A Few Thoughts on Mavs 103, Celtics 109

[SleepingHero]

I saw Brunson fall apart at the end and get benched. Same as everybody else saw. But I sure don’t share what appears to be the majority consensus opinion.

1. Delon appears to be on a minutes restriction still.

2. JJB was a no go for whatever reason.

3. That leaves Seth and Jalen as the creators of offense. And Seth, while en fuego himself, was not distributing and was turning it over.

4. Meanwhile, Jalen had 10 assists to just 1 turnover by the middle of the 3rd quarter. Sure, he turned it over twice more and had some sad-finish drives to nowhere as the game got physical during the 4th. And there's no doubt he played his way to a seat on the bench. But there were more than flashes of top-shelf play for much of the game. And that 10/7/11 stat line, even with 3 turnovers, is nothing to complain about.

Seriously now, on a night when 3 of 5 starters basically no showed, we're complaining about the sub for our injured star? When that sub is our 2nd leading rebounder and posts an 11:3 assist to turnover ratio?

Strong post.
After taking the night I realized I was a bit harsh on Brunson. He really did play a good game for basically 28 of his 31 minutes. 

With that said, I think it was undeniable that he played a large part in why the Mavs weren't able to win. I felt he took way too many shots, especially when he was having an off night. He was 4/13 from the field, which isn't much worse than the 4/17 clunker THJ put up. Hard to win any game when your backcourt goes a combined 8/30.

And yet the Mavs were right there, and Brunson essentially threw it away with 2 incredibly bad back-to-back turnovers, and then a forced drive that went nowhere in the final minutes. It was so egregious that Rick pulled him. 

However regardless of how Brunson played near the end, he still managed to distribute effectively and fought for rebounds. He had some fantastic defense against Kemba in the 2nd, though that disappeared near the end as well.

All I can say is that Brunson has some serious flaws, and on a winning team right now he's best suited to be played off the bench for less than 20 minutes a night. BUT, he's only a sophomore, and terrible late game choices aside, he's overall stepped up his production and is averaging 13.7 ppg/ 6.0 rpg/ 10.0apg on 39.5% from the field (yuck) 42.5% from 3 (amazing) and 83% from the line. Which is incredible and are remarkably similar to Kyle Lowry's numbers.