Spurs are not without highlights, but ......

Jock Landale, 26, twirls his growing beard and frowns as he stares at his national teammate in front of him as if to find a few truths in his rocky NBA wanderlust through those big, warm, innocent eyes and the same wild growth of hair as himself.

I've heard that there are usually seven major choices in life, and although the number "seven" is as empty as "cats have nine lives", the young Randall has already used up several of them. The first time, he gave up basketball just as he was making a name for himself in the world of basketball; the second time, he chose his hometown's Geelong Grammar School, a perfect inheritance of the Australian wilderness where all seniors must spend a year in the mountains, learning teamwork and outdoor survival. The long hikes and crag climbs didn't excite him; instead, it was the ramshackle baskets and bare basketball hoops on the yellow court that rekindled his enthusiasm.

Langdale has forgotten whether he ever said "I want to play basketball" to his coach, he gave up his favorite ice cream, and his height and skills are like bamboo shoots in spring. After graduating from college, he made his third choice: enter the NBA draft. After unexpectedly falling short, he joined the ABA league in the Balkans, averaging 12 points per game on 56 percent shooting in a world of big white bears. He later returned to Australia and helped Melbourne United sweep the defending champions in the finals, taking home the finals MVP in the process.

As if everything was falling into place, now Langdale is faced with a new choice - the Spurs have expressed their intentions, as evidenced by a call from his agent on his cell phone. The development league contract three years ago was nothing more than an out-of-town experience ticket, and this time, an official invitation to the NBA awaits him.

Langdale took a few slow breaths to calm his slightly fluttering chest. His 15-year-old adventure in the mountains taught him the importance of calmness and thought, and he began to consider more realistic questions: Can I play in the NBA and the Spurs' rotation? And if so, how long would I have to wait? Will I be just another passerby?

A figure became clearer in Langdale's mind, and he realized that it had surfaced in his subconscious the moment he received the call: the same unsuccessful draft pick, the same overseas league player, the same national team player, the same Spurs pick. Why not ask the more experienced Patty?

Tokyo is as hot in July as it is in November in Australia, and Patty Mills squinted for a moment at the red and white Tokyo Tower in the distance, turning his head in response to Langdale's serious and confused eyes, and he seemed to see himself 10 years ago: "Be patient."

"Huh?" Langdale froze for a moment as if he thought he had heard wrong.

"Be patient." Mills repeated, stirring the straw in his glass with a clatter of ice, "Like you, I played in a league outside the United States."

"In China?"

"Yes. There I heard a story about a group of Buddhists who, from China, walked to India in search of scripture, and they went through ...... halfway." Mills' index finger tapped the table, "81 challenges, yes, 81, before they successfully got the scriptures."

"You mean to tell me that playing in the NBA involves that many challenges as well?" Langdale's frown deepened.

Mills put down his hand that was stirring the straw and waved it at Langdale: "No, no, no, I mean, you have to be ready to swing 81 court towels before you get a chance to play."

Langdale had long heard of the rule that Spurs rookies don't get to play their first year, but he quickly picked up on the subtlety: "What about one more game?"

Mills picked up on it almost without hesitation, as if receiving a pass and immediately pulling up for a three: "There's one more game you're playing in the Development League."

Langdale was lucky, although the Spurs had the iron-clad starting five in Bortles, Eubanks with his big Riley-style back, and the jack-of-all-trades Thaddeus Young. But after more than 20 games, Eubanks has proven once again that he can't play in the second-team rotation, and Thaddeus Young, who is averaging only six points per game, has publicly said "this is not where I want to be" - mainly because at 33, he is the oldest person on the team.

So there's no room for "rookies guarding the water cooler for a year" for the Spurs, as Wassell, Primeau, and Tre Jones all have (relatively) bright futures.

The 26-year-old Langdale is not young, but he is the second tallest man on the team, except for Zach Collins, who is still lying in a hospital bed. More importantly, he is the best interior player to replace Ade's "block and cut" function.

Since December, Landale's minutes and points per game have gone up and up, eventually playing in harmony with the Lakers and Pistons, scoring 31 points on 70% shooting in two games, leaving Howard, James, Garza, and others in the background.

