After a string of picks categorized as draft and stash, the San Antonio Spurs have excelled in recent years turning back end of the first round guys in to rotation players.  Tiago Splitter I suppose was a bit of both, then there was George Hill, then DeJuan Blair who was actually a second round pick.  More recently Cory Joseph has shown he's at least a back up caliber point guard.  This year their draft position will be no different.  Now that the college season is over for all but four teams, we may be getting an idea of who the Spurs might be targeting.

According to Ray Fittipaldo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, general manager R.C. Buford himself was in town last month presumably to have a look at freshman center Steven Adams (H/T to Dan McCarney for the link).

A struggling San Antonio Spurs team watched their season-long lead over the Oklahoma City Thunder dissipate to a half-game margin to control the top seed in the Western Conference. 

“I saw him come across half court actually limping at one time, so that’s when we pulled him,” Popovich said. “I said ‘Tony,  you’ve got to stop, so we can figure out what it is.’ He just couldn’t go.”

Spurs guard Patty Mills, along with the Coyote and some of the Spurs Silver Dancers, lent their time and support to the Dribble to Stop Diabetes campaign. Mills was out promoting the benefits of a healthy and active lifestyle to the patients at the Communicare Health Center in San Antonio.

The Spurs are showing that having a healthy community is as important to them as winning their fifth title.

UPDATE: The San Antonio Spurs have announced that they've assigned Aron Baynes to the Austin Toros.

With no Tony Parker and no Kawhi Leonard in the line up, it was a given that someone, probably multiple people, from the Spurs' bench were going to have to step up against the Orlando Magic this past Wednesday, we just didn't know who.  I'm willing to bet not many of us thought it would be Aron Baynes.

Since signing with the San Antonio Spurs at the end of January, Baynes has pretty much been given the Cory Joseph treatment, which is to say racking up the mileage driving from San Antonio to Austin to play with the Toros.  Considering he hasn't even had a training camp with the Spurs, none of us really expected his first season to amount to much more than that barring some sort of injury.

The Spurs got good games from Gary Neal, Nando De Colo and Cory Joseph, but Baynes' second half was pretty surprising.  Nine points and five rebounds in 18 minutes may not seem so impressive, but it may allow Gregg Popovich to rest not only Tim Duncan, but Tiago Splitter as well in the future.

The nominees for the 2013 Basketball Hall of Fame are surfacing and listed is former SuperSonics guard Gary Payton.

"The Glove," who had a phenomenal career in Seattle and won his only NBA title with the 2006 Miami Heat, will reportedly pick San Antonio Spurs legend George "The Iceman" Gervin to be his presenter along with former Jazz guard John Stockton.

“John Stockton is someone that I respect and was the toughest basketball player I played (against),’’ Payton had said. “George Gervin, because I admired him ever since I was (growing up). Those are guys that I respect a lot.’’

Second year San Antonio Spurs forward Kawhi Leonard has made leaps-and-bounds from his rookie season and is now a vital part of the team and its success.

This season he's averaging 11.7 points, 1.7 steals, 5.7 rebounds, and shooting 49% from the field and 37% from the three-point line in 30.9 minutes per game. Needless to say, he is making an impact on both ends of the court and has had a tremendous hand in the Spurs successful season which has them currently atop of the Western Conference.

Leonard was featured on NBA Action and spoke on his drive to be a better player while his teammates and coach (Gregg Popovich) also weighed in on the youngest member of the Spurs.

It may have been a tough loss versus the Thunder last night in Oklahoma for the San Antonio Spurs but at least head coach Gregg Popovich gave us another one of his classic sideline interviews.

Needless to say, with the Spurs down 11 points to the Thunder, Pop was not in the best of moods to discuss the game when TNT's Craig Sager had the unenviable task to talk to Pop.

Check out Pop being Pop and Sager being a champ about it all.

Late in the fourth quarter of the San Antonio Spurs’ 100-88 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday, TNT’s sideline reporter Craig Sager had reported that Spurs guard Tony Parker, who had scored just two points in 25 minutes, had went to the locker room where he was having ankle, neck, and back troubles.

After the game, Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich said he feared Parker might have added a new injury to the one’s he’s already been suffering, an issue with his shins.

"My feeling is tendinitis,” said Popovich after the game, “something in his shins or whatever."

"I saw him come across half court actually limping at one time and said Tony, you’ve got to stop,” continued Popovich, “so we’ll figure out what it is."

In the locker room after however, NBA.com’s Jeff Caplan reported Parker wouldn’t discuss his new injury.

"I'm not going to talk about all my stuff,” said Parker. “I've got a lot of stuff going on. I just have to get healthy."

According to Jeff McDonald of the San Antonio Express News, Parker said, “we’ll see” if he will play Saturday versus the Atlanta Hawks in San Antonio.

In written words, Popovich’s thoughts are striking. Here’s what Caplan reported he said about losing Parker, after already losing Manu Ginobili for three weeks.

"So to have those two guys in that situation now is really disappointing. But, you move on. Life is tough."

The matchup of the game for Thursday night's game between the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder will be between Tim Duncan and Kendrick Perkins.

Although both men technically don't play the same position, Perkins usually guards the bigger Duncan to let Serge Ibaka roam on defense with Tiago Splitter not being a shooter or threat on the perimeter. This will put pressure on Duncan to make his outside jumpers and force Perkins out of the paint where he'll most likely be. With Manu Ginobili and Stephen Jackson out for tonight's game, there may be more pressure for San Antonio to slow down the game to Duncan's old school type of game than a running mentality.

What Duncan must do on offense:

The San Antonio Spurs (56-19) will visit their Western Conference rival Oklahoma City Thunder (54-20) tonight in Oklahoma City in a battle of the two best teams in the West. Currently, the Thunder and Spurs are separated by 1.5 games for the No. 1 seed in the West and this will mark their final meeting this season. However, the Spurs will have to face the Thunder without Stephen Jackson who injured his right ankle during last night's game versus Orlando. He is to have an MRI done on his ankle.

The Spurs hold a 2-1 regular-season lead with the Spurs winning the last meeting 105-93 in San Antonio. Tiago Splitter finished with 21 points and 10 rebounds while Russell Westbrook had 25 point, 6 rebounds and 6 assists.

The Spurs are coming off a 98-84 win over the Magic in San Antonio.  Danny Green scored 20 points to lead the Spurs who were without Manu Ginobili, DeJuan Blair, Tony Parker and Kawhi Leonard.

The Thunder, who have not played in four days, are coming off a 109-99 win over the Bucks in Milwaukee. Westbrook recorded his first triple double of the season with a 23-point, 13-rebound, 10-assist night.

And as the Spurs and Thunder get set to clash, here are five things to watch for during the game:

• The Spurs are 8-7 on the second game of a back-to-back this season.

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