‘It is Pop’s determination. He is earned that’ – Inside Gregg Popovich’s battle to return to the San Antonio Spurs

THE DRIVE FROM Keldon Johnson’s ranch in Boerne, Texas, to the Frost Financial institution Middle was predictable. Thirty minutes on the weekends, 45 in the course of the week. However lately he has to depart early to account for the development on seemingly each main freeway within the space.

Every part concerning the metropolis and the San Antonio Spurs feels prefer it’s rising — bursting with new power and residents who’ve come right here to fill in all of the large open area that used to outline this a part of Texas.

Even earlier than the Spurs drafted Victor Wembanyama, No. 1 general in 2023, that power was inspiring to educate Gregg Popovich. “What’s most fulfilling is they’re like younger, clear slates. You begin on the backside and educate,” he stated in 2022, after years of main a veteran-laden group.

Johnson, who at 25 is by some means the Spurs’ longest tenured participant, has realized to observe Popovich’s lead. Which is why they each arrived on the area so early on the afternoon of November 2, 2024.

Johnson was there to get further work and remedy earlier than a sport towards the Minnesota Timberwolves, and Popovich, then at age 75, was there to undergo the pregame exercise routine that had develop into important as he made his manner by way of the grind of an NBA season.

However shortly after stepping away from his exercise subsequent to the group’s locker room, deep contained in the warren of white, silver and black hallways on the area, Popovich stopped in his tracks. Crew staffers who have been round whereas he was lifting weights knew one thing was off and grabbed him, in keeping with sources with data of the state of affairs.

They instantly sat Popovich down.

Close by, Johnson heard the commotion because the coach started receiving medical consideration.

“I could not see him,” Johnson instructed ESPN. “However to see how all people was speaking about it was scary.”

Johnson tried to get nearer, however Popovich was already being attended to by group staffers who would finally lead him to an ambulance out of the world to a close-by hospital. Only some gamers, staffers and area workers had any sense of what had occurred.

“No one actually wished to say something,” Johnson stated. “No one wished to allow us to in and inform us what was actually occurring. The unknown was actually powerful.”

At round 5:15 p.m., reporters gathered within the interview room for Popovich’s pregame press convention. Though he’s usually punctual, it wasn’t utterly out of the atypical for Popovich to be late or miss one in all these availabilities. One time final season, he received caught in site visitors on his manner from the group’s new follow facility, The Rock at La Cantera.

Different occasions, he has missed video games for minor medical procedures or private causes. The assistant coach that had run the scouting on the evening’s opponent was normally appointed to fill in.

So it did not elevate any eyebrows when Spurs longtime spokesman Tom James got here into the room round 5:30 to announce that Popovich was “below the climate” and assistant coach Mitch Johnson would lead the group that evening.

Behind the scenes although, phrase had begun to unfold among the many group that what had occurred to Popovich — the rock upon which one of many NBA’s most profitable franchises has been constructed — was severe and maybe life-threatening.

It might take time for medical doctors to find out the extent of the harm Popovich suffered after what was deemed a light stroke. Gamers weren’t capable of speak to him for weeks. It was a number of months earlier than he was robust sufficient to stroll after which stand in entrance of the group and communicate on to them.

“It has been fairly powerful for me,” Johnson stated. “He is been our position mannequin since I received right here. He is been that chief.”

A lot has occurred within the 5 months since. The Spurs made a blockbuster commerce to land All-NBA guard De’Aaron Fox. Stephon Fortress has blossomed into the presumptive Rookie of the Yr. Wembanyama regarded each bit just like the generational famous person he was billed to be earlier than he was misplaced for the season with a blood clot in his arm.

However Popovich hasn’t coached since that evening and will not coach once more this season. Veteran Harrison Barnes stated Popovich is “forward of schedule” in his restoration. One other supply stated the coach has superior in 5 months of rehab to the purpose the place many who are suffering strokes progress over 9 months. Nonetheless, nobody is aware of but whether or not he can return to the sidelines subsequent season, both.

