The Not-So-Surprising Basketball Longevity of Tim Duncan

[BwareDWare94]

Each post-2010 NBA season passes and we're met with the same exaltations over ageless wonder Tim Duncan, the longtime F/C of the San Antonio Spurs. Is he the same player he was 10 years ago? No, he certainly isn't, but has he deteriorated as you'd expect for a player whose age now begins with the dreaded 4? He hasn't done that, either.
 
Duncan continues to excel in a league that has long since evolved beyond the necessity of a traditionally skilled man in the middle. Mostly gone are the days of back to the basket post play, though a small re-emergence may be credited to Karl-Anthony Towns over the next few years.
 
All around the league teams are searching for the athletic freak Center who might not be able to throw a golf ball into Lake Superior, but can sure as hell send layup and dunk attempts into the bleachers. Though most of these centers aren't as unskilled as, say, DeAndre Jordan, most are not going to lean into their defender and use their footwork to get an easy shot. Most aren't going to turn around and face their defender before dribbling one way, spinning back the other way and dropping the ball in the basket with an easy jump hook. Today's Centers are looking to be garbage men on offense, cleaning up missed shots and finishing alley-oop dunks with ferocity. Of course there are exceptions to this rule, but most of those players had to be meticulously developed, and many of today's post up centers are slow footed and therefore a liability on defense like Jonas Valenciunas and Greg Monroe.

All of these points lead us to one conclusion—Tim Duncan is perhaps the last of a dying breed, the old school post player who can use basic fundamentals to get easy shots and play nearly perfect defense. And as we take a quick look at the intro to this article, we are forced to wonder why Duncan didn't deteriorate like his peers, namely Kevin Garnett, the guy Duncan was most compared to during his career as both players dominated the league. To be fair to Garnett, his deterioration was sped up by knee injuries, but there's no denying that the things he depended on, primarily the crazy elevation he once rose to on his jump shots, was going to deteriorate, and deteriorate fast at some point.
 
So why has Duncan's deterioration been so slow compared to his peers? Part of it is hard work on his part, the way he leaned up later in his career and keeps himself in shape in the offseason, and part of it has to be credited to Greg Popovich for giving Duncan plenty of rest over the past few seasons, but most of it is a much less complicated than we'd expect, and it's observable every time we get to watch him play.

Tim Duncan's primary assets don't deteriorate with age. His sheer size and ability to not have wasted movement, the things that make him a force on the defensive end, aren't going to go away with age. You don't see Duncan over playing anything, allowing him to cover as much ground as possible while avoiding excessive movement that puts pressure on his joints. You add his basketball IQ to the equation, and there's no reason that Tim Duncan can't continue to be a good to great defender.

On the offensive side of the ball it's even clearer. There's a reason Tim Duncan has long been referred to as The Big Fundamental. Fundamentals are the keys to his offensive game, from his use of the glass on any shot off centered from the basket to his basic posts moves. Duncan may have been more athletic in his twenties and early thirties, but never was he the high flying freak ala Antonio McDyess or Amer'e Stoudemire, two early career greats who had to re-invent the way they played the game because injuries stole their elite athleticism. Duncan has always been a very basic, fundamental player, but it's basics and fundamentals that have provided his longevity, and will likely allow him to play as long as he realistically wants.
 
Do we expect to see a 45 year old Tim Duncan playing NBA basketball? Probably not, but if he so chooses, don't expect to see a severe decline, because basics and fundamentals don't deteriorate.
 

 

[bosoxlover12]

I'd be shocked if he even played next year

 

[Pugz]

i would but i still wouldnt be surprised if he played until he was 45