It's interesting to watch the Mavs organization become the definition of a paper champion. Sure a lineup including Nowitzki & Kidd arguably looks great on paper. I agree that Kidd brought the veteran leadership Nowitzki doesn't have enough of. However, the Mavs obviously lost too much by giving up Devin Harris. Now the Mavs compound their problems by getting rid of the only person, Avery Johnson, who is sane enough to understand the basketball side of the equation. I appreciated Avery Johnson's class in how he handled being fired from the Mavs. I don't believe it was his fault he was handled a team that was destined for failure. The Mavs should also have realized that Avery Johnson was the leader of this team for several. It'll be difficult to replace his fire & passion for basketball. Hopefully he will be very successful in his next NBA job. I'm not a fan of the Mavs, but I do feel it was unfortunate that Johnson was fired as a scapegoat. It happens in any business like the NBA often so I can't be surprised. Good luck to the Mavs in their quest to close their window of opportunity further. As a Jazz fan I appreciate how Mark Cuban has makes it easier for teams like Utah to succeed on a daily basis. It's very strange that the Suns & Mavs chose this season to make a trade when they obviously needed to set themselves up to live to compete at a higher level another day.
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Posted on: May 1, 2008 6:27 pm
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Dallas Mavericks |
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Level: Superstar Since: Sep 4, 2007 
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Posted on: May 1, 2008 8:33 pm
Dallas Mavericks2 compromised futures, no championships. It's only one year, but this was their best chance to do it. |
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Reputation: 98
Level: Superstar Since: Jan 2, 2008
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Posted on: May 3, 2008 12:04 pm
Dallas MavericksShan, I couldn't agree with you more about Avery Johnson. Getting rid of him was a major mistake on Cuban's part. They are looking at Rick Carlisle now and frankly, I don't get it. The criticism of Johnson is that he doesn't win in the playoffs but neither has Carlisle. He had a losing post season record in Detroit both years he was there...and then followed that up with losing post season records two out of the next three seasons in Indiana. His last year there they didn't even make the playoffs. Carlisle is an excellent coach and a former coach of the year, but so was Johnson. This would not be an upgrade. |
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Level: Amateur Since: May 5, 2008
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Posted on: May 5, 2008 10:25 am
Dallas MavericksOk so i agree with firing avery johnson being a bad idea. i am a mavs fan and i think they can still do well. i do not know what they are missing but they have a good team and they just need time to work with the new point guard and get everything worked out. It will be a good year next year if they can get it all pulled together. ~aaron |
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Reputation: 98
Level: Superstar Since: Dec 12, 2006
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Posted on: August 8, 2008 4:33 pm
Dallas Mavericksi do not know what they are missing Allow me to tell you what they are missing.... 1) They are missing a substantial quantity of "athletic swing men" that can guard multiple positions--They have Josh Howard, and, well, um, er.....Having players who can guard a number of different positions along with contribute at the offensive end allows you to match up with a lot of different types of teams. James Posey would have been a great pickup for them because he can guard 2's, 3's, 4's and the occassional 5 and although not being a great offensive player, he is still a good enough shooter and decision maker on offense that he doesn't hurt your offense. 2) They don't have a bona fide "Go To" Low Post Scorer--Dirk is a great scorer, but he is a perimeter scorer mainly. Brandon Bass is a decent low post scorer, but is not a 30+ minute per game dominant low post scorer. The fact that Dirk is not a great post up guy allows teams to put long perimeter guys on him who can guard him more effectively then power forwards and he is not really able to tage a big advantage in the low block (i.e. the type of guys that are missing from the Mavericks lineup as brought up in item #1 above). At the same time, this forces Dirk to defend a guy on the perimeter, something he is not very good at. Not all teams have the type of personnel that they can do this against Dallas without hurting their own cause in some way, but enough of them do have these type of guys to keep Dallas from just dominating every team they face. These are the main two weaknesses I see. Two weaknesses means they are still a pretty solid team but these two weaknesses are enough to keep them out of homecourt advantage in the the playoffs and put them at risk of not even making the playoffs in a loaded Western conference. |
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Posted on: August 8, 2008 4:44 pm
Dallas MavericksHowever, the Mavs obviously lost too much by giving up Devin Harris. I don't think giving up Devin Harris was a big mistake in and of itself. To me the guy is an overrated player. He has been talked about as a guy who is "going to be great" for a long time now. To me, at best, he is slightly above average as a starting point guard and basically is what he is at this point. He is 25 (and a half) years old now and most players pretty much are what they are at that point. I wonder how many people will be saying Devin Harris is "going to be great" when he turns 30 as this seems to be a prevailing recurrent theme on these boards. I see the Kidd trade as something that did not really help nor hurt them. If Kidd was about 3-4 years younger this would have been a real nice trade for Dallas. But if they hung onto Harris instead of trading for Kidd, they would have went down to the Hornets in the same exact fashion more or less that they did with Kidd. Giving up Diop and Harris was probably a bit too much for Kidd, but they got Diop back for this season anyway, so it is basically Kidd for Harris---in other words a trade of a "has been" for a "never will be". |
