Spurs’ motto: If you can’t draft them, build them

When Bryn Forbes says he owes his budding NBA career to the Spurs’ player development staff, he means it quite literally.

Forbes had gone undrafted out of Michigan State in 2016, and was auditioning for a training camp slot with any team that would let him.

Chip Engelland and Will Hardy were the coaches who worked Forbes out during his San Antonio tryout.

“They’re the reason I’m actually here,” Forbes said. “They pushed for me a lot after my workout, trying to get me here. I owe those guys everything.”

For Forbes, the work did not end — for himself or his development coaches — the day he signed a low-cost free agent deal with the Spurs.

On the flip side, the work was only just beginning.

In his third NBA season, Forbes has bloomed into an unlikely starter for the Spurs, playing out of position at point guard and averaging 11.8 points per game.

The 25-year-old is well on his way to becoming another success story for the Spurs’ player-development staff.

“They’ve helped me sharpen up everything,” Forbes said. “They’re the best in the business, in my opinion.”

Player development is an integral part of any NBA team’s program. It is especially so in San Antonio, where the team’s last lottery draftee arrived in 1997 with Tim Duncan.

In the years since, the Spurs have not entered a draft with a pick higher than the No. 18 they used last June to nab Lonnie Walker IV.

Before that, the closest they came to adding lottery talent was in 2012, when they dealt George Hill — a former No. 26 overall pick — for the 15th choice and the right to select Kawhi Leonard, a future All-Star.

Often unable to draft ready-made NBA players, the Spurs have been left to build them out of a collection of late first-round picks and second-rounders.

“Developing those guys is pretty important,” coach Gregg Popovich said. “The last time we had a high draft pick was when we traded George for Kawhi. Other than that, we’re not going to get those kinds of players.”

Engelland is perhaps the most well-known shooting coach in the NBA, having begun his career working with Grant Hill in Detroit.

Hardy is one of the league’s more well-regarded up-and-coming coaches. A former video coordinator, Hardy was elevated to the player-development staff when Chad Forcier left to become an assistant coach in Orlando in 2016.

It is those coaches’ job, in part, to mold NBA rotation players out of prospects who might not otherwise be.

Their work has been paying off lately, with the ascent of Forbes, Derrick White (drafted 29th overall in 2017), Davis Bertans (a former second-round pick) and Jakob Poeltl, a 23-year-old center acquired as part of the July trade that sent Leonard to Toronto.

Each of those players has had a role in the modest two-game winning streak the Spurs carry into Tuesday’s game against moribund Phoenix at the AT&T Center.

“It’s not just the improvement; it’s the confidence,” All-Star guard DeMar DeRozan said. “The more loose you become out there on the court, not worrying about mistakes, everything else falls into place.”

Poeltl and Bertans were the driving force behind the Spurs’ fourth-quarter comeback against the Los Angeles Lakers on Friday, combining for 27 points in the team’s 44-point frame.

In consecutive wins over the Lakers and Utah — the Spurs’ first since Oct. 31 and Nov. 3 — Forbes totaled 26 points and made 10 of 16 field goals.

White played 30 minutes against the Jazz, chipping in four assists and three steals.

“These last few games, those guys have definitely had some big moments for us,” All-Star center LaMarcus Aldridge said. “They’re just going to get better.”

Of the Spurs’ core of youngsters, Poeltl possesses the most impressive pedigree. The 7-foot Austrian, who played collegiately at Utah, was a No. 9 overall pick three summers ago.

Among the Spurs, only LaMarcus Aldridge and Rudy Gay were selected higher. They went second and eighth, respectively, in 2006.

In four December games, Poeltl is averaging 18.2 minutes off the bench, logging 9.6 points, 6.4 rebounds and 1.4 blocks per game. He is proving to be a reliable weapon in the Spurs’ pick and roll game, making 77.8 percent of his shots in that span.

“I think for me, it was about getting comfortable and getting to know my teammates and the system,” Poeltl said. “That really clicked in these last couple weeks. I really found my spots.”

Undersized for an NBA shooting guard at 6-3, Forbes’ first big undertaking after joining the Spurs in 2016 was to cross-train as a point guard.

This meant a new plan of attack from the team’s player-development staff.

“Changing a whole position is not easier to do for a player,” Forbes said. “It’s not easy to do for a coach, either. It takes a lot of time and patience.”

Forbes spent much of the 2017 offseason — his first as an NBA player — working with Engelland and Hardy on skills that were foreign to him.

He spent hours in workouts learning how to make decisions in the pick-and-roll. Later, the group might rope in an unsuspecting member of the video staff to help Forbes with defensive slide drills.

“And a lot of times, they made me stay out of the gym,” Forbes said. “They wouldn’t let me come in. They’d kick me out and make me think the game.”

When the Spurs found themselves in dire straits at point guard entering this season, with Dejounte Murray, White and Walker all on the injured list, Forbes was as ready as he could be to man the position.

Popovich jokes that Forbes has done a good job “pretending to be a point guard.”

“He’s really overachieved,” Popovich said.

For that, Forbes — and the Spurs — can thank the team’s player-development staff.

“They’re patient, that’s the biggest thing,” Forbes said of Engelland and Hardy. “They never got frustrated. They knew it was going to be a long process. And we’re still working. That’s the thing.”

jmcdonald@express-news.net

Twitter: @JMcDonald_SAEN