"After the game, I told my players that I wish they hadn't been so selfish, that giving out 37 assists wasn't enough," revealed Gregg Popovich this week, after his team's win (106-115) in Minnesota , at that point the third in four season games.
“And they are so young that they stared at me like I was serious.
Then they realized that it was just a joke.
I think I have to be careful, they are too literal”, he confessed to the journalist Tom Orsborn.
The anecdote, in fact, came to explain two things.
One, that the current Spurs squad is indeed very young (only the Thunder and Rockets do not reach their average age, less than 24 years).
And two, that despite the fact that when Popovich assumed command of the San Antonio bench the vast majority of his current group had not even been born, the veteran coach retains the irony and passion for the game that have made him an icon.
This Friday (early Saturday morning in Spain), in the duel that will measure his team against the Bulls, Popovich will meet his 2,051st meeting training in the regular phase of the NBA, thus breaking ties in the historical third place with the legendary Bill Fitch, champion with the Celtics in 1981 and recognized in 1996 –on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the competition- as one of the ten best coaches ever in the League.
Only Don Nelson (2,398 games) and Lenny Wilkens (2,487) remain ahead.
And although to reach the first Popovich, who will turn 74 next January, he would have to endure this and another five more seasons -in principle something complex due to his age-, his place in the main echelon of basketball will remain, whether he succeeds or not. , unchanged.
Last March Pop surpassed Nelson, for whom he incidentally worked as an assistant in the Warriors during the 1990s, as the coach with the most wins in the history of the NBA regular phase (he accumulates 1,347 and continues to add).
His run through the finals is equally impressive, ranking second in total games coached in knockouts (284), behind only Phil Jackson;
and third in wins in that context (170), behind only Pat Riley and Jackson himself.
In other words, Popovich is already one of the greatest of all time.
However, in his case, the backbone lies in the fact that it is not even so due to the numerical ephemeris, which would be a strong enough reason for it, but rather that it has reached that dimension due to the mammoth influence that he has exerted from his position as architect of a model franchise for decades.
Popovich celebrates his twenty-seventh season at the helm of the Spurs, an almost surreal milestone in a current sport that burns protagonists, especially on the bench, at the speed of light.
And although, due to the circumstances, the current cycle of his project is much more focused on the development of young people than on competing for the title, his mark has also gone deep in that scenario: the 22 courses in a row that his Spurs achieved a ticket for the Playoffs (between 1998 and 2019) remain the longest record in NBA history and their five championships are only surpassed by two other coaches, Red Auerbach and Phil Jackson.
During all this time, Popovich evolved from his initial rigidity, inherited from his military past, to an open and plural conception of basketball and life, because his impact has not only been reduced to a rectangle.
The years have transformed the stubborn and technical conservative into a kind of shaman whose message, carefully balanced between knowledge and humor, transcends results, contexts and times.
For example, to the globalization of the game contributed facts.
And not only with opportunities for foreigners in its structure, at a time that is not so accessible in that aspect, but even giving maximum responsibilities to players also trained outside of US soil such as Tony Parker -French- or Manu Ginóbili -Argentine- in a group in which Tim Duncan stood out, one of the best interiors in history.
And she has also fought, from practice and not only from words, against the gender barrier, establishing herself as the main endorsement of former player Becky Hammon in her career as a coach.
Hammon, who spent eight years with the Spurs as an assistant -until she headed to the WNBA, with the role of head coach-, was convinced by Popovich, whose admiration for her lucidity acted as a support when entering her into a universe deeply masculine, based on a resounding point: if you need someone qualified for a position, it is absurd to self-censor your options to fill it.
That is, projecting professional value above prejudice.
Thus, that unexpected call that his old friend Larry Brown made him in the summer of 1988, offering him a seat as his main assistant in the Spurs, not only changed his life.
Because going from the tiny Pomona-Pitzer, a Californian university that he took in the third university division and which he directed then, to the full focus of the NBA, was a colossal leap.
He also did, consequently, with the sport of basketball itself.
That he was discovering and understanding one of the most unique, intelligent, winning and influential characters that he has ever had in his history.
That in a limited world, with races restricted by its beginning and its end, he found a timeless figure that goes beyond numerical impact.
That he saw an infinite coach flourish.
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