I Reject the Tenor of the Forum

[fifteenth]

I know I'm not the only one who thinks this way, but I'd say the following even if I was.

The season is not over.

If the season does end tomorrow, it does not constitute a failure.

Taking a contender to a 7th game and giving them all they can handle in Luka's third year is praiseworthy. 

The fact that they've done this with a KP that might be less  than half of what he was a year ago is pretty amazing. 

Luka has grown immensely,  but so has the team in general. 

Luka is not the only success story on this team. Other players have grown and contributed. The team as a whole is doing things it could not do last year.

The team actually does have assets. 

I have no problem criticizing the Mavs. I've done it many times before. But right now they are on an upward trajectory and have earned room, for my part, to attempt to continue the upward trajectory. 

If they blow it and stall out, or regress, I might join the chorus calling for more drastic changes.

But this season does not constitute stalling out or regression. 

Kudos to the coach, the front office and the team for improvement, for a good season of overcoming adversity, for giving the Clippers a heck of series, and for setting themselves up for the possibility of another leap forward next year.

[dirkfansince1998]

Kudos to the coach, the front office and the team for improvement, for a good season of overcoming adversity, for giving the Clippers a heck of series, and for setting themselves up for the possibility of another leap forward next year.

Making some good points but I disagree on the front office part. I think what we are seeing is the result of internal development. The MBT tried to add another piece but failed to do it. No on court production added. Assets burned. Richardson the big addition lost his starting spot. The Mavs are paying him 10.8m to shoot clutch FTs.
Players and the coaches deserve a lot of credit. The same core that wasn´t good enough for the playoffs two seasons ago is going head to head with a stacked Clippers team.

[jesusshuttlesworth82]

I guess it'll depend on how the Clippers fare in the rest of the playoffs.  If they make it to the Finals, maybe we can consider this season a success taking them to 7.  If they get bounced in the next round again, I wouldn't consider this season a success.

DFS and Brunson took a step forward this year and that's nice.  Hopefully we can retail both long term but they're probably 4th best/5th best players on a real contender.

KP was a disaster.  The KP question/problem is looming over this franchise. There has to be a future where THJ is not the 2nd best player on this team.  

We've had assets and cap space for 2 years now and failed to improve the team much.  One could argue our improvement is exactly from Luka ascending from a top 25 player to top 10 player to top 5? player.  

That's a lot of words to say "Incomplete" is probably a fair grade for this team if they lose game 7.

[Kammrath]

[DanSchwartzgan]

I guess it'll depend on how the Clippers fare in the rest of the playoffs.  If they make it to the Finals, maybe we can consider this season a success taking them to 7.  If they get bounced in the next round again, I wouldn't consider this season a success.

DFS and Brunson took a step forward this year and that's nice.  Hopefully we can retail both long term but they're probably 4th best/5th best players on a real contender.

KP was a disaster.  The KP question/problem is looming over this franchise. There has to be a future where THJ is not the 2nd best player on this team.  

We've had assets and cap space for 2 years now and failed to improve the team much.   

I agree that it depends on what LAC does from here.  I said yesterday that it would be really nice to have one more guy to join KP, DFS, THJ and Luka.  We have a series of bad answers between Maxi, Powell, WCS, JRich and Brunson.  If they had a time machine and knew Giannis and most of the bigger name FA's would sign, they wouldn't have prioritized cap room.  If they knew Maxi would take a step backwards, they might have pushed harder to get someone else in here (Crowder as a for instance, but it didn't have to be him).  I'm not saying one more guy makes us a contender, but one more guy would make us better.

The trick now is can you get better by trading KP?  Can you get better by using the THJ cap room for someone besides THJ?  You can get a pretty nice mid teens slot depending on what happens with JRich (and WCS).  But, none of us agree on what that slot should be used for.  Secondary ball handler.  Defense and rebounding.  Three point shooting.  We need all of it, but don't have the path to get it all unless we tear it down to build it back up.

[ReunionMav]

I agree with the see how the Clippers do. I said it in the Mass Luvr thread. I also think we found the beginning of a new playoff role for KP in this series. I doubt we can trade him for any value until the trade deadline. I hope a healthy off season results in shockingly good improvement for KP. It would not be a first.

