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NBA FINALS: SPURS v HEATJune 12, 2013Gregg PopovichSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: Practice Day Q. Coach, your thoughts on Tony right now. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: We'll wait and see. Q. I know it's a light practice, but could he test it in any way today? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Did he what? Q. Did he test it in any way today? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: No. Q. If Tony can't play, you were 11‑5 without him this season. What enabled you to have success without him? How are you able to compensate for his loss? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Everybody else stepped up, I guess. Q. How do you wrestle with the notion of wanting Tony to play but if you think give him one game, whatever happens in Game 4, give him that game and maybe you have him for Game 5, 6 and 7? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Can you repeat that? Q. Good point. What I'm trying to ask is the temptation is to play him obviously. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Hit me, go ahead. Q. I'm trying to figure out what I'm thinking. The temptation I would think is to mail in Game 4 and have him at full strength for 5, 6 and 7 as opposed to risking him for the full time. How much do you wrestle that? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: I have to tell you that phrase "mail in Game 4"‑‑ Q. Good, right? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: It confuses my whole brain. I don't think I can think past that comment. I would like to help you, but I don't know how to help you. You can come back to our coach's office and hit us. We'll be talking about all these sorts of things. Any ideas are welcome. I have no idea until I know how healthy he is tomorrow. Q. In Game 3 you guys were able to force Miami into taking a lot of mid‑range shots and then they missed them for the most part. How much of that was your defense versus them just missing open shots? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: 50‑50. Q. Manu was saying he doesn't necessarily think LeBron is struggling. He thinks it's more of a product of your defense. Would you concur with that? And if so why? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: I don't know what Manu told you, so I'm not going to comment on something Manu said that you say he said. Q. How do you feel about your defense about LeBron? You have to be pleased, I would imagine. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: I think overall our team defense has been pretty good. Q. Pop, you mentioned last night one of the keys to Danny Green's success now is just gaining confidence in himself and keeping that. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Yes. Q. Has Kawhi since he's been here ever shown any lack of confidence? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Kawhi has never spoken to me. So I don't really know what his level of confidence is, but watching him play, it seems he has no problem in that area. He just plays and goes home. Q. How rare is that for a rookie? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Really, really rare. He just doesn't seem to have doubts. He has aspects of the game that he wants to and does work on daily. But he never shows doubt. He just shows his willingness to go to work. Q. What has Cory Joseph shown you throughout the playoffs? And are you confident if his role is increased, if Parker can't play? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Games tell us if somebody's role increases. Every game is different. I can't tell you how much or how little he's going to play. I can always count on him being a competitor in every way, shape and form every night. That's what we like about him the most. Q. I know a lot of this is kind of speculation ‑‑ COACH GREGG POPOVICH: You're going to ask me anyway. Q. And you're going to shoot it down. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: Next question. Q. Miami played really hard throughout that winning streak they had to keep that thing going. You sometimes rested guys during winning streaks when you had 10 or 11 in a row and kind of let them fall apart. Are you seeing that is the way to go because maybe regular‑season games take a toll later in the year for you? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: That is speculation. You're correct in assessing your own question. There are no right and wrong answers to the way people do things because it's pretty hard to assess and evaluate. Suffice to say everybody has a different approach to playing time or when to sit or not sit players. And we do it one way, other teams do it differently. There's no one to say one way is right or the other way is right. Q. You were asked last night kind of the same question you were asked a few minutes ago, not by me, the one about your team defense on LeBron. And both times you ignored the LeBron part of that question. Just talked about your team defense. Is LeBron a sleeping dog you're letting lie? You won't get into the LeBron issue at all? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: You're digging really deep. You must need to write an article by 4:00 today or something. Q. Good guess. COACH GREGG POPOVICH: I can't help you. Our team defense is not just LeBron. Just like Miami's defense, team defense is not just Tim Duncan or Tony Parker. Team defense is exactly what it says. It's for everyone. You all keep bringing up LeBron, but we're guarding other people with the same team defense that we're guarding LeBron, and they're guarding us with their team defense. It doesn't change based on every single individual and every time down the court. Team D is team D. Q. Pop, I'm not a medical professional or anything, but I think the grade I strain usually takes a week of recovery time in a lot of sports. And you're obviously not a coach who would ever put your player out if he was hurt. Have you thought about that? Is it really a day‑to‑day thing? COACH GREGG POPOVICH: I say day to day because he just had the MRI today, and they said it's grade I, and that's the lowest level of injury, I guess, for the hamstring from what they tell me. But I want to wait until tomorrow before I make a decision whether he should play or not. And obviously a lot of it will have to do with Tony, and what happens to him during the day, and how I think his play will affect our team, whether good or bad. It's unfortunate, but it is what it is, and we'll see what he looks like tomorrow. A lot of it will be what he feels, I think. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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