Those Historic Mavs
On November 15, 2006, I wrote a post analyzing why the Mavericks were struggling early in the season. I stick to that analysis. Did I think they would improve? Of course I did. Did I think they would improve this much to the point that they are better than they were last season? No, but, then again, it was hard to think that they could have been even better than last year because they were so good las season. On that note, I was wrong. But, I think the rest of the post was on point.
So what has changed? Well, for starters, Josh Howard got healthy and he continues to improve and impress. This moved Stackhouse back to the bench as the sixth man, where he belongs. It blows my mind how many teams passed on Howard in his draft class. The guy was the ACC player of the year in an awesome conference during his final year at Wake, and it wasn’t like he did not have an NBA body or position. You could clearly see that he could play the small forward/wing position. How did that happen? It is insane that so many general managers whiffed on him and his abilities.
Then, there’s the implementation of Devin Harris back into the starting lineup, which allowed Jason Terry to move to the shooting guard position. Harris is a much better pick-and-roll point guard than Terry was. Harris can use his speed to turn the corner on a pick and attack the rim. Plus, starting Harris has boosted his confidence. It happens. Running Harris at the point frees up Terry, Howard, and Stackhouse to knock down jumpers from the wings. It also causes the pick defender to move to cut off Harris, allowing Dirk to pop instead of roll. And NOBODY is better at picking and popping for jumpers than Dirk. NOBODY. Dirk has also continued to refine his post-up game. I think that the Spurs playoff series really helped to hammer home the point that Dirk cannot and should not allow 6′7″ players (like Bruce Bowen) to man-handle him in the high post. This is why Dirk is the MVP this year.
Add to all of this that the Mavs got rid of Anthony Johnson, who was surely going to become a malcontent after losing his starting spot and the fact that the Mavs have realized the limits of Devean George’s broken-down body, and you have addition by subtraction. This opens up role-player minutes for Croshere and Buckner who have finally started knocking down some shots.
Plus, another year in Avery Johnson’s system has enabled Erick Dampier (who realized that it is okay to play with some energy after receiving a fat paycheck) and DaSagana Diop to flourish. The defensive rotations are crisp and fast, which is eerily reminiscent of another quality NBA team (that wears silver and black).
All these factors, and a heavily front-loaded NBA has enabled the Mavericks to turn around a disasterous start, and have a record-setting NBA regular season. Do they deserve some credit? Yes. Do I want to eat some crow and give it to them? Not really, but I will, for now.
Can’t wait for the playoffs.