[cow]

The trick now is can you get better by trading KP?  Can you get better by using the THJ cap room for someone besides THJ?  You can get a pretty nice mid teens slot depending on what happens with JRich (and WCS).  But, none of us agree on what that slot should be used for.  Secondary ball handler.  Defense and rebounding.  Three point shooting.  We need all of it, but don't have the path to get it all unless we tear it down to build it back up.

By the power of Haralabos Voulgaris, let someone else overpay THJ.  He showed who he is throughout the season and playoffs.  When he's hot, he's a flamethrower, when he's not, he's a deep freeze.  Paying him a contract starting at his current rate of 18m would be a massive misstep.  He still has a tendency for stupid shots, albeit way less than his NYK days, and unfortunately for him, he's in a Mavericks jersey so he'll never get favorable calls on drives or when people run into him while he's shooting from deep.  

Mavs should be thinking about JRich.  He had a nice 4th quarter in one of the playoff games and was terrible for most of the rest of the series.  

As the biggest WCS hater on this forum, he was alright this year.  I'd take him as a cheap backup to the backup big man.  

KP isn't without fault but he has no chance of being the second best player (what we are paying him for) with Luka and Rick.  He'll ask out this offseason and we should oblige since Luka and Rick aren't going anywhere (yet).

Money needs to be spent on a someone who can take some playmaking responsibilities away from Luka.  This team is completely lost on offense without him.  There are a lot of holes on the team, but none of the other ones matter if Luka needs to generate 80%+ of the offense unless we figure out some miracle in the offseason that lets him play close to 40 MPG and still be fresh/effective in the 4th quarter.

[ItsGoTime]

I reject your rejection, good sir!

Thwap! 

[DallasBasketball]

If the Mavs had somehow pulled off the Clippers upset, which I think they were basically a hot shooting game away from doing.. if they had, who knows what the ceiling of this team would have been?

I feel like what I saw in this playoff series against the Clippers was some of the most amazing shooting I’ve witnessed since the Dirk era Mavs. I don’t know if it can just be said that no one plays defense anymore, but when you see stats like 13-17, 8-10, 3/3 from 3.. in the first half! It’s mind-blowing that these players can shoot so consistently. For both teams! 

In the Dirk days I don’t think we ever faced another superstar as superior as Kawhi is right now sans 06 D Wade, who had the refs help, and maybe so did the Clippers in game 6, but that’s not really the point of this. The point is the story of the nba right now is skilled players, and we are holding our own because we got a pretty darn good group to go with Luka.

But Luka means we’ve got to get better fast. Because Luka can compete for championships right now. And since those 2001-2011 days, we’ve seen what cap hello looks like. And since 2012+ we’ve seen what dry powder looks like. And we had Luka on a rookie deal for 3 off seasons and got to go hard at one all-star who made a mistake not to join Luka(Walker 2 Boston). And now we are at the crossroads of another plan powder or cap hello plan. I can’t say I know what we should do, but I don’t think we should quit on what we have because I think it is something to build on.

[mavsluvr]

Well, I don't know who the tenor of the forum is, but I don't see what a guy's voice has to do with anything. 

Man, sometimes this forum is wack.

[fifteenth]

Well, I don't know who the tenor of the forum is, but I don't see what a guy's voice has to do with anything. 

Man, sometimes this forum is wack.

Hey, we weren't all blessed with a deep, smooth bass play by play voice!

And I apologize for my wack attack of the forum tenor. My singing voice isn't anything to brag about.

In other news, it's the off season, my homerism can relax a bit. Go ahead Mavs, fire, cut, trade and replace whoever you want.

[Dahlsim]

If the Mavs had somehow pulled off the Clippers upset, which I think they were basically a hot shooting game away from doing.. if they had, who knows what the ceiling of this team would have been?

I feel like what I saw in this playoff series against the Clippers was some of the most amazing shooting I’ve witnessed since the Dirk era Mavs. I don’t know if it can just be said that no one plays defense anymore, but when you see stats like 13-17, 8-10, 3/3 from 3.. in the first half! It’s mind-blowing that these players can shoot so consistently. For both teams! 

