Numbers Say Tim Duncan Has Plenty Left in the Tank, Even at 39
Sales pitches are part and parcel of the NBA offseason. Most of the time, they're used to recruit and retain free agents. In some cases, a la Kevin Love and LeBron James in 2014, they're a means to push blockbuster trades through.
This summer, they'll serve a new purpose, under completely different circumstances, as the NBA and its fans try to deliver Tim Duncan a succinct, yet powerful message: Don't go.
Unlike other offseason propaganda, this not a plea for the 39-year-old free agent to sign with a new team or stay with San Antonio Spurs. It's an attempt at getting him to stay in general, to stave off retirement for at least one more season.
Because the league and its fans, irrespective of rooting interests, aren't yet ready for him to leave.
Eighteen years, 15 All-Star selections, five titles and two MVP awards into Duncan's career, perhaps we should all be ready to say goodbye. After all he's done, there shouldn't be a sense that he has unfinished business. He has accomplished enough to walk away on top at any given point—even after a failed bid at winning consecutive championships for the first time in his career.
Yet on the heels of San Antonio's 111-109 Game 7 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers, the prospect of Duncan walking away, while very real, feels wrong.
Not necessarily because a first-round exit isn't an end befitting him and the Spurs. That's certainly part of it. The Spurs have been eliminated in the opening round just four times during the Duncan era and only three times over the last 15 years. Bowing out this soon, after being dominant for so long, is not in any way indicative of their run together.
Mostly, though, the idea of Duncan retiring feels wrong because he doesn't look ready.
Duncan averaged 17.9 points, 11.1 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.4 blocks through the Spurs' seven-game set with the Clippers. The last player (minimum seven appearances) to reach those postseason benchmarks was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1980. He turned 33 on April 16 of that year. Duncan celebrated his 39th birthday midway through the Clippers series.
No member of the Spurs registered a higher player efficiency rating than Duncan. Only Cory Joseph, who logged all of 22 minutes, shot a better percentage from the floor.
Only 23-year-old Kawhi Leonard matched Duncan's total court time (250 minutes). Duncan contested 10 shots at the rim per game. He moved off picks with ease and scored at will—which is to say, 60.5 percent of the time—inside 16 feet of the hoop.
There were even times when Duncan beat the Clippers up the floor in transition, outrunning DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin, each of whom is more than 10 years his junior:
Insofar as it pertains to Duncan, none of this is out of the ordinary. Rather, his playoff campaign was just an extension of his regular season, during which he averaged 13.9 points, 9.1 rebounds, three assists and 1.9 blocks while anchoring a top-tier defense and missing just five games.
The last player over the age of 35 to match those statistical yardsticks: Duncan himself. And after him, there is no one else. He is the only player in his age group to sustain that level of production.
Although there's something to walking away at the height of your craft, Duncan is a special case. He doesn't appear to be on the verge of a decline. He is as far from that reality as any of his teammates, as ESPN.com's Ethan Strauss argued:
Gregg Popovich began managing Duncan's minutes long before the situation called for or warranted it, and that conservative, big-picture approach has helped pave the way for this ageless wonder. He could opt to return next season and still figure heavily into a Spurs team with championship aspirations.
And that's the other part of all this. The Spurs were only one regular-season win away from securing a No. 2 playoff seed. Duncan would be returning to an existing title contender fully capable of thriving within a brutal Western Conference.
It's one thing to retire while still dominating on an individual level with nothing else on the line. But Duncan has the opportunity to play for his sixth ring and further cement an indelible legacy that already puts him in line to be remembered as one of the five greatest players ever.
And he can do so while bearing firsthand witness to what the Spurs have in store for life beyond him.
Yes, he's already played and won a title beside Leonard, the new face of the franchise. But the Spurs will enjoy ample financial flexibility this summer, according to Basketball Insiders, after delaying Leonard's extension, giving them a chance to add another premier player to a ready-made contender.
The Spurs have been linked to Marc Gasol as recently as late March, according to the Sporting News' Sean Deveney, and ESPN.com's Marc Stein says they project as serious contenders for LaMarcus Aldridge as well. Assuming Duncan returns at another discount, as he did in 2012, the Spurs don't just have a chance to remain scary.
They could be scarier.
"Imagine this front-line rotation: Duncan and Aldridge starting, with either Tiago Splitter or Boris Diaw backing up both. Better yet for Duncan, he could reduce his minutes," wrote the San Antonio Express-News' Buck Harvey. "And if the Spurs can find a price point with Danny Green, and he and Leonard keep improving at the wing, wouldn’t the Spurs be stronger on paper than even 2014?"
Indeed, this is a whimsical pipe dream. But it's possible. The Spurs have the NBA's best record since Duncan entered the league, winning 130 more regular-season contests than the nearest franchise. They have a budding superstar in Leonard, a two-headed monster at point guard in Tony Parker and Patty Mills, five championships since 1999 and a system that's shown it can unseat even the most star-stuffed rivals.
That mystique sells itself and should get the Spurs in a room with any free agent. Their pitch just becomes that much stronger when it includes at least one more season of Duncan, the symbol for everything Spurs.
Why, then, would Duncan retire now, at a time when he and the Spurs are still great with the means to build upon that greatness?
"The only reason for Duncan to retire is lack of desire," Dan MacCarney for the San Antonio Express-News. "Otherwise, he remains one of the leading two-way players in the NBA, and was the Spurs’ best and most consistent player against the Clippers. Given his skill level and low-impact style, it isn’t unreasonable to think he’s got at least one more quality season in him, and maybe more after that."
Having that knowledge is comforting; it makes Duncan's return feel inevitable.
Popovich's postgame presser after Game 7 did the same, per SI.com's Ben Golliver:
Look, nothing is for certain, and more importantly, nothing is forever.
For all the times Popovich has perhaps divulged Duncan's preference to return, he has also intimated that his future Hall of Famer will consider retirement.
That's the offshoot of longevity. Everything has to end at some point. There will come a time when this Spurs core disbands and the organization is forced to push forward without Duncan.
If that time comes this summer, Duncan's final act will have not disappointed. Chris Paul's series-winner in Game 7 will sting, but Duncan will walk away having dominated that matchup in his own right, making more shots than Parker and Manu Ginobili combined, putting the Spurs in position to win at all.
Then again, if Duncan leaves now, his transcendent performance in that series will be everything wrong with his departure—not because of what wasn't done, but because of all that he and these Spurs can clearly still do.
Stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com unless otherwise cited.
Dan Favale covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter: @danfavale.
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