It’s a unusual new actuality for everybody. The bond between Popovich and the Spurs has been so strong, so ingrained in all the things, that it fueled the rise of this proud franchise. They grew collectively, developed, aged after which began anew. Till Popovich stopped in his tracks that afternoon in November, leaving everybody at a crossroads. The long-discussed and delayed succession plan was instantly pressing, and selections that have been as soon as his to make, maybe have been now not.

For the primary time in three many years, the person who has been on the heart of this metropolis and this franchise has been on a distinct sideline — combating to get again to what he as soon as was.

THERE ARE REMINDERS of Popovich’s affect throughout San Antonio. Cease by the Chicken Bakery in Alamo Heights the place he had cookies custom-made for his seventieth celebration. Or Battalion, a superb eating Italian spot within the historic Firehouse 7 constructing the place Popovich is an investor. Or one in all his favourite French bistros over in Southtown: Bar Loretta. Each waiter or sommelier has a narrative, a fond reminiscence of when Popovich got here by.

Johnson does, too. Popovich invited Johnson and that yr’s rookie class to a elaborate dinner at Bliss, a restaurant in Southtown that includes American fare. “He was like, ‘Y’all attempt these oysters,'” Johnson stated. “And Quinndary [Weatherspoon] was like, ‘I ain’t by no means had oysters.'”

“You wish to play?” Popovich stated. “You higher attempt the oysters.”

Thankfully for Johnson, he had tried oysters, passing Popovich’s first check. Over the following 5 years that he performed for him, the assessments stored coming.

In 2021, he invited Johnson to the nationwide group camp, telling him, “I want you to be prepared as a result of I am going out on a limb telling all people you are prepared.” Johnson simply assumed he was being invited to the junior group camp. Even that was daunting.

However Popovich thought he was able to extra, and when Johnson had a powerful camp, the coach went out on one other limb, selecting him for the Olympic group that competed within the Summer time Olympics.

“He is actually formed who I’m as a younger man,” Johnson stated. “Lots of people assume Pop is so stern. No, no, no. He is probably the greatest human beings I’ve ever been round. He treats all people very well and places everybody earlier than himself.”

His legacy is ironclad, unimpeachable, and was already so if he’d retired a decade in the past, after San Antonio gained its final championship in 2014. The 5 championship trophies the Spurs gained — throughout their unprecedented 22-year run of creating the playoffs below Popovich and govt R.C. Buford — are housed inside The Rock, now the most important mass timber (pure wooden) sports activities facility in North America.

Positioned 20 miles up Freeway 10, at 1 Spurs Method, the group spent $500 million to open the 45-acre group venue within the fall of 2023. Along with state-of-the-art amenities for the Spurs, there are parks for households, eating places, group trails, a 40-foot LED display that performs all the things from Spurs video games all through the week to “sing-along Sundays,” in addition to plans for a medical heart that can serve the group. It was made in Popovich’s picture — what he values and what he cares about.

Essentially the most outstanding show contained in the 134,000 sq. foot constructing, nevertheless, is Popovich’s teaching mantra, The Stonecutter’s Creedo:

When nothing appears to assist, I’m going and have a look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock maybe 100 occasions with out as a lot as a crack displaying in it. But on the hundred and first blow it would break up in two, and I do know it was not that blow that did it, however all that had gone earlier than.

The quote from Jacob Riis, a Danish activist and reformer, seeps into each facet of Popovich and the Spurs, though Popovich would have you ever consider he is performed only a small position in establishing it. Nevertheless it’s the Spurs Method.

“I used to be tasked with the job to create an surroundings so we may have some success,” he stated at his Corridor of Fame ceremony in 2023, a ceremony he delayed till the Corridor of Fame gamers he coached — David Robinson, Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker — had been inducted.

However the fact is Popovich’s influence on basketball, and on the Spurs, can by no means be absolutely encapsulated.

“Pop is pretty much as good a coach as there has ever been in any sport,” former Duke coach Mike Krzyzewzski, just lately instructed ESPN.

The 2 teaching lions have grown nearer later of their skilled lives.

“We actually received to know one another when he was named the nationwide coach and I used to be nonetheless the nationwide coach,” Krzyzewski says. “We turned actual shut and I wanted I used to be that shut with him my complete profession.”

