Are San Antonio Spurs Still Among NBA's Elite?

Frankly, it's a silly question.

The San Antonio Spurs sit in second place in the Western Conference, yet a very poor record against the rest of the NBA's elite has the team's fans and NBA folks around the league questioning their status. Though really, it's understandable.As a whole, observers' memories are generally selective; what they see in front of them is what is tangible, and the rest is just theory.

San Antonio is 2-11 against the top six teams in the league, which is unquestionably poor. Whether it's an excuse or just good reasoning, the majority of those losses came on the second night of back-to-backs or without several key players, but these things must be taken into consideration when applying context to the situation.

And here's the other part of the equation: The Spurs have lost only twice to teams with a losing record (New York Knicks and Detroit Pistons), and they also maintain the NBA's best road record. In fact, the Spurs' 21 road victories is more than 26 teams have in their own buildings.

Let's be honest with ourselves, too: What exactly do the Spurs have left to prove in the regular season? Seeding is crucial in the Western Conference, to be sure, but does it matter where the wins actually come from?

San Antonio is notorious for dialing it back a notch during the regular season. With aging core playersTim Duncan is 37, Manu Ginobili is 36 and Tony Parker is 31it's a necessity that they approach it this way, especially considering they've all been through these wars. Self-preservation is key, and this isn't a team with anything to prove through the first 82 games.

And when you consider all the injuries this team has endured, they haven't had a chance to prove anything, anyway. Since Jan. 4, Tiago Splitter, Kawhi Leonard, Danny Green, Ginobili, Duncan and Parker have not spent a single second on the court together

The Duncan-Parker-Leonard-Green-Splitter starting lineup that cruised through the 2012-13 postseason has spent all of 137 minutes on the court together this season. If we're debating their status as a contender, this has to be taken into account.

Early results with this group weren't good. They were playing great defense, allowing just 92.2 points per 100 possessions; but something was off on the offensive end, where they were putting up just 91.4 points per 100 possessions, per NBA.com's media statistics page. But overall, the Spurs have been just fine. San Antonio has an offensive-efficiency rating of 107.5 this season, which is good enough for seventh in the NBA, according to the same site.

However, since the calendar turned, that lineup hasn't played one second together. Once Splitter went down with a sprained shoulder on Jan. 4, the Spurs went into an injury tailspin. Green followed Splitter's injury with a broken second metacarpal in his left hand just eight days later, Leonard followed that with a fractured fourth metacarpal in his right hand only nine days later, and Ginobili tweaked his hamstring only a week after that.

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Are San Antonio Spurs Still Among NBA's Elite?