Although he failed to punish Gobert with a three-point shot, Langdale seems to have become a qualified backup for Bortles. The Spurs' interior is now like the backcourt of two years ago - Boutell is long on rebounding, defense, throwing, and inside-out finishing, but has no outside range, while Langdale has an extra outside shot in addition to rebounding and eating pies down the stretch, though has yet to prove his defensive hardness. The two complements, each other as an all-around center with star potential, but now can only serve as a functional role to watch the food go down. The merging storyline only exists in the world of Seven Dragon Balls, reality will always just break a mirror in half, you half me half.

Just as McGee saved the Suns' depth at the five spots, incidentally creating a sense of crisis for Ayton who claimed an early contract extension, Langdale's emergence has inadvertently brought a touch of competition to Bortles - Bortles ranks seventh in the league in front boards, but Langdale also slightly outpaces Bortles in front boards per 36 minutes. Both have played in Europe, and both have a handful of pass-cornering skills; although Langdale has three points, his main skill at the moment is to eat pancakes under the basket, shooting 80.8% from the field, while Bortles is "only" 70.7%.

Of course, the limited sample is not enough to draw objective enough conclusions, but this is certainly good news for the Spurs' two table guards. As the saying goes, the male is not away from his mother, the scale is not away from the weight, Lillard is not away from Nukic, Curry is not away from the dream (the dream with a missing battle again proved this), the Lakers are not away from the thick brow. In this era of small ball lineups becoming more and more popular, good big men are more and more valuable and important. Blocking, downhill, outside cutting, jamming, rebounding, rim protection, changing defenses ...... All the things that the outside core can't do and is too lazy to do, have to be done inside. So the improvement of the Spurs guards, combined with the complementary symbiosis of these two interior players, has allowed the Spurs to play all the way to ...... Eleventh in the West.

But the eleventh in the West is also considered the normal play of the Spurs, in the ESPN summer projections, the loss of DeRozan's Spurs probably has the potential to swoop the first dollar, now playing to this ranking (total net points or positive), one thanks to Murray, White, Langdale, and other people play, so that the Spurs still have highlights to see; two also thanks to the collective "rotten" of the Western teams "The Spurs are still able to fight for the elimination of the game.

In Ade and DeRozan have left the team, and become the size of the legs of their respective teams in the East, Dezhangtai Murray, the 25-year-old, the third year of his career also broke his leg wing-style guard, finally lived up to the expectations of the core of the team to carry the ball and the weight.

Averaging 18+8+9 Willis-style numbers doesn't mean that Murray is Willis-style play, or at least he has half as many turnovers as Willis. In all seriousness, Murray's offensive game is now more like the Spurs' DeRozan of his first two years - the use of the block, the passes to Bortles and outside teammates, and of course the trademark free throw line jumper.

With a usage rate of only 25% this season, he's arguably not sticking to the ball, and he's certainly not very efficient, with his true shooting percentage not quite above 50%. Because Murray's shot distribution is so even, it almost rains from the basket to the three-point line, and accuracy naturally ebbs and flows with opponents keying in on him.

But the Spurs can tolerate this inefficiency, they choose Murray to become the main offensive player with the ball, eating a large chunk of the ball left out by DeRozan, and must accept a certain degree of efficiency decline, just like VanVleet who suddenly became the main offensive player in 19 years.

And the Spurs' patience has paid off to some degree, as Murray's ball-handling offense has grown richer and his ceiling of ability has gradually approached the average player-to-star split line.

Murray's growth is not only in bookkeeping but also in his ability and impact on the court. Although the efficiency is still slightly solid, the current Spurs need more confidence and guts in his daring shots and decisive choices. This is a big step from a role player to a ball-holding core, just like the numbers on an invoice, without the opening 1, it doesn't help how many zeros are behind it. After all, whether in the NBA or other circles, 1 is always a scarce resource.

Of course, you can say that Derrick White also can do so, but this season's White is only 0.5 level, his offensive options are extremely magic ball, three and box shots accounted for nearly 86% - yet the three-point accuracy is only a miserable 29%. On the other hand, his usage rate is only 20%, and White plays on the offensive end, or the role of weak-side sub and no-ball shooter1.

However, after Murray was isolated, White, who temporarily stepped in as the main attacker, faced the Jazz and scored 21 points on 50 percent shooting. It remains to be seen further.

This makes White a bit like the Rockets' Gordon, the 76ers' Curry Jr. (a three-point miss version), and the Maverick's Brunson, with some ability to hold the ball and curl up on the block to share the pressure of the lead scorer. White's ball-handling level leaves something to be desired and his long-range shooting accuracy is too off the charts, but his other strength is court awareness.

