Tiago Splitter has a lot to offer as a basketball player.
For starters, he’s just a shade under 7 feet tall. He’s exceptionally quick for a player his size, can catch and finish on the move, and offers rare defensive versatility from the frontcourt. The Brazilian import never developed into a household name for the San Antonio Spurs, but his isn’t the kind of game that lends itself to recognition – it’s simply effective in myriad ways.
One of those ways, though, isn’t as a floor-stretching 3-point shooter. In fact, Splitter has taken only six shots from beyond the arc in his five-year career and, unsurprisingly, made not a single one of them. But that didn’t stop one casual basketball fan from confusing him for one of San Antonio’s 3-point marksmen that still haunt the dreams of Miami Heat fans everywhere.
Splitter recently posted this amusing account of the interaction on Twitter.
lol pic.twitter.com/CagknVXnrm
— Tiago Splitter (@tiagosplitter) September 21, 2015
Frankly, we’re surprised someone who’s able to recognize Splitter as a former Spur would so starkly misremember his role. For the LeBron-era Heat, it would be akin to mistaking Norris Cole as a rim-protector or Mike Miller as a highlight-reel dunker. Those guys are bit players; if you know their name and face, it makes sense that you’d have a general semblance of their playing style, too.
Then again, we also can’t really blame the fan here. San Antonio shot a mind-boggling 46.6 percent on 23.6 three-point tries during its incredible 2014 Finals performance, and both Danny Green and Gary Neal got very, very hot on the game’s biggest stage one June prior. The Spurs may not be the Golden State Warriors or Houston Rockets, but they still love the long ball.
Just imagine if Splitter did, too – he’d be an All-Star! Maybe this random, hilarious encounter will be what propels him to expand his game to the arc in Atlanta.
(Via Tiago Splitter)
