Tim Duncan is impressed by Manu Ginobili.
Really impressed.
At 38 years old, with 13 NBA seasons to his credit, Manu Ginboili’s best days are clearly behind him. His per-game minutes averages have been in decline since 2010-11, and his role within the San Antonio Spurs’ offense isn’t nearly as prominent as it once was. But that’s what happens as players age. They regress. They play less. They look different, often a shell of their former selves.
That is, unless they’re Tim Duncan, ageless alien extraordinaire.
Anyhow, last season was the first time in three years Manu Ginobili didn’t miss at least 14 games. And from what Duncan can see of his teammate of 14 years now, per Jeff McDonald of the San Antonio Express-News, Ginobili is ready to follow up that semi-durable, mostly reliable campaign with a worthy encore:
Tim Duncan on Manu: "It's the best I've seen him look in years."
— Jeff McDonald (@JMcDonald_SAEN) October 19, 2015
Hooray for backhanded compliments!
If it’s any consolation to anyone at all, though, Manu Ginobili himself cannot believe how good he looks. Per Mike Monroe:
The 3 p.m. tipoff of Sunday’s Spurs-Pistons preseason game left just enough time for Manu Ginobili to join his family for a school picnic.
“We’ll have to make this quick,” the 38-year-old Spurs guard told reporters crowding around his locker in the refurbished AT&T Center. “I hope to get there in time to eat one rib.”
After making 5 of 6 shots and scoring 15 points in the Spurs’ first preseason victory, 96-92 over a Pistons team that had starters on the court in crunch time, Ginobili deserved more than a single rib. In the three pre-season games he has played he has been the team’s most accurate shooter (12-for-15; 5-for-7 on 3-pointers) and is the team’s No. 2 scorer, at 11.6 points per game.
Nobody is more surprised by the fast start than Manu Ginobili.
“I am shocked,” he said. “To tell you the truth I wasn’t expecting this but I am feeling great; healthy; making shots. I’m playing relaxed. I am really enjoying the experience. That is what I wanted to achieve, this mental state. It’s way easier to do it in pre-season when everything is more relaxed but we’ll see how it goes.
It’s great to know that Manu Ginobili is feeling so, well, great. It was always assumed that Duncan would return for this season, his 19th, and make another run at a title. Ginobili was more of a wild card. He’s younger, but he hasn’t had Duncan’s bill of health. Nor has he aged as gracefully on the court. The traces of star power are still there, and Ginobili is still posting above-average PERs, according to Basketball-Reference, but he just isn’t the same. His spry, young man’s game, while still intact to some extent, has given way to additional errancies, more than Spurs coach Gregg Popovich is even used to when it comes to his notoriously love-me-hate-me future Hall of Famer.
But if Manu Ginobili is really healthier than he’s been in years, San Antonio is sitting even prettier. They already have an embarrassment of riches, most notably in the frontcourt that now employs Duncan, Kawhi Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge, and Ginobili is playmaking insurance against the aging Tony Parker, who, like Ginobili himself, doesn’t appear to be on the old-man-Duncan career trajectory.
Truthfully, this is all just a fancy way of reinforcing a time-old adage: Continue to the fear the Spurs.
