Tony Parker says that the San Antonio Spurs are no longer championship contenders
The San Antonio Spurs were the top team of the Western Conference during the regular season and had the second best win percentage (0.744) record in the entire league after the Chicago Bulls (0.756). Keeping in view their regular-season
record, many pundits of the game tipped Spurs as the favourite in this years’ playoffs.
However, the eighth seeded Memphis Grizzlies had other plans.
The team with just 0.561 win percentage shocked everyone when they knocked the No. 1 seed out of the playoffs in only six games. In a matter of two weeks, all the hard work, the Spurs had done during the regular season to establish
themselves as the championship contenders all went down the drain and with it perhaps, their last chance to win the championship.
Tony Parker, the Spurs point guard reiterated this fact in his recent interview with a French magazine. Tony Parker implied that it’s all over and he is not the only one who is saying so, every Spur is off the same opinion. During
the interview, Tony was quite guileless and blunt regarding the future of current Spurs roster.
He said, “At the start of the season I said this was our last chance. Tim (Duncan) and Gino (Manu Ginobili) are getting old. It’s going to be tough to regenerate ourselves. We will always have a good team but we can no longer say
that we’re playing for a championship.”
Parker said that the fixes required to put the Spurs back on the contender track can neither be accomplished by simple tweaks nor by pushing the aging roster to work more on defence. Rather, a major overhaul of the squad is required,
one that will change everything. The team needs backups for every position.
If the Spurs do this they will have to start over from the scratch because a new roster requires time to adjust. The coach will have to try different combinations of players at different positions and the process will keep on going
until he finds appropriate substitutions.
Addressing another note, Parker said he is looking forward to play for France in this year Euro-Basket, a championship that can ensure an Olympic berth for his country.
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