Open Thread: Spurs “what if” #3- Derek Fisher missed the 0.4 shot

Oct 4, 2022 - 11:00 AM

Let’s just be honest - Derek Fisher should have never made that shot.

For one, the clock didn’t start at the immediate moment the ball was inbounded. Even Derek Fisher admitted the clock was his ally.

Two, it’s Derek Fisher! Most important shot of your season doesn’t go to Kobe Bryant?!? The basketball gods should have smite the Lakers for their egregious game plan.

Third, Derek’s form is all cattywampus. Meanwhile, Manu Ginobili is straight up-and-down, arms extended, and the Argentinian has a good five inches on the former Trojan.

Fourth, it’s Derek Fisher! In addition to Kobe you have Shaq, Karl Malone, and Gary Payton. Seriously, I can’t get over Fisher being on the team, much less the floor in clutch time.

But I digress...

In the alternate reality where Spurs-colored glasses are automatically prescribed to all watching the NBA-

Derek misses the shot (or the buzzer goes off before the ball leaves his fingertips). The energy from Tim Duncan’s fade away is enough to carry the Spurs to a decisive win on the road in Los Angeles.

The Lakers do not advance to the NBA Finals where their all-star starting team is not completely embarrassed by the Detroit Pistons (that really happened) in a 4-1 Finals blow out (Lakers lost by 20 points in Game 3, scoring only 68).

Instead, the Spurs and Pistons duke it out in a seven game slugfest that can only mirror what happened one year later.

Big question- do the Spurs rinse and repeat in 2005, or do they rest on their laurels? The Spurs never winning back-to-back titles is the only question that tends to remain. Could, they, would they, if they had ever?

I’d like to think they would have, but that’s why I wear the Spurs-colored glasses.

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