At one point, before Murray learned to pass to his inside teammates, White was Bolt's most reliable blocking partner for this very reason (and, why did Diop, who averaged 3.8 points per game, swipe a 100-percent shooting 30 on the Lakers? Because the Lakers' basket is as open as a meadow).

No need to break down Keldon Johnson's corner threes and dynamite drives to the rim one by one, or highlight Lonnie Walker's threes and Vassell and Primo's potential ball-handling ability ...... The list of highlights goes on and on, all the way to Diop's special pie-eating skills and Tre Jones - you can think of him as the "affordable Derrick White".

Looking at the current Spurs through the eyes of the feeder game, you seem to see the merits and room for development in every player, but these exciting rounds and highlights in the eyes of Spurs fans do not prove that this team has a higher talent ceiling than the Grizzlies, Mavericks, Cavaliers, Timberwolves, or Hornets. In terms of realistic records, these teams also have better records than the Spurs.

Just like even the most daring Spurs, fans wouldn't dare to say something like "Murray will be better than Morente in the future".

With Murray and White as the starting point, the offensive signals are amplified by Bortles and Langdale and passed to Keldon, Walker, and others. The Spurs' big four and five small systems are not complicated and are not fundamentally different from the Blazers, the Rubio-era Suns, or even the current Hornets over the years. After several years of grinding through Leonard, Ade, and DeRozan, a new stable version was eventually iterated in the hands of Murray and White. This version of the Spurs is no longer like the past, a bunch of functional puzzle pieces can not put together a reliable dueling lineup, but also a long time to do a certain degree of offense and defense.

The Spurs are currently 15th in the league in offensive efficiency and the middle of the league in defensive efficiency (17th). No matter how strong the opponent is, they can always play a 50-50 game, and when they get hot, they can even beat strong opponents like the Jazz and Warriors in a row. The name of Texas Little Power has climbed from Houston to San Antonio, and the stonemason's clank and bang, always hammering out a human form.

But, the ceiling of the Spurs' supposedly stable, complete offensive and the defensive system is also clearly visible. Popovich is right, the Spurs can't score 120 points every game, although they once scored 130 points per game, when the guards feel back, the hot and swollen Spurs will quickly be cooled back to their original form by a pot of cold water, 21 losses and ranked 11th in the collective crotch of the West is clear evidence.

It's hard to understand the thinking of the Spurs' management, which has traded for Ade and Gay and given a three-year, $36 million contract to the aging Big Gasol, as Cuban said, "Most teams don't think about championships, they think about making money. From this point of view, the Spurs did not have the option to sell out. They did not want to take the risk of plummeting attention and revenue, nor did they want to waste the twilight of Popovich's career on selling out. When they finally made up their minds to take the path of a mild rebuild and achieve some success, they quickly ran into the wall of talent.

Once the system is formed, it is difficult to take drastic steps. The Spurs can continue to dig in like the Raptors, but while doing so, will the Spurs lose patience and not break down like the current Pacers, as rumors said this summer - with only one non-sale item on the team, Keldon?

The Spurs just experienced four wins in six games and suffered two consecutive losses along with Murray's isolation. Talking about this at this juncture is quite a spoiler, but hidden problems and issues don't go away with closed eyes.

A year goes by and it's a new year, and few people get a little better every day. Life is not a steady upward spiral, but an up-and-down skiing adventure. It's not easy for more people to just maintain the status quo and not get swallowed up by the avalanche. For the Spurs, who have been out of the championship cycle and fairy tale bubble for five full years, rebuilding isn't easy to get used to. From the management, coaching staff, and players to fans, there's still a lot to adapt, choose, and change.

Mills suddenly remembered the stonemason quote from the Spurs locker room, remembering the HAMMER tactic he played for 10 years with the Spurs, giving him a hammer swing from Parker to Leonard, from DeRozan to Murray. He suddenly misses those weak side block cuts, the round where he stumbled to pass to Manu, who then dumped it to Duncan for a dunk with writhing on his face. He thought about the silver-haired Popovich on the sidelines, and how nothing seemed to have changed, but the Landale, who was gradually loosening up in front of him, was reminding him that things were long gone.

The corners of Mills' eyes rippled with laughter as if he was sitting in front of himself 10 years ago.

"Be patient." Mills said once again.