Manu Ginobili will forever live in basketball’s soul

Twenty-thousand captive fans, sensing what we now know, chanted his name in unison. Manu, Manu, Manu. A man wearing his Argentina jersey swung his hand up and down, begging the final remnant of the Big 3-era Spurs to stand up and play after banging his knee against Andre Iguodala.

Manu Ginobili walked it off, played, and the years fell away. With a minute-and-a-half left in Game 4 of a 3-0 first-round series against the Warriors, he was crouching and pivoting on the right block, trying to shake free from Draymond Green’s towering frame after picking up his dribble. Green knocked the ball away, but Ginobili retrieved it, re-armed with the dribble and removal he needed to knock down a falling lefty hook shot. It was the final iteration of what he has made a career of doing: performing under duress.

Throughout his career, which officially ended with his retirement announcement, Ginobili outwitted not only his opponents, but the trappings of the game. He overcame awkward angles and seven-foot obstacles so systematically and regularly that watching him stopped feeling stressful and started harkening adventure. The question was no longer whether he could MacGyver his way out of his one, but how he would do it.

You knew it when he pass-faked former Defensive Player of the Year Kevin Garnett and snuck a layup over his retreating 6’11 arms. You knew it when Richard Jefferson overthrew a lead pass and Ginobili, falling out of bounds, corralled it, and whipped a perfect behind-the-back pass to DeJuan Blair for a lay-up.

Ginobili expanded the parameters of basketball by working within its rules but outside its norms. As a result, he was never out of counters. An alternative choice awaited at every horizon. He was always thinking ahead, maximizing even the most meager of movements by anticipating his opponent’s actions. As long as he could move, he had a move. You wonder if he let Draymond knock the ball out of his hands on purpose.

Game 4 wasn’t the first retirement-fearing chant to break out for Ginobili, who has flirted with walking away numerous times before Monday, when he ended the rare Hall of Fame-level career that featured NBA averages of 13.3 points, 2.8 rebounds and 3.8 assists.

A player with Ginobili’s talent could have dominated the ball, racked up multiple 25-point-per-game seasons, and cashed in his countless game-winning shots into the individualistic mythology that turns athletes into professional endorsers.

Instead, he played for the spotlight-reticent Spurs and adopted their credos. He came off the bench for the majority of his prime, never averaged more than 20 points per game, and invited little fanfare, receding into the background until the moment called for him to make his mark.

That’s why the crowd’s celebration in that Game 4 was heartwarming. It was filled with people who have come close to watching every moment Ginobili has played, who have the capacity to love him like no other fanbase ever could. Those fans had the best sense of who he was, not only because they had a front row seat to every magical moment he created, but a deeper understanding of the impulses he muted everyday, the risky punches he pulled to be the best teammate, leader, Spur — really, the best Manu — he could be.

He was a Spur all the way through: a hero to his people, but in none of the ways that attract external hero worship.

As a result, despite historical account and YouTube and analytics, the brunt of Manu’s magic will be lost to history. It’s almost inevitable that he’ll be criminally underrated. I imagine he’s fine with it, because he’s Manu.

And anyway, his legacy will live in the soul of the game: the flops, charges, and underhanded defense; every ball bounced out of bounds off an opponent’s body. Ginobili lives in the euro-step of James Harden, whose robotic precision and repetitive strokes are Ginobili’s antithesis. He lives in Chris Paul’s deception, in Dwyane Wade’s change-of-direction. He lives in J.R. Smith untying Wilson Chander’s shoelaces and Westbrook bouncing an inbounds pass off Rodney Hood’s back to nail a mid-range jumper at the buzzer. Ginobili lives in Stephen Curry’s infectious smile and the pretense that defines the dynastic Warriors: marrying competition with joy.

In the 2017 Western Conference Semifinals, he blocked James Harden’s potential game-tying three-pointer at the buzzer, even though he could have sent the NBA’s king of foul-drawing to the line.

It wasn’t the defining moment of his career, nor were any of those aforementioned highlights. The defining moment of Ginobili’s career came a decade ago, at a dead-ball in the first quarter of an early-season game against the lowly Sacramento Kings. The game stopped because a bat flew onto the court. Ginobili eyed it, crouched, anticipated its flight path, lurched out and captured it in his hand — on Halloween of all nights.

It was pure absurdity and innovation, the single weirdest thing we have witnessed from the man who always ventured where others wouldn’t and took risks where others would play it safe.

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