Separated at Birth 12/24/09

By FreshSportsDaily.com Wire Services

We're all looking forward to when NASA once again visits Coach Popovich's face.

The Death of the Spurs Dynasty

By MAX CUSTARD, FreshSportsDaily.com Wire Services

When anyone mentioned true NBA title contenders for the past 10 years, the San Antonio Spurs always came up. The familiar mantra has been "the Spurs are the Spurs. They'll always be there." Much like their closest NFL counterpart, the New England Patriots, there is a tightly-held belief that San Antonio will, at the very least, get to the conference championship annually.



Just as every dynasty must inevitably fall, Wednesday night's loss to an undermanned Portland Trailblazers squad might be the moment that we point to in the near future as the end of the Spurs' run of excellence.



I hate to be an alarmist, but in 30 years of watching basketball I have never seen a team dress only six players and be competitive, let alone win, an NBA game on the road as the Blazers did Wednesday. Without diminishing what an incredible accomplishment it was for Portland to win that game, it is completely inexcusable for coach Gregg Popovich to have allowed his team to show up so blatantly flat and unprepared to play.



While it may still be too early in the season to be writing obituaries, I have a gut feeling that we will not see a Tim Duncan-led Spurs team win another NBA Championship ever again. NBA champions just do not lose games to 6-man squads that do not even feature their best player.