Breaking Down the San Antonio Spurs' Best Trade Bait
Over the past few years, the San Antonio Spurs have developed a reputation for their unrivaled consistency.
Whether it's consistency in production—the Spurs boast 15-straight 50-win seasons—or consistency in their talent pool, veterans Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili have expertly repelled Father Time for the better half of the past decade, establishing themselves a perennial threats despite their looming retirements.
So, it should come as no surprise that San Antonio brought back its entire roster—the exception is rookie Kyle Anderson, who is the team's only fresh face—after a dominant 2014 postseason run that saw the franchise win its fifth title.
Now sitting at 17-9 on the season, the Spurs have proven themselves as contenders once again. As such, consistency should be expected from a roster standpoint for the remainder of the year, right?
Well, the same could have been said last year, but the Spurs bucked their trend at the trade deadline and moved point guard Nando de Colo, bringing in Austin Daye from the Toronto Raptors to bolster the team's frontcourt depth. It was a relatively meaningless move but nonetheless substantiates the notion that no precedent is carved in stone.
Masked by the team's routine early-season dominance has been a handful of unraveling narratives that suggest that even if a trade is unlikely, the possibility still warrants exploration.
Too Much Backcourt Talent, Not Enough Playing Time
For a long time, San Antonio has faced a major problem that, at its surface, isn't so problematic.
Just as we saw in the days of George Hill and Gary Neal, the Spurs' current roster has a surplus of talented guards and not enough playing time to allocate.
Tony Parker is, without question, the leader of the pack. Having established himself as San Antonio's offensive leader, the French veteran has a strong grip on the starting job. And even as he ages, Parker remains a lock for over 30 minutes each night.
That leaves Patty Mills and Cory Joseph to round out the point guard rotation. Thus far into the season—and for at least a few more weeks—Mills is sidelined as he recovers from shoulder surgery this offseason. Targeting a January return, he'll leave the backup point guard spot to Joseph—who has played extremely well during Mills' absence.
Once Mills returns, San Antonio will find itself at a crossroads. With two talented backup point guards to choose from, one is going to have to accept a significantly smaller role than he had previously been used to.
Both guards bring different skill sets to the table, as Mills is an offensively oriented player with a shooting prowess, while Joseph is a fantastic on-ball defender and a more natural floor general.
The leading reserve role has gone back and forth between the two, with Joseph the top backup during 2012-13—a season where Mills' role was reduced to waving a towel on the bench—and Mills having won it out last season, only to watch Joseph prove himself capable this year.
With a handful of teams in dire need of a point guard change, the Spur who finds himself in a third-string role could very well be used as trade bait.
Naturally, fans will be hesitant to part with either. But the third-string point guard role has historically been minor in San Antonio, and it would be both a waste of talent for San Antonio and a rut for the player's growth.
The only alternative to re-writing the point guard pecking otder would be to reduce Marco Belinelli's role and play Mills up a position at the 2. Mills, a great shooter and off-ball player, could certainly handle that role offensively, but he could find himself at a size and strength disadvantage on defense.
Nonetheless, that option remains and would thus make Belinelli expendable, too.
With one player destined to receive a major minutes reduction, there will be an underused Spurs guard who will make perfect trade bait should the team look to strengthen an area of weakness near the deadline.
Expendable Pieces
Realistically, it's unlikely that either Mills or Joseph finds themselves shipped away midseason. Even if it makes sense, both are fan favorites, and it's difficult to see coach Gregg Popovich parting with one of them. Even if they play the same position and would fight for the same minutes, they fill very different roles when on the court and provide injury insurance for the backcourt.
However, the Spurs do have a collection of assets who have not yet won over the fanbase nor Pop, as their playing time would suggest. Both Jeff Ayres and Austin Daye play limited roles and have yet to establish themselves as anything more than garbage-time players.
The problem with Ayres and Daye as it relates to the trade market is that neither brings all that much to the table for a prospective buyer. Sure, Daye can shoot the ball and brings decent length to the small forward position, and Ayres is athletic and can sometimes shoot the mid-range J, but no team should see either as a must-buy.
That said, both are on expiring deals worth over $1 million and could thus be somewhat attractive to a team looking to unload cap space this summer.
There are a few teams, though the Philadelphia 76ers are the best example, who are currently below the cap floor and might look to add salary before the deadline to meet the minimum. If San Antonio sent one of its garbage-time players away, perhaps paired with a second-round draft pick or the rights to an overseas talent, there may be teams interested in the luxuries that come with the player, if not the player himself.
With the Ayres experiment having failed, the team lacks depth in the interior. If San Antonio could get its hands on a different project—perhaps one with more size and talent—from a team who would rather fill cap space and grab a pick, a deal could potentially be worked out. For example, Andrew Nicholson has fallen out of the Orlando Magic's rotation, but could provide San Antonio with another big man, something necessary with Tiago Splitter's injury history and the ever-present need to preserve Duncan's health.
And, of course, the Spurs could always part with their first-round pick—something that would draw interest from a number of teams. Though that might hurt them in the long run, with the rebuilding process officially starting in the next year or two, it might be necessary if they find themselves with a deficiency as the deadline approaches and are still eyeing a final run with the current core.
Even so, the team is in a position where looming trades seem absolutely unnecessary. Regardless, there are pieces available to make a deal work if the right offer came along.
And who knows—even with their label of consistency, the San Antonio Spurs have surprised us before.
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