It was pain, not self-sacrifice, that prompted Spurs center Kurt Thomas to pass up a point-blank putback shot in favor of a wobbly pass to teammate Manu Ginobili in the fourth quarter of Thursday's game against the Clippers at AT&T Center.
Thomas took a healthy ration of ribbing from teammates after turning down what looked like an easy layup, but he had an explanation. "I caught an elbow in my forearm, and my hand went kind of numb," he said, "so that's why I threw it out. ... Believe me, I like to score."
Thomas played all 12 minutes of the fourth quarter of the Spurs' 106-84 blowout victory, allowing Tim Duncan a relatively short night of 31 minutes and 21 seconds. The 13-year veteran had a game-high nine rebounds and made all four of his shots, scoring nine points.
"It helps anyone to really get into a rhythm to get a good, long run, and into the flow of a game," Thomas said. "Then, when the shot is there, you can just knock it down."
Landslide election: With just nine days remaining before the close of voting for starters in the All-Star Game, Duncan has a commanding lead over his closest pursuers among Western Conference forwards.
According to the latest tally by the NBA, Duncan leads the second-place vote-getter among forwards, Denver's Carmelo Anthony, by more than half a million votes.
Duncan has 1,454,918 votes, one of only four Western Conference players with more than a million votes. With 1,903,798 votes, Lakers guard Kobe Bryant tops all Western players. Houston center Yao Ming has 1,758,499 votes; Suns center Shaquille O'Neal has 1,006,383.
Spurs guards Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker rank fourth and fifth, respectively, among Western guards. Spurs forward Bruce Bowen is seventh among Western forwards.
Getting closer: Ginobili's dynamic block of a driving shot by Dwyane Wade on Monday, combined with a couple of solid drives to the rim, convinced Gregg Popovich that Ginobili is 90 percent back to being himself.
Ginobili missed the entire preseason and the first nine games of the regular season as he rehabilitated his surgically repaired left ankle. The explosion that characterized his game, pre-injury, slowly has been returning.
"I think he's on the right track," Popovich said. "The last three games he's made explosive plays that we're used to seeing, either at the rim, or the block he made on Dwyane Wade in the Miami game. That sort of thing is stating to come back in the last three games.
"I'd say he's within a week or two of being 100 percent. That's what I'm hoping."
