Scott Wachter-Imagn Images Chris Paul and Harrison Barnes have not turbocharged the offense, but the Spurs are getting enough stops to keep games close and get wins. How much have the veteran additions, Chris Paul and Harrison Barnes, helped the Spurs so far? Marilyn Dubinski: They have been a pleasant surprise so far. Barnes’ play was a little concerning in the preseason, but in typical veteran fashion, he flipped the switch in the regular season and has been a steady force for the starters with his shooting, cutting and ability to always make the right play. For Paul, it took a few more games to mesh. Despite filling out the assist column, turnovers remained a problem for the Spurs, and his passiveness with regards to shooting was bogging down the offense. I get the feeling that somewhere around the Thunder game, Pop told him that they needed him to score more, because he flipped a switch, has started looking for his own shot, and the Spurs have looked like a whole new team when he’s on the floor. Mark Barrington: It’s been especially evident at the end of close games, when the team can run a play and get a decent shot, whereas last year, they would always end up out of position and often not even getting off a shot. Barnes has been useful in providing scoring when needed and tightening up the defense. The biggest overall improvement has been in team discipline, the young players are just executing the plays with more precision because of veteran leadership that guides them and provides accountability. Jacob Douglas: When Paul is aggressive and looking to score, it helps the offense a ton. Just having someone who can take the top off the defense with his pull-up jumper both from three and mid-range is huge for the Spurs pick-and-roll game. Barnes has been the solid presence that we’ve expected. His shooting has been a welcomed addition, and I love his slow step and pump fake on layups that he’s been using in the last three games. Jesus Gomez: Both guys were supposed to help on offense more than on defense, and the offense is still struggling, but they brought a level of general steadiness that last year’s younger version of the Spurs was lacking. The team is not losing as many big leads as it used to and has kept it close in some losses. Barnes and Paul haven’t transformed San Antonio into a contender but they have done what was expected of them: bring consistent effort, make the right plays and lead by example. Devon Birdsong: Being totally honest, I really didn’t anticipate that Barnes would greatly improve the offense and I still think that’s likely to be the case. However, having him on the floor with Sochan and Wemby has helped make that starting unit pretty stingy defensively and because Barnes’ skill set allows him to flex to either unit pretty easily, it’s possible he’ll become a real x-factor for the Spurs. He has a history of being a little streaky from long-distance though, all the way back to his Warriors days, and if he’s not hitting his shots the spacing in the starting unit gets really ugly. We’ll have to see what effect adding Devin Vassell has to really know what Barnes’ true value is, I suspect. Paul, on the other hand, feels like he’s just scratching the surface on his overall offensive impact so far. I’m giving their additions a solid ‘B’ for now, but I think there’s room for a higher grade in the future. The Spurs have one of the best defenses in the league. Do you think their success on that end is sustainable? Dubinski: I don’t know if it remain top 5, but they have the pieces to be top 15, maybe even top 10. Victor Wembanyama will continue to be a wrecker by himself, and Jeremy Sochan is breaking out as one of the league’s premier perimeter defenders, but there are still plenty of weaknesses on the roster beyond those two, especially with the second unit (which is also severely struggling offensively). It will be interesting to see if Devin Vassell’s return impacts the current defense in any way. He too has the tools to be a plus-defender, so if he can just be neutral at worse, that will go a long way. Barrington: As long as Wembanyama is healthy, the team will be elite when he’s in the game, but there’s a lot of drop off when he sits. Sochan is also a very good defender, and his physical play gets under the skin of opponents. Collins tries on defense, but he’s not quick or agile, and he’s often outmuscled by other team’s interior players. Malaki Branham is a scorer coming off the bench, and he’s not a good defender at all. The Spurs defense is going to have a split personality this year, with Hyde starting and Jekyll coming off the bench. Douglas: I don’t know if they’ll be one of the elite defenses, but I think they can be in the top half of the league. Wembanyama is just as impactful as ever, Sochan has become a real stopper, and the team’s defensive effort overall has gotten better. I’m interested in seeing what happens to the defense when Devin Vassell comes back and one of Barnes or Julian Champagnie heads to the bench. That will likely be a defensive blow to the starting five, despite the clear offensive benefits. Gomez: It doesn’t feel sustainable. They were a top 5 defense before the Clippers game and they probably don’t have the personnel to be that high up. Opponents were also not hitting threes at a high rate against them, even wide-open