NEW YORK, NY - JUNE 10: Victor Wembanyama #1 and Head Coach Mitch Johnson of the San Antonio Spurs looks on during the game against the New York Knicks during Game Four of the 2026 NBA Finals on June 10, 2026 at Madison Square Garden in New York, New York. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowle dges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2026 NBAE(Photo by Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images) | NBAE via Getty Images Before the 2022-23 season, I wrote a piece about the importance of the Spurs learning from losses. The title was “Watching for small victories in a season that won’t feature many Spurs wins”. I ended the piece with this: In our lives, and watching this Spurs team struggle through this season, let’s all try to embrace the small victories, even if they don’t all translate into wins in the standings. Of course, that season of abundant losses ended with a huge victory at the draft lottery when the Spurs got the top pick in the NBA draft. They then cleverly chose a tall French player instead of Scoot Henderson. Fast forwarding to before the start of the 2025-26 season, I ended a piece about the strength of the Western Conference with this: While the 2025-26 Spurs cannot realistically expect to challenge the top five from last year, they can set their sights on the next three, along with Play-In losers Mavs and Kings. Let’s aim for that 6-spot. And maybe face the Clippers in Round One. Does that sound about right? That might have sounded right in September 2025, and it was not just me. The Vegas over/under for the Spurs was 43.5 wins, barely over a .500 record. The actual 2025-26 standings reveal that 43 or 44 wins would have gotten the Spurs the 7th spot in the West. That means if the theoretical 43-win Spurs won their Play-In game, they would have matched up with the 2nd seed in the West. Looking again at the standings as the season actually played out, our 43-win Spurs team would have played the first round of the playoffs against … the San Antonio Spurs, who went 62-20, not the 43.5 wins predicted by Las Vegas. In that theoretical first round match-up, I would definitely have picked the Spurs to win. After all, they would have home-court advantage for all 7 games, if it went that long. Of course, this Spurs team was the 62-win team juggernaut, not the barely over .500 team that would have had to win a Play-In game to even make it into the “real” playoffs. And the juggernaut team had to survive a Victor Wembanyama concussion against the Blazers in the first round, a Victor ejection against the Timberwolves in the second round, and a 3-2 deficit against the defending champs — including a “win or go home” Game Seven in OKC — to even reach the NBA Finals. So why do I feel so terrible now? The answer is easy — the Spurs could have and should have won it all. They didn’t, and it hurts. Once they made the Finals, all the way too pessimistic preseason predictions, all the playoff hardship, all the “they are too young” pundits went out the window. The Spurs were in the NBA Finals, led every game by double digits, and the Finals could have easily been a 5-game Spurs coronation instead of what actually happened. For me, the most pain was after Game Four. When Game Five and the Finals ended, I realized I had spent all my angst not sleeping Wednesday night. I simply could not summon up the same amount of angst so soon after the Game Four slowly unfolding nightmare. I slept OK after the Finals ended way too soon Saturday night, got up Sunday for my Sunday morning hoops, and lost myself on the court —passing, shooting, trying to defend, just hanging with my hoops buddies. My safe spot, my sanctuary. It felt good to be on the basketball court. On the drive home after the Sunday morning game, my mother called from Oregon. We try to talk every Sunday morning. She said she read a bunch of stuff criticizing Mitch Johnson. I told her two things. First, I told her I had not read anything — not even Pounding the Rock — after Wednesday. I had watched Game Four and didn’t need to (and didn’t want to) read about all the things that went wrong on Wednesday night that led to that result. Second, I told her that I find it amusing/infuriating when arm-chair pundits criticize coaching decisions. I have been in locker rooms, coaches’ meetings, hundreds of practices, intense halftime strategy sessions, and on the bench during games. I don’t understand how people who have not had any of those experiences believe they know better than the people who have — with this Spurs team — and who do this as their full-time jobs. Even ex-players, some who are Hall-of-Famers, have this disease of “knowing better”. At halftime of Game Five, one of those Hall-of-Famers said that the Spurs should not play De’Aaron Fox in the second half. What does that even mean? Were Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper supposed to each play 24 minutes in the second half? Of course not. In related news, one of the two guards Chuck apparently thought should play all 24 minutes in the second half had zero baskets in the first half of that very game and did not make a single basket in the first 47 minutes. Stick to being a commentator, Chuck. Coaching is hard. One final thought: The Spurs’ most painful loss, even worse than Game Four in Madison Square Garden, was the Ray Allen game in 2013. Absent missed free throws by Manu Ginobili and Kawhi Leonard in the last minute, some funky bounces on Heat bricks, and Allen’s back-pedaling three from the corner, the Spurs would have been champions in 2013. What did the team do to re-tool for the next season? They brought back the entire team. This year’s team would have been champions in 2026 absent some missed free throws and lay-ups, numerous crazy threes from the Knicks, Victor’s “back-pass” to Castle, OG Anunoby’s block on Fox, KAT’s fingertip on Harper’s pass to a wide open Castle at the end of Game Four, and too many other weird things to list here. What should the team do to re-tool for next season? Let’s run it back. ...read more read less