Thinking Basketball Classic Game Rewatch | The Beautiful Game 2014 Spurs in One Quarter 

Boris Diaw started out as an oversized point guard, his idol was Magic. I love how he was part of what opened the modern game for big men, definitely my favorite all-time French player.

Pure delight. Beautiful basketball and outstanding analysis. Ben is the man!

The genius of the beautiful game spurs was not just that they were playing basketball in the future, but that they could morph from minute to minute as their personnel changed. You're getting high level playmaking and shooting from a small lineup, and then they sacrifice some shooting and they're crashing the offensive glass with two bigs. They elevated every style possible.

My favorite team of all time. Spurs 13-14

The effort they put in was beautiful, never giving up on the play

Got to give Duncan credit for @20:15. Being a floor general and telling the PG where to go on the floor for a high percent shot.

would love Ben Taylor's analysis of the most defensive finals game ever, 2005 Spurs v Pistons Game 7. People may decry that game as 'boring uh cause low score' but it was truly two titans of defense playing next level chess.

Boris is so good

My favorite team of all time.

Man I loved Diaw on the 2006 Suns and on this squad. Once he entered the starting lineup in game 3 of the finals, the Heat had no chance. He also killed Okc in game 6 on switches

I'm not the most experienced watcher, but I've been pausing through some of these sequences, and I think the moment from 20:35 on illustrates really well why teams have switched to sidestepping or stepping back for 3's on closeouts. Kawhi is scrambling behind the play here (after cheating over to help in the paint) and jumps out to Batum; Manu (who's on Wesley Matthews at the moment, I think) immediately recognizes that. Batum attacks Kawhi's closeout, but if he faked and sidestepped to the wing, like guys do now, it would've been a longer, tougher closeout and it looks like he would've been able to get a clean 3. Instead, Manu's able to get there in time and force Batum to pass, and because that's off, the Spurs are able to recover and prevent any damage on the possession. It's a small thing, but I think it's part of the reason why offenses are so difficult to stop now. While I'm here, I should mention that I've been absolutely loving these videos. I can rarely take time out to watch old games (and I don't have LeaguePass or anything on DVD), so these are super-valuable for me as I continue to learn about the game. It's just a joy to watch the Spurs offense and the speed and sharpness of their actions, relative to the league, remind me a ton of the Kings.

4:19 Ginobili was a superstar. Although he was old at that time and a little out of his prime so yeah, I guess you could say that.

Awesome video. Watching this since the Spurs are in some tough times right now. Man those bench lineups were so fun to watch. Manu and Patty flying all over the court nonstop, and everyone else reacting in turn. I looked it up and in 2013-14, when Manu and Patty shared the floor together, they had a +23.3 NetRtg (!!!!!) in 1297 possessions. Absolutely ridiculous.

Quand sa parle de Parker je regarde la vidéo directement ! Merci

I love the 2014 Spurs, the best NBA season I followed, thank you for this analysis.

Very cool Game to pick apart. To see the contrast between these two teams ist great. The constant motion by San Antonio and the stagnant movement by Portland with its isos.

It’s funny how Parker’s shooting remained a knock on his game for basically the entirety of his career, but his midrange game had improved so vastly by this stage that his 8-16 footer was effectively a strength.

Clayton Crowley has another great video on the 2014 Spurs and their playoff run. It’s called The 2014 Spurs and the best basketball ever played.

My fav team of all time. Top 3 teams all time, IMO. Go Spurs!!

The season that the most beautiful basketball ever witnessed was played.

Those are some really clean shots the Spurs are creating for themselves there. Makes the game a lot more relatable for those of us that can’t rely on the insane athleticism that creates the plays you see on most highlight reels. This is why you should always watch the entire game before you form your opinion.

watching this breakdown relit that love and fire i have for this child's game. simply beautiful.

If you really think about it, Diaw had it all besides his lack of effort staying in shape, especially on bad teams. He was so good in 2006 and on this team. There is a story about phoenix were he took off his flip flops and then proceeded to jump higher than Amare in a vertical jump test. His iq was elite, as was his passing. He could actually defend basically every position, watch him against Bron in 2013. He could shoot from mid range and later from three at a solid clip, he feasted after switches on the low block, he could bring the ball up the floor. With the Hawks he was a guard, in 06 he played full time center once kurt thomas went down. Man, if he had just cared more about being great...

More Ben Taylor content, please. I feel my basketball IQ increase whenever I watch one of his videos.

As someone who couldn't stand the Spurs, I still have nightmares about Tony Parker. He put so much pressure on defenses.

love these in depth videos, i know they don’t attract as many viewers but learning the game and the NBA preaching it is how our fans become better informed i love it !!!!

Getting Ben Taylor to make content here is the greatest decision the NBA social media team hs made. Dude is a legend and knows his stuff. Great analysis

1:10 this is right out of the triangle offense. the big sets the screen to the entry pass to the corner, than plays a 2 game action with the guy on the corner. im amazed Ben didn't bring it up, its such a classic play!

