{"id":788174,"date":"2026-07-27T23:16:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T23:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/788174\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T23:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T23:16:09","slug":"2025-26-spurs-player-reviews-jordan-mclaughlin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/788174\/","title":{"rendered":"2025\/26 Spurs Player Reviews: Jordan McLaughlin"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to Pounding the Rock\u2019s 2025-26 player reviews! The series will look at the players who finished the season with the San Antonio Spurs<\/a> on guaranteed contracts and who played consequential minutes and\/or a vital role (so no two-way players because we hardly saw them this year, no players who were traded away, and none of the deep bench centers, since they were both irrelevant and are now all gone).<\/p>\n

2025-26 stats: 44 games played, 6.4 MPG, 2 points, 0.7 rebounds, 0.9 assists, 42.5 3FG%<\/p>\n

Contract Status: 1 year, minimum contract<\/p>\n

There\u2019s not much that can be asked about journeymen on minimum contracts. They are simply expected to suit up when needed, likely due to injury to a rotation player, and mostly blend in, helping when possible but mostly just not hurting the team too much.<\/p>\n

The Silver and Black, who couldn\u2019t find a veteran big who could live up to those modest expectations, mostly got that from their fourth-string point guard. Jordan McLaughlin only played a total of 282 minutes in the regular season, fewer than Jeremy Sochan, as a comparison point, spread over 44 games, so it\u2019s hard to consider him an impact player. The good news is that he didn\u2019t try to be one when his number was called, even in his handful of playoff minutes.<\/p>\n

At this point, McLaughlin knows that the reason he\u2019s still in the league is that he plays within himself. The veteran guard took decent care of the ball, played disruptive defense, and was happy to pass to a more talented creator while spotting up from beyond the arc. He brought the same level of professionalism in garbage time as he did in the Conference Finals, which is what you want from your 11th guy.<\/p>\n

Delving into the numbers from someone who played so little and so often in low-leverage situations isn\u2019t really helpful, so any judgement of McLaughlin has to rely on the eye test, which is kind to him. As a break-in-case-of-emergency ball handler and veteran stabilizer, he looked the part. He never impressed, but he rarely looked out of place or helpless when he was on the floor, as others in the deep bench did.<\/p>\n

While McLaughlin was fine in his role last season, he benefits from the comparison to the horrendous platoon of veteran centers and an underwhelming Lindy Waters III, who showed some intriguing flashes but couldn\u2019t crack the rotation. The expectations from everyone on the periphery of the roster were low, so McLaughlin meeting them doesn\u2019t feel like a significant achievement.<\/p>\n

There was a case to be made for a change in the fourth guard spot heading into 2026\/27. Knowing what you are going to get from someone can be comforting, and the still youngish and supremely talented Spurs need veterans who will be fine with little to no minutes, but taking the long view, finding someone with more oomph to their game than McLaughlin might have been a good idea. After all, at some point the logjam at point guard will eventually disappear as a result of the increasing cost of the roster, and San Antonio will need actual production from a backup.<\/p>\n

For now, though, McLaughlin (and the two-way guards) will do. The vet won\u2019t complain about the many, many games in which he won\u2019t get to see the floor and hopefully will continue to hit open threes to complement his solid floor game and tenacious defense.<\/p>\n

If this is, as it probably should be, J-Mack\u2019s last season in San Antonio, he has the opportunity to leave a good impression just by being ordinary instead of a liability in the few minutes he gets, which seems like something he should be able to accomplish.<\/p>\n

6 points, 1 assist in Game 2 of the Western Conference Finals against OKC. McLaughlin got few but important minutes in De\u2019Aaron Fox\u2019s absence and did well enough under the bright lights.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Welcome to Pounding the Rock\u2019s 2025-26 player reviews! The series will look at the players who finished the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":788175,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99,87488,335265],"class_list":["post-788174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-nba","tag-sports","tag-spurs-analysis","tag-spurs-player-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=788174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788174\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/788175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}