By Charlie Thaddeus | Pounding The Rock (PtR), 2024-11-28 02:15:00
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
圣安东尼奥再次战胜了赛季初的苦主犹他
常规操作！圣安东尼奥马刺的常规胜利。我都不知道该如何处理这类信息了。我们一直处于一种要么极度兴奋要么极度低落的危险状态中，以至于像这样的胜利在此刻几乎都无法引起波澜。他们战胜了一个他们需要战胜的对手。他们大部分时间都打得很好。他们在第四节终结了比赛。多么奇妙的概念！
我们现在感觉很好，当我说“我们”时，指的是更大的马刺体系——球迷、球员、城市以及更广泛的散布各地的马刺球迷。气氛好到爆。我们在社交媒体上斗志昂扬，为令人兴奋的球员组合想出了朗朗上口的昵称（51区组合非常棒）。我们冒险走出以马刺为中心的「内容舒适圈」，去寻求各种赞美或关注。有没有人注意到文班亚马(Victor Wembanyama)的三分命中率上升了？「斯蒂芬·卡斯尔(Stephon Castle)年度最佳新秀」的活动有任何进展吗？有人在乎马刺王者归来吗？！
这真是令人兴奋的时刻。现在做这些是不是有点早？我的意思是，是的。虽然这波连胜令人愉悦，但也很容易看出它的含金量不足。缺少核心球员的雷霆？爵士？背靠背作战的勇士？还是爵士？这可不是什么死亡赛程。你也不用回溯太久就能发现马刺惨败于独行侠，令人沮丧地输给湖人，以及非常恼火地输给……爵士。
从某个角度来看，很容易耸耸肩说：“那又怎样？”一个客观的观察者可以，而且很可能会介入并告诉你，马刺目前有点像纸老虎。他们昂首阔步，打得好像他们理应如此，但这很大程度上可以归因于“空热量”。他们正在做他们应该做的事情——击败他们应该击败的球队。他们在第四节结束了几场比赛？所以呢？我们应该开派对吗？我们应该邀请迈克尔·乔丹吗？
这是一个客观的观察者会说的话。我呢？我不是一个客观的观察者。我正在畅饮「酷爱」[注：此处指完全相信，不带任何质疑]。我正在一个网站上发布博客，该网站的标语上有“圣安东尼奥马刺社区”。我准备好相信这是真的，没有其他原因，只是因为感觉对了。感觉不一样了。我不必说服自己去感受这种兴奋——它只是自然而然地发生了。这支球队比过去几年都更有信心和目标。这……很难解释。这些年来，我们见过很多糟糕的比赛和很多「虚假繁荣」，而这次看起来完全不同。
这并不是说他们已经达到了最终形态。我认为没有人会这么想。更确切地说，他们是升级了。他们获得了新的技能，并且越来越有能力做更多的事情。球队还没有满员，整个赛季都没有。文班很出色，很了不起，所有这些都是事实，但他还没有取得每个人都期待的显著飞跃。尽管如此……他们更好了。他们看起来更好，他们听起来更好，而且他们肯定打得更好。这支球队的底线感觉已经得到了真正的提升，这对我们来说是一个实实在在的变化——即使它不一定能转化为 Inside the NBA 或 The Hoop Collective 或我们可能希望看到的任何其他大型国家媒体的精彩片段。
作为一个球迷群体，我们这里一直以来都像是干燥的引火物，所以只需要像这样一个小小的火花就能让我们燃烧起来，这也在情理之中。目前来看，这有点疯狂，也许有点失控，但这并不意味着它不是真的。我们仍然会经历一些挫折、现实的检验以及其他一切。但这并不是很快就会消失的东西。
马刺球迷群体可能有点疯狂，但球队本身似乎终于稳定下来了。一场常规的胜利？就在三周前，这些词还不在我们的词汇表中。现在很难想象没有它的生活。
要点：
- 听着，如果文班要继续像这样投三分球，那我凭什么让他停下来？它……看起来并不棒。所有的投丢，从美学上看都不好。我一直认为，我希望他只是在篮筐附近活动，左右轻松得分。然而！我也是那种在播客上听到蒂姆·邦坦普斯发表这种观点就会怒发冲冠的人。我在车里大喊：“你根本不懂！他现在需要投这些三分球！这是为了长期培养他的投篮！”所以，也许不要太在意我对文班的做法的看法。我当然不会对他砍下18分的三分球而嗤之以鼻。
- 我已经想不出还有什么方式能从屋顶上大声喊出斯蒂芬·卡斯尔就是拥有那种天赋的程度了。我喜欢看他打球，当他不在场上时，我会想念他。
好样的，斯蒂芬！
新秀拿下20分！pic.twitter.com/nAcL51mEOp— 圣安东尼奥马刺 (@ spurs) 2024年11月27日
- 我没有力气、精力或时间坐在这里讨论马刺的替补中锋情况。扎克·科林斯每次上场都会受到的抨击，其程度已经到了让我感到厌恶的地步。这是马刺这波令人兴奋的小高潮中唯一让我感到沮丧的部分。他是一个不完美的球员，在一支有趣的球队中扮演着次要角色。客观地说，他的数据比上个赛季要好。查克·巴塞是一个有趣的故事，而且可能更有趣。两人都是努力做到最好的好人。两人都不会成为决定马刺全年整体走向的主要因素。每个人都需要冷静一下。当我说马刺球迷群体有点疯狂时，我指的就是这个。
- 天哪，我真是受够了打犹他爵士。今年我们30%的胜利都来自他们，这感觉太疯狂了。在这一点上，我谈论爵士的时间比我大多数亲戚都多。明年见，犹他！
WWL 赛后新闻发布会
- 你似乎对这个赛季的期望有点摇摆不定。一开始他们太高了，现在又太低了……我们这是在干什么？
- 听着，我一直很坦率地承认，在分析马刺的每一场比赛时，我的情绪不稳定，而且“身心不健全”。你看完一场精彩的比赛后，就得进来，发表一些看法，感觉就像……好的。冲啊。我们回来了。这里没有太多时间或空间来进行细致的分析。
- 你不想用理性的心态来扫大家的兴。