He admired how Popovich had led his groups and tried to make use of his platform exterior of teaching, he stated. They’d bonded over their navy pasts. Krzyzewski was an Military cadet. Popovich went to the Air Power Academy.

Krzyzewski had the luxurious of planning his retirement and selecting his successor [Jon Scheyer] when he retired in 2022 at age 75. He was able to be completed with all of the journey and recruiting and calls for of teaching a high faculty program. And he had a job with Duke and household life all arrange and ready for him.

Popovich wasn’t there but. His ardour for teaching stays, particularly for this younger group with Wembanyama as its chief. And so far as the Spurs have been involved, that was the way it ought to be.

“It is Pop’s determination,” one individual near the state of affairs instructed ESPN. “He is earned that.”

THAT HAS BEEN the Spurs’ succession plan for the higher a part of a decade. Every summer time, Popovich would take a while to digest the season and see if the fireplace nonetheless burned inside him. Buford and Co. would watch for phrase, trusting that Popovich would all the time be trustworthy sufficient with himself to do what was finest for the group.

Through the years, a half dozen assistant coaches have been talked about as potential successors. First it was Mike Brown, Mike Budenholzer and Brett Brown, however they finally received head teaching positions elsewhere. Then got here Ime Udoka, Becky Hammon, Will Hardy, James Borrego, Monty Williams and Taylor Jenkins. Popovich outlasted all of them, too.

Final yr there was speak across the league that Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr, who performed for Popovich for 4 seasons, could possibly be positioned as a successor if he did not come to an settlement on an extension with the Warriors. However Kerr re-signed with Golden State for 2 extra seasons — a deal that ends after subsequent season — and the expectation is that he’ll coach there so long as Stephen Curry is hitting 3-pointers by the Bay.

So it was Johnson who was named interim head coach in November. In comparison with others who’ve been talked about as potential successors, Johnson’s resume was mild. He’d performed at Stanford, got here up by way of the Spurs system and had earned a powerful popularity in teaching circles after interviewing for a head teaching job final summer time in Toronto.

“Seeing him within the place he is in now will not be a shock. He belongs there,” Milwaukee Bucks heart Brook Lopez, a former teammate of Johnson’s at Stanford, instructed ESPN.

“Such an clever basketball participant, the best basketball IQ I’ve ever performed with or been round,” Lopez stated. “He sees the sport otherwise. We truly known as him “maestro” due to the way in which he conducts and runs the present.”

Nonetheless, James, who has been the Spurs high communications official for 30 years after first becoming a member of the group in 1988 as an intern, knew a lot of the media in Los Angeles weren’t acquainted with him earlier than the group’s sport towards the LA Clippers on November 4.

“For these of you not from San Antonio, our coach tonight is Mitch Johnson,” James stated in entrance of the room, a couple of minutes earlier than Johnson stepped to the rostrum.

The sensation within the room was somber. The total extent of Popovich’s state of affairs was nonetheless coming into focus.

Earlier that day, officers revealed to the group that Popovich had suffered a stroke, sources stated. He was nonetheless within the hospital, and nobody may say but how damaging the stroke had been.

It was an unattainable replace for the group to swallow. They’d spent the previous two days not realizing what had occurred, solely to study simply how severe it was. All a few of them knew was that their chief had been whisked away in an ambulance, from the protection of the world to the unknown.

Previous to tipoff at Intuit Dome, veteran level guard Chris Paul was requested to talk for the gamers, and he did so, just some steps away from the locker room.

“We all know he will be watching,” Paul stated earlier than the sport. “He’ll tell us what he sees. All the blokes with our group, employees, everybody undoubtedly misses him as a result of he is Pop. There is a feeling when he is within the room that simply calms all people.”

Mitch Johnson delivered his personal heartfelt assertion about Popovich earlier than the sport, earlier than going by way of his pregame warm-up with Wembanyama and the group. “I simply wish to begin off by saying that Pop’s influence on our group … it is laborious to articulate or put into phrases, and if I attempted it will not do it justice,” he stated. “He is been large for me personally, and proper now his well being is the No. 1 precedence. … I talked to him final evening. He is in good spirits. He is OK, and we won’t wait to have him again.”