ones. But I think they can absolutely stay in the top half of the league and maybe the top 10. Wembanyama is a game-changer in the paint and they have enough perimeter defenders to at least bother the best scorers. Birdsong: This is a tough one. On the one hand, the Spurs haven’t faced any of the league’s premier offenses. The Rockets actually have the highest offensive rating of the teams they’ve played, and they’re currently 9th, so it’s impossible to know how the Spurs will fare against offensive buzz-saws like the Cavs, Warriors, or the carpet-bombing defending champs in the Boston Celtics. On the other hand, the Spurs are still integrating on both ends, and younger players like Wemby and Sochan are just beginning to explore their respective ceilings of defensive menace. As such, even if the Spurs have trouble staying fully healthy, I could see them ending the season with a top 10 defensive rating, which should scare the bejesus out of the rest of the league. Regardless, it was nice to see them finally having some luck with opponents shooting from three before the Clippers’ game. The past couple of years they’ve been teed off on from long-distance by seemingly everyone, and while some of that was defense, some it was also just plain old bad luck. Feels like a good omen. The Spurs’ offense is among the worst in the league. How much do you think they can improve on that end? Dubinski: Hopefully those issues mostly boil down to missing Vassell’s shooting among the starters and Tre Jones’ play-making off the bench. While I don’t expect Paul to keep scoring at the rate he has in the last few games, hopefully they have found something in these games that will keep the offense from bogging down. It also wouldn’t hurt if despite what Pop says, Wemby does not jack up too many ill-advised threes. That being said, I’m more concerned about the second unit. It has been very stagnant at times. Hopefully Jones’ return fixes some of those issues, but I would also suggest playing a certain Georgian big man with a hard-to-pronounce last name more as a means to jump-start that offense. If the defense remains good enough, there’s no reason to play a bogged-down offense. Barrington: The Spurs have never put a premium on shooting, and the only pure shooters on the roster are probably Branham and Vassell. Vassell is a much more complete player, and the team will improve when he rejoins the starting lineup. Tre Jones will make the second unit better when he’s back, also. Will that make the Spurs a good offense? I doubt it, because there are too many players on the court that have a limited ability to score. Sochan’s offensive improvement this year is encouraging, and if everyone is healthy, the team has a chance to become a middle-of-the-pack offense, which will help Victor a great deal when opponents’ defenses can’t concentrate on him as the only credible scoring threat. Douglas: I’ll be concerned with the offense if it continues struggling when Vassell returns. Right now, the Spurs need more players who create in the half-court. Having more shooters won’t hurt, either. They’re 28th in the NBA in three-point shooting at 31.1% as a team. Vassell would give them both of those. Plus, it would move a starter to the bench, which should help their bench-scoring woes. Add a healthy Tre Jones to the mix and San Antonio might have something cooking. Gomez: It will all depend on how well the starters can use Wembanyama and how much scoring the bench can provide. Wemby has struggled to find his rhythm in some games and is not shooting threes at a high level. If the Spurs can get him going by having him catch the ball on the move inside the arc, it should help how well lineups with him in it perform. As for the bench, having to rely on Keldon Johnson to create his own shot is risky because he’s inconsistent. If Stephon Castle improves as the games go by, there could be enough firepower to get out of the bottom third in the league at the very least. Birdsong: So far I see the issue as three-fold: 1. Vassell’s absence has had a significant ripple effect spacing-wise. 2. The bench unit really has trouble with consistency minus Tre Jones. 3. New players are still integrating into the offense. All of those issues will likely improve with time. The real question is what the coaching staff will decide to do once Chris Paul figures out how he wants to do things in this offense. Paul’s been an all-time point guard, but he does have a reputation for functioning as his own system rather than bending to the system in place, with coaches often making offensive adjustments based on Paul’s preferences. So far it looks like Pop’s avoided that conflict by leaving things pretty loose until Paul finds his footing (which he appears to be doing quickly), but I suspect we’ll start seeing a lot more organized intent after the first 25 games or so and that will probably begin to tell us a lot about what both Pop and Paul have left in the tank, and that’s likely going to determine a lot. So far, my bet is on something in the neighborhood of Paul’s 2019-2020 Oklahoma City Thunder team, and that team finished 17th in offensive rating, which feels about right. Do you have any topics you would like to see discussed in In The Bonus, our roundtable? Post some questions in the comments and the PtR staff will answer them in a future edition.