The team's regular season offensive efficiency is down but diversity is up which will help in the playoffs.
Brunson has looked great as a starter really from day-1. Efficient, great shooter, can finish at the rim and mid-range, hits free throws, can play on ball or off, seemingly great chemistry with Luka. He's a natural leader and winner; and starting another ball handler will help Luka get to the next level. The rotation with Ntilikina subbing in for Brunson looks workable and should only improve.
Brunson looks great as a starter, and no doubt will eventually start for some team someday. But...we need him right now to come off the bench as a spark plug with the bench guys. Otherwise we will have little offense and no ball handler. FN looks like he might grow into the ball handler/point guard position, but that's...a little later.
He is the secondary ball handling guy we wanted and has grown into the role and need. I doubt we could go get someone (real world) better than him right now, without giving up many of our meager assets.
I'm all for JB starting in place of THJ. Just can't have so many negative defenders against the other team's starters.
He is at CJ McCollum level already, and still improving. Pay him and play him.
So far Brunson has a 99.1 defense rating in a small sample size...
(11-04-2021, 01:12 PM)ballsrchr Wrote: [ -> ]But...we need him right now to come off the bench as a spark plug with the bench guys. Otherwise we will have little offense and no ball handler.
Kidd's rotation has Luka or JB in the game at all times.
I want to see:
Luka
Brunson
DFS
Bullock
Moses
I’ve always thought Brunson is the team’s second best player and and should start.
We have two options. Either we start him. Or if not, so will most of the league. He is that great yes.
The Athletic's Tim Cato works hard to pour cold water on the Mavs. In his most recent article he writes that Brunson isn't really getting better, he's just getting more minutes. To make his case, he points out Brunson's per 48 stats are similar to last year and his efficiency is slightly down.
Piling on, he says Brunson is just getting more minutes because the Mavs are forced to play him. Cato loves to dog the Mavs roster: "Brunson hasn't necessarily improved as much as he's earned more minutes and trust, which is both warranted by his play and out of necessity due to this roster."
If Brunson starts Cato thinks Kidd will have to bench THJ because Brunson and Luka also poor defenders. "it's difficult to justify those two and THJ playing together and maintaining any semblance of a high level defense."
I wonder, how much of a defensive liability is Brunson?
"The thing about Brunson is he's really come a long way," Carlisle said. "It didn't just happen for him. He had to make a lot of adjustments. He's worked to change his body, his game and to adapt to the NBA 3-point line. Now he's an effective scorer at all three levels, and he was very much a mid-range player when he came. He's learned a lot about defense, and the work that he's done with the strength, body development and quickness has helped make him a very solid defender."
(11-05-2021, 08:02 AM)vfromlmf Wrote: [ -> ]I wonder, how much of a defensive liability is Brunson?
Not nearly as much as Luka! And I would argue JB is a slightly above average NBA defender.
(11-05-2021, 08:02 AM)vfromlmf Wrote: [ -> ]The Athletic's Tim Cato works hard to pour cold water on the Mavs. In his most recent article he writes that Brunson isn't really getting better, he's just getting more minutes. To make his case, he points out Brunson's per 48 stats are similar to last year and his efficiency is slightly down.
Piling on, he says Brunson is just getting more minutes because the Mavs are forced to play him. Cato loves to dog the Mavs roster: "Brunson hasn't necessarily improved as much as he's earned more minutes and trust, which is both warranted by his play and out of necessity due to this roster."
If Brunson starts Cato thinks Kidd will have to bench THJ because Brunson and Luka also poor defenders. "it's difficult to justify those two and THJ playing together and maintaining any semblance of a high level defense."
I wonder, how much of a defensive liability is Brunson?
"The thing about Brunson is he's really come a long way," Carlisle said. "It didn't just happen for him. He had to make a lot of adjustments. He's worked to change his body, his game and to adapt to the NBA 3-point line. Now he's an effective scorer at all three levels, and he was very much a mid-range player when he came. He's learned a lot about defense, and the work that he's done with the strength, body development and quickness has helped make him a very solid defender."
I don't mind Cato since he actually does work to get stuff out on the Mavs and he isn't a bad writer. But I think you're right about his generally negative opinion of the roster and front office. And he has no problem with mixing news and his own commentary, or just going straight commentary.
In this case, why the need to take a small sample size of games to say "he hasn't gotten better" when he clearly just did something in a 4th quarter that he's never done before. He's had good fourth quarters, but this time he took one over, and had Luka just giving him the ball each time down.
And Tim's opinion of whether Brusnon can start is an example of where he just issues message board opinions from the seat of News Man. Tim doesn't know whether Kidd thinks Brunson and THJ are too poor defensively to be on the floor together. It's just a straight up opinion that he doesn't even bother to support.
In a message board folks say "and he's a negative defender" as if it's fact. Someone here might push back on our fellow poster, but it doesn't really matter, because we're all trying to squeeze in a post in between tasks at our real jobs. But Tim's real job is following the team, researching the Mavs and writing on them. He should be better than the message board thing of "he's a negative defender" without supporting it, or making statements about what the Mavs can or can't do that are just opinions worded as news.
