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NBA FINALS: HEAT v SPURSJune 14, 2014Tony ParkerSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: Practice Day Q. You said the other day you thought you guys played better on the road. It was a little different attitude. You played well in Games 3 and 4. How do you get that attitude now coming into Game 5? TONY PARKER: It's a great question. So far in this series none of the teams played well at home. Both teams played great on the road, so we want to try to change that trend and play better. A great opportunity tomorrow and just try to make sure we do the stuff that we've been successful on the road and try to bring here. Q. At different points in your career and Tim's career and Manu's career you all could have taken more money to probably go elsewhere. How meaningful is it for you guys not only to make these kind of runs but make them together as a unit? TONY PARKER: It makes it all worth it. All three, we took, like you said, less money to stay here and to win championships. So it makes it even better to have been able to play my whole career with Timmy and Manu and experiencing those great moments. We're never going to forget our whole life. That's why we play basketball, to win championships and create moments that we're never going to forget. So I've been very blessed, and I don't take it for granted. I enjoy every moment, especially with Timmy and Manu. Q. Coach Popovich just said he wants to coach beyond this year‑‑ TONY PARKER: He said what? Q. Coach Popovich said he wants to continue coaching past this year. Any concern if you guys do win this title, that Tim could say, that's it, call it a career, and you wouldn't be able to play with him anymore? TONY PARKER: I don't know. I have no idea. That's a question you have to ask him. I know he's got one more year on his contract, and he loves being with us, loves playing basketball. Either way, whatever he decides, I'll support him. But if I have to choose, obviously, I would love him to keep going. I love playing with him. Q. Speaking of great moments, I know you just became a dad a couple of weeks ago. I wonder how has fatherhood changed you any, and how grounding is it to come home and have your little boy, after all the challenges in the playoffs, to have him at home waiting for you? TONY PARKER: It's a great feeling. It's a unique, amazing experience, and definitely puts life in perspective. It will be just unbelievable to win a title with him being there. It will be pretty special. Q. Just on that last question two questions ago, last year it seemed like the big storyline was perhaps the last hurrah for the big three. It doesn't seem to be that same storyline this time around. Why is that, do you believe, and is there a lot more in the tank for you guys? TONY PARKER: I don't know. You should talk to your colleagues, you know? You've been saying that for the last seven, eight years, you know. I don't know what to say. Every year just the journalists keep saying the same stuff that we've done and it's the last run. I totally understand. We're getting older every year, but we always come back and just keep pushing the limits, I guess, especially Timmy and Manu. We just keep playing great basketball. Our young guys are getting better and better. Danny, and Kawhi, Cory Joseph, Patty Mills, they're all getting better. And right now we just have a great mix between young players and the veterans. We just try to push the limits, I guess, to try to keep going with that unbelievable run we're in, since '99 for Timmy, and myself and Manu since '01, '02. Just try to keep it going. Q. So much gets talked about the big three in Miami, and the big three here for a long time too. There have been times in the series where Kawhi and Boris have been two of maybe the best players on the floor. Does that surprise you in any way how valuable and how productive they've been in this series especially in key times? TONY PARKER: Not at all. If you want to win championships, obviously you need, like you said, a big three. But you need your role players to play great too. And every time we won championships in the past, the big three we played great, but we had great role players. Like Robert Horry, Michael Finley, all those guys were playing great basketball. Fabricio Oberto was doing all the dirty work, a little like Boris in unbelievable passing. If you want to go all the way, you need the whole team to play great. Q. Last year you guys got to being a Top 5 defensive team after some years of regression on that end. How did that happen? What was the driving force behind that? TONY PARKER: Yeah, we just focus on it more. I think, like you said, we slipped a little bit, and we knew if we wanted to get back to the top, we needed to get back to where we were when we were winning championships. The start of 2011, we had the best record and we were making steps toward that to try to be a better team defensively. The last two years we were in the Top 5, and this year, especially in this series, our defense has been great. That's one of the keys. The role players have to be great. You have to have great defense. Everything has to be clicking if you want to win the title. Q. How important has it been for you and the ability for Pop to manage your minutes this year, to have Patty establish himself as such a reliable guy as your back‑up? TONY PARKER: Yeah, it's been great. He's been great. Patty improved a lot. Just like I said earlier, you need everybody to play well if you want to win the championships. And our bench has been a big key. So, for me, it was good this season because I played four years in a row and the National Team, two NBA Finals, two European Finals, like we go all the way in both competitions. So it's been great to have a great back‑up. I wish luck for Patty this summer because I'll be on vacation the whole summer, so I'll be laughing at Patty next year (laughing). FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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