Ginobili out for season opener
While San Antonio Spurs fans may be ready to start the new season off on Wednesday, unfortunately Spurs guard Manu Ginobili is not.
Ginobili sat out of the final preseason game on Friday against the Washington Wizards and will not travel with the team to New Orleans for their season tipoff against the Hornets, according to News4WOAI's Don Harris.
Coach Gregg Popovich told News 4 WOAI Monday afternoon, "He’s not going to travel to New Orleans and we’re going to assess him again on Thursday, He still feels his back. He tried to get on the court today and he couldn’t do it.”
Ginobili has been suffering back spasms for the past few days.
The Spurs still have not ruled out Ginobili playing in the home opener Thursday against Oklahoma City.
With Ginobili out, Nando De Colo could see some extra playing time on the floor in spot minutes at both guard positions. The Spurs could also use Patty Mills more at backup point guard and slide Gary Neal over to backup Danny Green.
The Spurs tip off against New Orleans at 7 p.m. on Wednesday.
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Hopefully it's not as bad as what it is. This might be a blessing in disguise for the team as what the article mentioned. Pop can experiment on his back court rotation with Manu out. This will give minutes to Nando and gauge this early how good he is on a real NBA regular season game is. and the Gary and Patty can have quality minutes on SG spot until Manu comes back. Anyways, it's a full season so we can afford to let Manu sit out a couple of games this early.
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It's game 1 of the regular season. I would much rather see guys like de Colo and Joseph improve over Ginobili potentially make an injury worse.
Time for Manu to call it quits and retire. It's really concerning that he's had two injuries (foot and back) before the season even started. Give him an assistant coach job in the meantime. No wonder why he wouldn't rule out retirement before the season started.
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@kmgospurs Those injuries can happen to any players. Not just Manu. I don't see any reason why he should retire now most especially since it was Ginobili himself is vocal about possibly going for another title run. And his production is as good as it was from his previous seasons. Give the guy some slack. It's a long season, he doesn't have to force himself to play with pain.
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@kmgospurs What are you talking about. I would rather rest him and have him ready for the playoffs. He is 35 which isn't young but isnt ancient. Just have him ready for the playoffs, we are always better with him on the floor
Ginobili out for season.....opener. Nearly had a heart attack, maybe have a title more like "Ginobili won't play in the season opener"
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Pop just fake that Manu is injured, he does this to so-called "extending" players' career all the time.