1. After the Dallas series, this is the one that give me the confidence that we'd win that year. 2. This is lowkey one of the strongest team Dame has throughout his Blazers career. 3. Before the series, many give Blazers a reasonable chance of coming out on top, me included. But we were wrong. The level of execution is insane - I think this is one of the less mentioned aspect of this 13-14 Spurs. It's not just the team-oriented play style. It's that we almost execute to perfection. For once, the cliche 'well-oiled-machine' is actually apt.

Tony parker what a player, what a player... Godlike

Thank you, Ben Taylor, for a fantastic piece of commentary.

Admiration for this beautiful b-ball, and this splendid analysis. Thank you, Ben Taylor.

great analysis!!

what stands out to me rewatching this as a giant Spurs fan who remembers this entire run is the effort defensively and just the know how when Spurs would get offensive rebounds or had to reset. Their know how against a young portland team was worth about 8 points alone

Love the channel Ben!

Loved this!

shout out to thinking basketball, great channel

Please make more 2014 Spurs videos

Important thing to notice: some people talk about the french busts, but here you have the french big three on the floor Parker Diaw and Batum for Portland, who were european champs the year before.

This is an amazing video

this was fun! great breakdown

more of these!!

Btw Marco Belinelli was a superstar coming to the NBA, he was like Anthony Edwards of Europe :D So he is a superstar soul in a role player that creates passing, fadeaway 3s, 3 point ft's.

future in the NBA

It was beautiful basketball..

What made the Finals for Miami even worse is that they played a blitz style defense where 2 players double the ball handler. It resulted in many easy transition baskets for the heat. Against this Spurs offense it was an absolute disaster and Spo never adjusted.

This video made my day. thank you and God bless Manu Ginobili

I love how this series led to lamarcus Aldridge deciding to sign with the spurs a season or two later

Saludos desde españa❤

Can you do a ton more of these?

Boris giving Belly a heads up that Green is open 5:58 behind him. and what's even crazier is that if Danny Green passes he has a knock down shooter in Mills open in the corner! This team was so good!

The offensive superstar was Pop

they went from being even to up by 20 in less than a 5 minutes of game time

I may have missed something, but I don't think Timmy took a single shot towards the basket. If he did, it was only like 1 or 2 shots. Absolutely insane how stacked this team was.

Why is this video hidden

8:58 Pop's face made me wonder if the Spurs were the ones down by 15 lol.

lol I never thought about what this guy looked like. great hair

Spurs almost beat the heat in the regular season with their bench that year.

so beautiful

The thing about that team is that they had guys who understand how to play fundamental basketball and don't have any egos. There are nights where Duncan only scored like 10 points and he's ok with that. While most superstars will loose their mind if they don't get their 30 piece

danny green two 3s off the bench is crazy

Thinking Basketball

Manu has the highest winning percentage in NBA history and the second one is way below him.

Coach Pop will rebuild the spurs, he already started with Wemby

The best basketball team ever

I know this about TP but man young Kawhi mid range was beautiful

POR VIDA

that entire sequence from 21:10 onwards is a pleasure to watch.

Dame was the only one tryna do something lol

Help the help helper... That's defense iq

This is honestly a great example of the cliché of “one team playing chess while the other is playing checkers“. The Blazers were completely out classed and outsmarted

Splitter was the best fit for Duncan.

Bruh Robin Lopez was getting cooked.

You nba wassup I’m hoping to join you league one day. Luke Richardson

😭😭😭😭😭

This game was pure Art. Great analysis however is incredible how with Wemby everyone is jumping on the Spurs wagon, when untill last year they was saying San Antonio will lose the franchise. Pathetic sport media mentality.

Do this often very very very very often olease

Lbj ram into so many players who had the best series of their careers against his teams in the playoffs.

I feel like Popovich's creativity has fallen off a cliff in recent years. I know we all get less flexible as thinkers as we age, but Pop was doing brilliant outside-the-box stuff as late as 2016 or so. But ever since Kawhi's injury, his teams have felt antiquated. Part of that's the talent. But most of his recent teams have had a bad shot profile and run ugly offense. As this video shows, you don't need to have top shelf talent out there to run creative stuff.

The beautiful game, interrupted by weak finishes by Splitter and Aldridge 😅.

I just love it when I get a notification saying "Someone liked your comment!" or "Someone has just subscribed!!!" That really makes my day!😍💭

Playing against these spurs would make me wanna quit basketball 😭

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"God can't give us peace and happiness apart from Himself because there is no such thing.” - CS Lewis "If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” - CS Lewis Key To Eternal Life: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-uZdv-TtiMkg.html

sometime they can over pass

Robin Lopez is really a bad player

I remember great basketball before Steph Curry ruined it in 2015 onwards

great analysis!

You nba wassup I’m hoping to join you league one day. Luke Richardson