 13th seed in the Western Conference. And of course, Victor Winyama’s season was cut short after suffering a season ending injury back in February where he suffered a deep vein thrombosis which allowed him to only appear in 46 games. When averaged 24 points, 11 rebounds, one steel, 3.8 8 blocks a game and 3.1 three-pointers made a game. Webinama became the only player in NBA history to average 3 plus blocks and three plus threes in a season. We all know that this guy’s a special talent. He’s a unicorn. He is the greatest prospect I have ever seen in my lifetime at just 24 years of age and I don’t think that there will ever be another Victor Wimpyama. He is truly a special unique talent that I think is in a class of his own. But before I go ahead and I start talking about the depth chart really as a whole, let’s go ahead and talk about some of the offseason moves that the San Antonio Spurs had this off seasonason. When you take a look at some of their losses, nothing too notable, maybe outside of the fact that they did lose Chris Paul, who went back to the Los Angeles Clippers and Bismac Bambbo, who had signed a couple of 10-day contracts last season before signing for the entirety of the 2024-25 season. Those were their two notable losses, but I think that they had significantly better and more positive additions to the roster this off seasonason. The Spurs biggest free agent signing was signing Luke Cornett, center from the Boston Celtics to a 4-year, $41 million contract. That was a terrific signing. Luke Cornet really shined in Joe Missoula’s offense, and I think that he’s going to be a perfect complimentary big to Victor Wenyama. They also signed Lindy Waters to a one-year partially guaranteed deal. They also resigned Jordan Mccclofflin to a one-year $2.8 million contract. The San Antonio Spurs also made a trade with the Washington Wizards a couple of weeks ago, acquiring center Olen in exchange for Malachi Bronnham, Blake Wesley, and a 2026 second round pick. Now, the biggest news for the San Antonio Spurs came yesterday afternoon when they signed Dearren Fox to a 4-year, $229 million max contract extension. And although there was a ton of unnecessary criticism and hate that I’ll address here momentarily on Twitter about the Spurs organization and Darren Fox agreeing to this contract, let me say from my perspective, I thought that this was a terrific deal for both De’Arren Fox and the San Antonio Spurs. Not only is Darren Fox just 27 years of age, he’s a former all-star, still an all-star caliber guard, but he’s a guy that is going to help alleviate a ton of pressure off of Victor Webbyama. You have a primary ball handler. You have a franchise cornerstone piece in that backcourt. And although you do have other players like Dylan Harper and Stefan Castle, Darren Fox is the best player on this team right now, not named Victor Webbyama, I love this deal for Victor. I love this deal for Darren Fox and the Spurs organization. And it goes to show to the fans and to WebMyama that the Spurs are serious about building a championship contender around Wem. And that’s exactly what this move said. Just want to take a moment to say if you are appreciating this type of work and coverage from me, the best and easiest way to support me is by liking, commenting, and subscribing down below. It’s free and it helps me and the channel out tremendously. My goal is to get this channel up to 10,000 subscribers by the end of the calendar year. And if you guys want more exclusive content from me outside of just here on YouTube, you guys can go ahead and follow me on my socials. The links to all of them will be in the description down below. But thank you guys again and let’s go ahead and get back to today’s video. Now, there was some criticism about Dear Fox and the Spurs and his organization for getting this deal done yesterday on Twitter, which I’m not going to be too long with, but let’s go ahead and read some of it. Kevin O’ Conor tweeted out, “I don’t love this for the Spurs. Fox is not a maxle point guard on any team, and in San Antonio, he has overlapping skills with Castle and Harper.” Let’s address this first. Kevin O’ Conor, great analyst, does a great job with all of his work, but I completely disagree here. Although I do believe that he has overlapping skill sets with Dylan Harper and Stfan Castle. Stfan Castle in his rookie season was not the most efficient player. Something we’ll talk about later on. And Dylan Harper, he hasn’t played a single minute in the NBA yet. That is all, you know, contrary to belief about what you project they are going to be. Dear Fox right now is the proven talent. Dear Fox right now is the better player. And where I love this deal is the fact that Dear Fox’s contract is locked up until the 2030 31 season where he will be an unrestricted free agent. Which means even though you’re going to be forking out a ton of money in that cap for Dear Fox, you have Stfan Castle and Dylan Harper on rookie contracts where you can afford to have Dear Fox for the next 3, four years before you have an out on him on his contract and you can have those guys on rookie deals. So it is affordable and you have that leverage