The Spurs got here out making almost each shot towards the Clippers, constructing a 26-point lead by the top of the primary quarter. However finally the emotional toll caught as much as them.

They misplaced, 113-104.

FOR A CITY that is altering as quickly because the climate shifts in south Texas, the Spurs transfer at a decidedly slower tempo. Strikes, updates and modifications occur behind closed doorways, and the franchise broadcasts or acknowledges them in a manner that creates as little noise as potential.

Previously 9 years, the group quietly modified management, from longtime proprietor Peter Holt, who retired in 2016, to his ex-wife, Julianna Hawn Holt, and now to their youngsters, Peter John Holt and Corrina Holt Richter, who symbolize the household on the franchise’s board of managers. The membership has additionally added minority house owners and strategic companions equivalent to Michael Dell, CEO of Dell Applied sciences, Joe Gebbia, co-founder and chairman of Airbnb, and the McCombs household, which returned after 30 years in 2023 to buy a share within the group that the household’s patriarch helped set up and as soon as owned.

These are big modifications for a franchise. Had they occurred in New York or Los Angeles and even Dallas, it will’ve been worldwide information. However with the Spurs, there have been just a few tales within the native media and all the things stored on going the way in which it has for the previous three many years.

That is due to Popovich and Buford, who met on Larry Brown’s employees at Kansas 39 years in the past and have been inseparable ever since. Buford is the Spurs’ CEO whereas Popovich is the Spurs’ president and head coach. Brian Wright has been the group’s basic supervisor since 2019.

The group strikes when it has readability on a state of affairs, not when there’s hypothesis.

The Spurs have provided 4 updates on Popovich since Nov. 2. First to say that he wouldn’t journey with the group to Los Angeles. Then, 11 days afterward Nov. 13, to say he’d suffered a light stroke and was anticipated to make a whole restoration.

Then, a month afterward December 16, Popovich launched an announcement thanking everybody for the outpouring of assist he’d acquired, joking that “nobody is extra excited to see me return to the bench than the gifted people who’ve been main my rehabilitation course of. They’ve shortly realized that I am lower than coachable.”

Lastly on February 27, Popovich introduced that he wouldn’t return to the sidelines this season however hoped that he may return to teaching sooner or later.

In between these statements, his restoration progressed. After just a few weeks within the hospital, Popovich was launched, and some months after that, he was capable of begin strolling once more, sources with data of the state of affairs instructed ESPN.

“It is Pop’s determination. He is earned that.”

Supply with data of the Spurs

He was in communication with the teaching employees, entrance workplace and a number of other gamers all through his rehabilitation, a number of gamers and group officers stated. Keldon Johnson stated he may inform from the textual content messages and calls he acquired from Popovich that he’d been paying shut consideration to the group all through the season.

“He’ll inform me that he is pleased with me, that he cherished me,” Johnson stated. “In an extended season, conversations that actually push me by way of to that subsequent day.”

By late January, Popovich was properly sufficient to deal with the group in individual. However with the annual Rodeo highway journey beginning February 3 in Memphis, it was troublesome to discover a date. Initially, sources stated the Spurs deliberate for Popovich to deal with the group the primary day again after the All-Star break. However that plan fell by way of when Wembanyama skilled ache in his shoulder whereas touring in Wyoming after the All-Star Recreation.

Two days later, the group introduced that Wembanyama would miss the rest of the season after a blood clot was found in his proper arm.

On Feb. 27, an off day between a sport in Houston and a sport in Memphis, the Spurs have been capable of finding time for Popovich to talk to his group. The collective weight of Popovich’s absence, Wembanyama’s devastating information and the lengthy highway journey — they’d been residence solely twice in a month — had taken a toll. The Spurs had misplaced 4 in a row to drop out of the playoff image.

On the follow courtroom at The Rock, Popovich stood in entrance of his group to ship a message: He wasn’t coming again this season, he instructed them. However he had been watching them carefully and was nonetheless in place to carry them accountable for his or her play.