- 我？当然不会。我想我们都同意，在一场胜利后坐在这里说“好吧，实际上，控制你的期望很重要”不是任何人想消磨时间的方式。
- 所以我们又回到「炒作列车」上了？
- 我们从未离开过「炒作列车」，我们只是……你知道，关掉了电源，让它在黑暗模式下沿着轨道滑行了一段时间。不过我们现在又把它点亮了，宝贝！现在没有什么能阻止我们了！
- 直到他们再次输球？
- 是的，当然，一场失利我们就开始恐慌。毫无疑问。
点击查看原文：What We Learned from the Spurs win over the Jazz
What We Learned from the Spurs win over the Jazz
San Antonio Logs another win against their early season nemesis in Utah
Routine! A routine victory for your San Antonio Spurs. I’m not even sure what to do with this kind of information. We’ve been in a constant state of riding dangerously high or dangerously low that a victory like this almost doesn’t even register at this point. They took on an opponent that they needed to beat. They mostly played well. The finished it off in the 4th. What a concept!
We’re feeling good right now, and when I say “we,” I’m referring to the greater Spurs apparatus—the fans, the players, the city, the wider diaspora. Vibes are off the charts. We’re getting chippy on social media and coming up with snappy nicknames for exciting player combos (Area 51 is very good). We’re venturing outside the Spurs-centric content bubble and trolling for compliments or attention of any kind. Has anyone else noticed that Wemby’s three-point percentage is up? Is the “Stephon Castle Rookie of the Year” campaign getting any traction? Does anyone even care that the Spurs are freakin’ back?!?!
Heady times indeed. Is it a little early to be doing all that? I mean, yes. As fun as this winning streak has been, it’s pretty easy to poke holes in its legitimacy. Shorthanded Thunder? The Jazz? Warriors on a back-to-back? The Jazz? It’s not exactly a murderer’s row. You also don’t have to go too far back into the recent past to find a shellacking at the hands of the Mavs, a frustrating loss to the Lakers, and a very annoying loss to… the Jazz.
When viewed through a certain lens, it’s very easy to shrug your shoulders and say, “so what?” An objective observer can, and probably will, swoop in and tell you that the Spurs are a bit of a paper tiger at the moment. They’re swaggering around and playing like they belong, but it can largely be chalked up to empty calories. They’re doing what they’re supposed to do—beating teams they should beat. So they closed out a few games down the stretch in the fourth quarter? Okay? Should we throw a party? Should we invite Michael Jordan?