and those cap flexibilities to work to your benefit. And one more from Twitter. We got bias Houston. Love you my guy. Point guards better than Darren Fox in no order. SGA, Luca, Steph, Brunson, Cade, John Trey, Harden, Hallebertton, Dame, Maxi, Garland, Jamal, and at the bottom he says it starts becoming a convo at LaMelo and what position you consider book hero and Derek White. Let me just say first and foremost, I think that Darren Fox is somewhere between that 9 to 12 range. Wherever you want to kind of mix and match guys, I don’t really care about. But I could tell you with certainty that I would take Dear Fox over LaMelo Ball, over Tyler Herro, Derek White, Jamal Murray, Darius Garland, Tyrese Maxi, Damen Lillard’s coming off injury. And I would probably take him over James Harden at this point in his career. And look, it’s no disrespect to anybody with their list and their opinions. Of course, I have my own thoughts and opinions with it, but where this unnecessary criticism has just all of a sudden came out of nowhere for Dearron Fox has absolutely baffled me and blown my mind away. I think he’s a top 10 point guard in this game. But that’s just my opinion. And probably the best and most underrated move of the offseason for the San Antonio Spurs came when they gave head coach Mitch Johnson a multi-year contract extension in the month of May. And Mitch Johnson is somebody who I think has been spoken glowingly about around NBA circles. When you talk to other coaches and you see the way that people speak about the Spurs organization post Greg Papovic, people praise Mitch Johnson a ton. From my very brief time spent around him and just the way that this man carries himself. I think Mitch Johnson is the right guy for this job. I think that he’s going to be somebody that’s going to help grow and develop and establish and continue that winning culture that’s there in San Antonio. I absolutely love this move for the organization and I do believe that Mitch Johnson is the right man for this job. So now when you kind of go down the depth chart and you really look at what this first team looks like in that starting five, you’re going to have De’arren Fox. You’re going to have Stfan Castle, Devin Vel, Harrison Barnes who’s carved out a very nice career for himself post Golden State and of course Victor Wimyama. Off the bench you’re going to have guys like Jordan Mccclofflin, Dylan Harper, Kellen Johnson, Jeremy Shan, and Luke Cornett. And then even if you go further into the rotation, you’re going to look at guys like Carter Bryant, Kelly Olen, and Julian Champagne because I didn’t mention it, but let me briefly mention it. In the draft, the Spurs also took Dylan Harper with the second overall pick, and Carter Bryant with the 15th overall pick, who fell into their laps, a guy who I thought was going to be a Portland Trailblazer at the end of the draft night before Portland traded back to get Young Hansen. And Carter Bryant was arguably the biggest steal of the draft. I believe in Yang Hansen and his talent and his abilities, but when we talk about what this kid Carter Bryant did at the University of Arizona, you want to talk about a freak, athletic, defensive-minded wing. A guy who I think is going to be a multi-time AllNBA defensive talent. He’s going to be one of the best wing defenders in the NBA. And he has the potential to be a defensive player of the year for multiple times in his career alongside Victor Wanyama. that is absolutely undoubtedly going to be one of the best defensive pairings in the NBA for the foreseeable future. And I absolutely loved the way that the Spurs went out there and they took Carter Bryant in this year’s draft. So now really when you’re taking a look at this depth chart and you look at the roster collectively as a whole, this has a ton of talent. They have a ton of potential. And some of the biggest strengths that I notice with this roster is the fact that they have not only one of the best passing units in the game of basketball, a bunch of unselfish guys who are willing to share the rock. They were top five, I believe, in assist, assist to turnover ratio, and assist percentage last season. They have a ton of athleticism on the floor. I know I mentioned Carter Bryant and what a freak athlete he is, but you look at other guys like De’aran Fox, Devin Vel, Victor Webeyama, and Stefan Castle. some of the best young athletic players in this game right now. Where San Antonio is struggling and I think that they need to get better if they want to continue to take that next step is the fact that I do think that they’re lacking in their shooting department. They were at the bottom towards the league, number 20 overall in three-point percentage and they were just 13th in pace of play last year. something that I think that they need to go into the top seven, top eight if they want to continue to be a better offense because I think that they have the roster construction and the players in order to be successful, in order to get out on the break and create easier opportunities with guys like De’ar Fox, Dylan Harper, Stfan Castle running the floor, getting guys out open in transition, creating those easy