“Everyone shut the f— up when he walked in,” Johnson stated. “That is simply the way it’s all the time been with Pop. Clearly, he is nonetheless recovering. However he was nonetheless cussing. ‘Y’all must play protection. Y’all must rebound.’ Figuring out that, s—, he actually is watching the video games as a result of he is calling out particular conditions, was large.

“It was what we would have liked. I really feel like he introduced that life, that spark. That Pop that all of us knew and cherished. He got here into that assembly and that is who he was. It was like he did not skip a beat.”

He spoke a bit extra slowly than earlier than, extra measured. Sporting an all-black sweatsuit, Popovich talked concerning the future, one he hopes features a spot on the head of the bench. But additionally he cautioned, reiterating a typical that has come to outline his three many years on the helm.

If I can not be 100% myself, I am doing all people a disservice.

His phrases have been met with silence and nods.

“It is a lot greater than basketball,” Fox stated. “That is about his life.”

The message hit.

“It is an inspiration,” Fox stated. “Going by way of the issues that he is going by way of, and him attempting to battle again simply to be on the market. It’s a testomony to who he’s as an individual and you may inform that he actually needs to be again on the market.

Fox, who will miss the remainder of the season with a tendon damage in his pinkie, had solely talked to Popovich on the telephone since becoming a member of the group in a commerce on February 2. This was the primary time he’d seen Popovich since coming to San Antonio.

“It might go from severe to laughing again to severe and laughing,” Fox instructed ESPN. “However he is aware of the right way to maintain folks engaged, and I feel that is why he is been capable of do what he does for therefore lengthy. Clearly, we would like him to be as wholesome as potential. However I’d like to be coached by Pop, for positive.”

FOR AS MUCH that has modified in San Antonio since Popovich first arrived in 1988, there are some issues that by no means do.

Individuals may go away the Spurs at one level of their careers, however they typically come again to dwell in San Antonio. This place, just like the group, is a perpetually residence. As soon as you’re a part of the Spurs household, there’s all the time a spot for you.

Monty Williams got here again after his first spouse, Ingrid, was killed in a automotive accident in 2016. He got here again once more after being fired in Phoenix in 2023 and Detroit in 2024. He is teaching his sons, Elijah and Micah, together with Tim Duncan’s son, Draven, at TMI Episcopal Excessive Faculty now.

Duncan by no means left after his taking part in profession resulted in 2016. Neither did Ginobili, who took a job with the Spurs and sometimes brings his 14-year-old twin boys to residence video games. Parker has left and are available again a number of occasions, having just lately been across the group as he plans out his future in basketball.

Mike Brown got here again in between jobs. So did Danny Ferry and Chris Grant.

That is additionally a part of the Spurs Method. Popovich created this tradition, and it has endured. The query, now, is the way it evolves when he’s now not its steward.

It is a query that has hung over the franchise for a decade however nonetheless does not appear actual, regardless of all the things that is occurred this yr. To almost everybody concerned, together with maybe the person himself, it is unattainable to think about any various.

However the fact is, a lot has already modified. Popovich has handed increasingly more of the teaching duties to his assistants over time. He empowered them to educate in his stead a number of occasions.

He even moved from his longtime residence in Dominion to a penthouse in Southtown just a few years again. That excellent four-bedroom home with the custom-made wine cellar he cherished a lot? He offered it in the course of the pandemic in 2020.

His youngsters are grown. His spouse, Erin, handed away in 2018 after an extended sickness. Every part was altering, and so he did, too.

Throughout his Corridor of Fame speech, the famously personal man acknowledged a few of what he’d been by way of and the way a lot he was nonetheless wanting ahead to in his life.

He thanked his youngsters, Mickey and Jill, for taking care of him. He gushed as he known as out to “the celebs of the present,” his grandchildren Bridget and Finn.

“My spouse Erin was our rock,” he stated. “My daughter Jill has taken over the mantle and retains us on the straight and slender.”

That is what he is been combating for this yr: to get again to the life he constructed for his household, his group and his metropolis — after which determine, on his personal phrases, how and when it’s time to go away.