But that's journalism these days, in some circles. The real stuff is still out there, but there is a lot of Cato style mix of news and opinion writen like news.
(11-05-2021, 08:02 AM)vfromlmf Wrote: [ -> ]The Athletic's Tim Cato works hard to pour cold water on the Mavs. In his most recent article he writes that Brunson isn't really getting better, he's just getting more minutes. To make his case, he points out Brunson's per 48 stats are similar to last year and his efficiency is slightly down.
Piling on, he says Brunson is just getting more minutes because the Mavs are forced to play him. Cato loves to dog the Mavs roster: "Brunson hasn't necessarily improved as much as he's earned more minutes and trust, which is both warranted by his play and out of necessity due to this roster."
If Brunson starts Cato thinks Kidd will have to bench THJ because Brunson and Luka also poor defenders. "it's difficult to justify those two and THJ playing together and maintaining any semblance of a high level defense."
I wonder, how much of a defensive liability is Brunson?
"The thing about Brunson is he's really come a long way," Carlisle said. "It didn't just happen for him. He had to make a lot of adjustments. He's worked to change his body, his game and to adapt to the NBA 3-point line. Now he's an effective scorer at all three levels, and he was very much a mid-range player when he came. He's learned a lot about defense, and the work that he's done with the strength, body development and quickness has helped make him a very solid defender."
I don't know what his PER is compared to last year but he's taken a big leap this year. His defense is better though not great. The shots that he has made are much harder against better defenders as he gets more attention. His rebounding is better. His passing is better. The only downside is that he still has really bad shooting nights sometimes.
(11-05-2021, 09:49 AM)haveitall Wrote: [ -> ]I don't know what his PER is compared to last year but he's taken a big leap this year.
Jalen Brunson 20-21 PER = 17.19 --> 21-22 PER = 19.84
Maxi is the only other rotation player with a higher PER than last year. Everyone else is down,
significantly.
Luka 25.33 --> 19.05
KP 21.33 --> 10.06
THJ 15.73 --> 14.80
DFS 12 --> 7.59
Powell 16.80 --> 13.84
WCS 14.32 --> 8.37
Kleber 10.59 --> 17.76
Official bench Timothy thread. No way we can afford to start JB-Timothy-Luka and get away with it.
You have to start him and play him heavy minutes to see what he can do. Need to see if he will be worth the big contract. And THJ won't be coming off the bench, not with that fresh contract and him being part of the Council. They will have to start all three and learn to enjoy it...for better or worse!
I do know, i think, why Brunson should start. But i would like to hear it from those fans, who thinks he should not start and especially the reasons why.
The Mavs already missed the chance to trade JB for a commensurate return. And, they have no real path to upgrade the roster generally as that time has come and gone with Luka’s rookie deal. So, at best, the Mavs are stuck with this roster and must resign JB whatever it takes. That means he gets starter’s money and thus should start. It’s also probably not a good idea to alienate your clear second best player when he’s headed into free agency.
(11-05-2021, 08:02 AM)vfromlmf Wrote: [ -> ]The Athletic's Tim Cato works hard to pour cold water on the Mavs. In his most recent article he writes that Brunson isn't really getting better, he's just getting more minutes. To make his case, he points out Brunson's per 48 stats are similar to last year and his efficiency is slightly down.
Piling on, he says Brunson is just getting more minutes because the Mavs are forced to play him. Cato loves to dog the Mavs roster: "Brunson hasn't necessarily improved as much as he's earned more minutes and trust, which is both warranted by his play and out of necessity due to this roster."
If Brunson starts Cato thinks Kidd will have to bench THJ because Brunson and Luka also poor defenders. "it's difficult to justify those two and THJ playing together and maintaining any semblance of a high level defense."
I wonder, how much of a defensive liability is Brunson?
"The thing about Brunson is he's really come a long way," Carlisle said. "It didn't just happen for him. He had to make a lot of adjustments. He's worked to change his body, his game and to adapt to the NBA 3-point line. Now he's an effective scorer at all three levels, and he was very much a mid-range player when he came. He's learned a lot about defense, and the work that he's done with the strength, body development and quickness has helped make him a very solid defender."
Most of the mavs beat writers are cuban fanboys that are scared to report negative and lose access. Not too different from jerry and the cowgirls. It’s actually refreshing to hear someone be real and speak the truth
Brunson and Hardaway are both one way players until proven otherwise. They both are great offensive weapons(with different skill sets that we need). Hardaway has the size, but lacks the lateral quickness to stay in front of his man. Brunson has some quickness, but lacks the size to match up with longer players.
Not sure if either can overcome these limitations. It’s not like these are effort/system/intelligence problems that can be fixed with coaching/adjustments/practice.
We need more two way players. It’s not like it all matters though until we find a real center that can protect the paint and rebound