That’s what an objective observer would say. Me? I’m not an objective observer. I’m drinking the Kool-Aid. I’m posting a blog on a site that has “a San Antonio Spurs community” on the masthead. I’m ready to believe it’s real for no other reason than it feels right. It feels different. I don’t have to talk myself into this excitement—it’s just happening on its own. The team is playing with more confidence and purpose than they have in years. It’s… It’s hard to explain. We’ve seen a lot of bad basketball and a lot of false starts over the years, and this simply has a different look.
It’s not that they have reached their final form by any means. I don’t think anyone thinks that. It’s more that they’ve leveled up. They’ve acquired new skills and are increasingly capable of doing more. The team isn’t at full strength and hasn’t been all season. Wembanyama is great and amazing and all of that, but he hasn’t taken the noticeable leap everyone was sort of expecting. In spite of all that… they’re better. They look better, they sound better, and they’re certainly playing better. The floor on this team feels like it’s been raised in a very real way, and that’s a tangible difference for us—even if it doesn’t necessarily translate to a glowing segment on Inside the NBA or The Hoop Collective or any other big national media space we might be hoping for.
As a fanbase, we’ve had some pretty dry kindling around these parts, so it makes sense that all it would take to get us going would be a tiny spark like this. It’s a little wild and maybe just a little out of control at the moment, but that doesn’t mean it’s not real. We’re still going to have some setbacks and reality checks and all the rest. But this isn’t something that’s going to be extinguished anytime soon.
The Spurs fandom at large might be running a bit amok, but the team itself looks to have finally steadied itself out. A routine win? Those weren’t words in our vocabulary as recently as 3 weeks ago. Now it’s hard to imagine life without it.
Takeaways:
- Look, if Wembanyama is going to keep making threes like this, then who am I to tell him to stop? It… doesn’t look awesome. All the misses don’t look good, aesthetically. I’ve traditionally been of the mind that I wish he were just living around the basket, grabbing easy buckets left and right. However! I am also the type of person who hears Tim Bontemps voice that opinion on a podcast and gets his hackles up. I’m in my car yelling, “YOU DON’T ACTUALLY GET IT! HE NEEDS TO BE SHOOTING THOSE THREES RIGHT NOW! IT’S ABOUT DEVELOPING HIS SHOT LONG TERM!” So, maybe don’t put a lot of stock in my opinion about what Wemby is doing. I’m certainly not going to turn my nose up at him logging 18 points from beyond the arc.
- Running out of ways to scream from the rooftops about the degree to which Stephon Castle simply HAS. THE. JUICE. I love watching him play, and I miss him when he’s not on the court.
OKAY STEPH
20 points for the Rookie! pic.twitter.com/nAcL51mEOp— San Antonio Spurs (@ spurs) November 27, 2024
- I don’t have the strength, energy, or time to sit here and debate the Spurs’ backup center situation. The pile-on that continues to happen every second Zach Collins is on the court has reached a level that is bordering on toxic to my eyes. It’s the one part of this exciting little run the Spurs have been on that has really been bumming me out. He is an imperfect player who is playing a minor role on a fun team. His stats are, objectively, better than last season. Chuck Bassey is a fun story and, probably, more fun to watch play. Both are nice dudes trying their best. Neither will be a major determining factor in the Spurs’ overall course for the year. Everyone needs to take a beat. When I say that the Spurs fandom is running amok, this is what I’m talking about.
- God, I’m so sick of playing the Utah Freakin’ Jazz. It feels insane that 30% of our total wins this year have come at their hands. I’ve talked about the Jazz more than most members of my extended family at this point. See you next year, Utah!
WWL Post Game Press Conference
- It seems like you’re sort of all over the place with regards to setting your expectations for this season. First they we’re too high, now they’re too low…what are we doing here?
- Look, I’ve been pretty upfront about being unstable and “not of sound mind or body” when it comes to analyzing the Spurs on a game-to-game basis. You come in here and have to like, fire off a take right after watching a fun game and it’s just like…YES. LET’S GO. WE’RE BACK. There’s not a lot of time or space for nuance there.
- You don’t want to swoop in bum everyone out with a reasonable mindset.
- Me? Certainly not, no. I think we can all agree that sitting here after a win and going, “well actually, it’s important to keep your expectations in check” is not how anyone wants to spend their time.
- So we’re back on the hype train?
- We never got off the hype train, we just…you know, turned the power off and let it glide down the tracks in dark mode for a while. We’ve lit it back up now though, baby! Ain’t no stopping us now!
- Until they lose again?
- Yes, of course, one loss and we’re panicking. No doubt.
By Charlie Thaddeus, via Pounding The Rock