MAVS NEWS:

[mvossman]

I'm pretty skeptical about this, too, but to be fair, Marshall IS a good defender, and that has been an undersold part of the grieving/acceptance process for all of us here, as has the significant improvement he represents, offensively. Frankly, he's miles ahead of DJJ on that end. 

One way of putting it is that Marshall, unlike DJJ, is a two-way player. We won't know what the drop-off is, defensively, for the team until we see their plan for using everyone. Maybe Marshall is close enough to Jones as a POA guy that this will all work in the aggregate. Maybe, as audiosway believes, he'll be better in that, specific role, even. Maybe he'll be more effective in a different defensive role than Jones was in the POA defense role, and Grimes will be tapped to fill in there more than we think. 

The only area in which I feel confident the Mavs just got worse is transition offense, having lost two of their three running-most players in DJJ and Green. But, even there I have hope, due to the "grab and go" abilities that Marshall, Thompson AND Grimes all bring to the table, to varying degrees. 

Defensively, I think the aggregate skills of the full rotation improved, actually, and maybe significantly. It's up to Kidd and his assistants to put those pieces into the roles that benefit the team. I KNOW the aggregate skills improved on offense. A lot.

While I recognize that Naji is a better all around offensive player than DJJ, I'm not ready to call him a two way player.  I'm not sure he will be any better floor spacer than DJJ.  He actually takes less 3s than jones does, and before this last season his career 3 point percentage was under 30.  His career average is now sitting at 31 and while I don't think he will regress all the way back to that, there is reason to believe it won't be as good as last season.  To continue the comparison, Jones has a better TS% and scores the same per 36.  

I am concerned that folks are building him up too much.  He is an energy player off the bench that will play good defense and hopefully won't kill you on offense.  If he continues the trajectory he started last season he could be more than that, but I don't think its something that should be expected, just hoped for.