opportunities. I’m not sure that the Spurs are ready this season with their current roster construction to make a deep postseason run. Of course, everything is going to bank on the health of Victor Webyama for the future. But where I do like the trajectory of the Spurs is the fact that they have the young developmental pieces that can grow and just continue to get better together with Mitch Johnson and his core. Because you look at Stefan Castle, who did not have the most efficient season last year, but he’s just 20 years of age. Dylan Harper, Carter Bryant, all of these young talented players can grow together and you’ve still got two all-star caliber players in Victor Webyama and Dearon Fox. This is a core that has a ton of potential. They still are going to have some draft capital and some cap space to work with in the future in order to micromanage this roster and to make more moves if necessary. There is still plenty of opportunity with this team for exponential growth. And like I said, the team is going to be banking on the health of Victor Wanyama, not just this season, but for the future. And although I do believe that this Spurs team is more than capable of winning a championship in the next 3 years, I think it’s possible. I think you have to look at teams like Minnesota, San Antonio, and Orlando as all of those teams that are on an upwards trajectory that really have an opportunity in the next couple of years of really winning an NBA championship. Now, before I go ahead and I end this video, let me go ahead and share that Greg Popkovich story with you guys very briefly. For you guys that don’t know me personally, I’ve been an NBA credentialed reporter and multimedia journalist that was working with Orlando Magic HQ the last two seasons. So, although I was working and I was covering with the Orlando Magic, I had an opportunity to meet Greg Popkovich during the 2023 24 season when the Spurs came to Orlando. And I think one story that I’ll always be able to share with my grandkids, my future kids, and something that I’ll always cherish forever is the fact that Greg Popkovich totally roasted me. My very first time I ever got to meet Greg Popkovich. And although I’m somebody who has the multimedia experience, I had the journalism experience and I’ve actually been in the industry talking with these coaches, these athletes, and these reporters, I don’t look at coaches and athletes as, you know, above me, right? I don’t usually get nervous around these people, but there are very few. And Greg Popkovich was one of those guys that I felt very nervous around. I’ve always idolized Greg Popkovich. And I grew up watching the Spurs dynasty. So, there was a part of me that felt like, wow, like this is Greg Papovich. And I will go ahead and I’ll play the clip for you guys so you guys can see the way that Greg Popkovich roasted me. I obviously jabbed back with him, you know, back and forth in a very light-hearted and playful manner. Um, but just to say that, you know, I had that experience and I handled the situation very well and um, you know, I had the ability to meet Greg Popkovich like that and, you know, he’s always been like that with journalists. That’s a moment that’ll always hold very dearly in my heart. Palibane Carol, kind of pick him back up on that point that Phil was making. He’s turned into one of the best the best players in the association at such a young age. You know, what have you seen from him in terms of his development on the court and then also just really his maturity at his age? I have no idea. No idea. Okay. Does he play for me? No, he does not. He actually doesn’t know. Do you know my record? Towards the bottom of the Western Conference. I don’t know the exact Pretty much. Yeah. You think I have things to do beside watch his film with Mr. Banchero? Not much, but uh I don’t know him personally, so I have nothing to say about his maturity. He might be the most mature guy ever or the worst for all I know. I would assume he’s great. What about a young player that you do have on your roster like Deon Bell? What have you seen from him in terms of his maturity? Then you’re just reaching out now, right? Now I am reaching. Yeah, I fig I figured you wanted me to get a good question out of you at this point. Anybody got a question that makes sense? But I do hope you guys enjoyed that little clip from Greg Papovich and kind of hearing my backstory about that. That was a very special moment for me and in my childhood and in my young career in which I got to experience that. But thank you guys again for watching and supporting today’s video. All of you guys’ continuous support doesn’t go unnoticed and it means the world to me. If you guys want more exclusive content from me outside of just here on YouTube, you guys can go ahead and follow me on my socials. The links to all of them will be in the description down below. But thank you guys again and as always, I’ll catch youall on the next one. [Music]

The San Antonio Spurs have continued to build around Wemby, and with their core pieces continuing to develop, I believe this team can win a championship soon.

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