A Few Thoughts on Mavs 120, Suns 113

[mavsluvr]

I will say they showed more grit and more "toughness" then at any point this season. But it seemed more out of necessity than anything, they were getting bullied the first few quarters.  This team is full of genuinely nice guys. They really don't want to mix it up with other players unless they have to. 

That seems reasonable. No point risking foul trouble, flagrants, technicals, injury, etc., if you don't have to. 

KP pushed Baynes, but he really didnt want those problems. Powell threw a phantom elbow at Rubio but I don't think it was intentional. When Rubio got in his face, Powell tried to reason with him and walk away. Powell is the probably the nicest guy in the NBA. Not good for your starting center. I really liked what DFS did. Out of character for him, but he shoved Oubre into the bench. It got him a tech, but Oubre was lights out to that point and I don't think he scored another point after that.

After that, he hit the two foul shots, had a layup a minute and a half later, hit a three at 3:05, and had a floater in the fourth. I would still like to know what got the normally phlegmatic Finney-Smith that irate. Not sure it really did much to stop Oubre, who pretty well torched the Mavs with 22 points and 10 boards, but agree that it was an interesting development. 

We need more of that from Finney-Smith. From the whole team.

Beyond that this game was about Luka doing Luka things again. And THJ continuing to stay hot.

Two topics I want to touch on though. First one is Porzingis. He's getting praised for his rebounding (13 boards), and I must say some of those were strong rebounds in traffic. His hustle is also very impressive. But his offensive game is struggling right now. Its downright painful to watch. He has no rhythm right now. He cant find his spots. Nothing is falling for him. This season all he's had offensively is that 3 pointer from the top of the key, and that wasn't falling last night. When that's not falling he brings nothing offensively at the moment. He has no post up skills, even against smaller players so he relies on that 3 pointer or tip in dunks. We can only hope that he's still rounding into shape and we are only seeing 75 to 80 percent of what he can be.

Agree that it was painful to watch KP struggle. I wouldn't say that he's adding nothing, though. He drew defenders and enabled shooters to get open. Do agree that he needs to be better, and that the Mavs need to get him some better looks. I noticed that they tried to run a little bit of stuff for him, but it went awry. 

The second topic that needs to be discussed is this bench/rotations. I like how the past handful of games it looks like Rick has ironed out his rotations and given defined roles. But when our bench unit is running with Wright, Curry, and Brunson, Kleber/Powell? Oh boy that's ugly. No one can create their own shot. Besides Curry, no real outside threat either. Seems like a lot dribbling and struggling to find a shot . As we've been mentioning on this board for weeks, this team is going to have to make a trade to address these ill fitting parts.

The bench outscored the Suns bench 39-26, and Seth was the team's third highest scorer with 11 points, but creating has been an issue for them. Rick has said that Seth and Brunson should both be capable in a playmaking role, and implied that they were working on that. It is surprising that this collection of spare parts has organized into a pretty well-functioning machine. But I don't deny that improvements in that direction will be necessary to take the next step. 

From the naked eye, Brunson seems like the odd guy out.  I would say Wright, but his size and defensive skills seem to fit better with this team. But having the two of them together on the court wont work for long.

I agree that it was good to see the grit and toughness, especially coming from these high-character players.