San Antonio Spurs: A Look Back At The Original Big Three

As the San Antonio Spurs close the book on what could be the Big Three’s final season together, we look back at the NBA’s winningest trio

Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, and Manu Ginobili.

Three of the most unassuming champions in a league full of superstars. After falling short in the Western Conference Semifinals, the San Antonio Spurs as they have been known for the last decade may have come to an end.

Duncan played a respectable regular season. But, even as the best power forward to ever play the game, he became a non-factor on the floor when it came time to battle the younger big men of the Oklahoma City Thunder.

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It has been said, joked, and disproven for years now. The Spurs are “old.”

But after winning an astounding 67 games in the regular season, and only losing once in San Antonio to set the best home record in NBA history, it appears that the Spurs great era might actually be at it’s end.

Duncan is 40 years old, Ginobli is 38. Neither is a guarantee for next year. And after an inauspicious ending to their season, the talk of retirement is more serious than it’s ever been.

If it is the end, the success of the Spurs Big Three needs to be celebrated.

They are the winningest trio in NBA history; since they came together they have won four championships. Duncan has five, benefitting from being able to join David Robinson earlier than the others in 1997.

The three won their first championship together in 2003 against the New Jersey Nets. Of course, at the time the Big Three were not quite everything they would become as the decade wore on. Duncan would win the Finals MVP, but it was Robinson who went out on top as he had announced during the season that 2003 would be his last.

By the time 2005 rolled around, the team was firmly in the hands of Duncan when they went to the Finals to face the Detroit Pistons. Ginobili was now seen as one of the biggest steals in draft history and Parker had gone from unknown to respectable guard in his own right. Together, they overcame Chauncey Billups in a seven-game series.

Before the league would see another chapter of the Lakers-Celtics rivalry, the Spurs Big Three made it to the Finals once again. This time, their opposition was led by a talented young man named LeBron James. Already a force, but not yet the basketball royalty he would grow to be, James and the Cavaliers ended up being swept in four games.

Notably, while Duncan remained, the reins on the court were handed to the younger Tony Parker who won the Finals MVP.

In the time before the Spurs would reach the Finals again, changes would happen to the Big Three on the court. Manu Ginobili, a proven starter for a championship caliber team, went to the bench in order to provide the firepower necessary when the second unit entered the game.

It was a selfless move that would prove brilliant as Ginobili would go on to win the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year award and allow the Spurs to continue to build toward the future.

2014 wound up being the poetic meeting of past and future. The Spurs found their way back to the Finals after losing a heartbreaking seven-game series the year before to LeBron and the Miami Heat.

This time, the San Antonio Spurs went on to shut down the Heat in five games behind a new face on the squad: Kawhi Leonard. Though the veteran Big Three would keep the squad composed, it was their young star that made his imprint on the Finals and took home the MVP award for the series.

What the immediate future holds for the Spurs is anyone’s guess. It’s clear after this season that the on-court leaders will be Kawhi Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge. More than likely, an addition will be discussed. It isn’t out of the question that a new guard may be necessary to face the increasingly small line-ups that are taking over the NBA.

But if this is the end for the Big Three, it is the end of an era that has defined fundamental team basketball. As an organization, they have demonstrated on-court the sacrifices and intelligence necessary to remain a championship contender as the years go by.

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In that respect, the Big Three have had another successful season.

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