In the Dirk days I don’t think we ever faced another superstar as superior as Kawhi is right now sans 06 D Wade, who had the refs help, and maybe so did the Clippers in game 6, but that’s not really the point of this. The point is the story of the nba right now is skilled players, and we are holding our own because we got a pretty darn good group to go with Luka.

But Luka means we’ve got to get better fast. Because Luka can compete for championships right now. And since those 2001-2011 days, we’ve seen what cap hello looks like. And since 2012+ we’ve seen what dry powder looks like. And we had Luka on a rookie deal for 3 off seasons and got to go hard at one all-star who made a mistake not to join Luka(Walker 2 Boston). And now we are at the crossroads of another plan powder or cap hello plan. I can’t say I know what we should do, but I don’t think we should quit on what we have because I think it is something to build on.

No matter what the Clippers do from here I think its clear Dallas Mavericks had to play over their head to compete as well as they did and give the "other" LA super team all they could handle.  
That Clipper team that won the games over the Mavs they did, played all the way up to their expected level. 
Utah is also hella good team now though so that should be interesting ...  Its not as though Dallas would have favored against Utah, they most decidedly would NOT. 

Kawhi went crazy whenever they had to have plays or a bucket.  He applied defensive clamps as much as humanly possible everyone from Luka to Boban!  Amazing performance by Kawhi. 
Paul George played like a legit #2 star should and then depth of the Clippers was clearly more consistent than the Mavs whose bench played hard, but were not as good overall. 

Kudos to Mavs on a season well fought.   Now about KP ...

I'll put the defense aside for a moment because I think he did hustle and really tried in the series but I also think he has a reserve now to protect his body that he didn't have in the Unicorn days.  
Unicorn KP not only had a higher usage but he also had a reckless abandon going inside and in the painted area which he may think his body can't hold up to. 

In terms of his usage next to Luka and in Carlisle's system I actually think its simpler than it might appear.  
KP has to get his shot back.  His shooting % have to be at Allstar levels, from the 3 all the way in.  
He's too tall for anyone to actually bother his shot most of the time, so it's mostly up to him whether he can drain them or not.  

0-5 in Game 7 from the 3. THJ an unusual 1 for 9 and those 2 shooting well is enough to change the entire game and the series or not.  I guess that's your #2 and #3 in some order next to Luka esp. since Brunson mostly sat the bench in the big playoff games. 

That's it folks.  Luka is #1, who is your #2 and #3.  They have to take the next step if it's these TWO.

[Halfnir]

To add an optimistic thought to the evaluation, for the first time in quite some seasons, all Mavs made it through the season without major injuries or surgeries looming.

Luka will play a bit for Slovenia (qualifiers up to 4 games, maybe even olympics), hopefully staying healthy, shortening his rest but also his slump period before he'll get back to training.
KP is healthy for the first time in 3 off-seasons and maybe he can use it to finally improve, focus on learning more basketball rather than getting his body back to work and become a better player. I would love for Dirk to reach out to him and spend some time together in a certain tiny gym in Germany. I think that would be one of the greatest things Dirk could do to help the Mavs solve the KP situation.
Kleber might play for Germany or rest, based on this article, he was hurting during the playoffs, could not run and needed injections to get ready for the game.
Brunson also healthy might help him to make significant improvement rather than deailing with a shoulder surgery.

[DallasBasketball]

In terms of his usage next to Luka and in Carlisle's system I actually think its simpler than it might appear.  
KP has to get his shot back.  His shooting % have to be at Allstar levels, from the 3 all the way in.  
He's too tall for anyone to actually bother his shot most of the time, so it's mostly up to him whether he can drain them or not.  

0-5 in Game 7 from the 3.

Such a good point. I don’t think I’ve heard anyone touch on this. KP was really bad from the mid-range, but he started to come on as the series progressed. He’s playing soft in the middle, but maybe if his shot is going down he’ll battle a little more down there and Luka will want to feed him.

On a positive note about KP’s shooting, I feel he has been one of the worst chuckers from deep I’ve seen wear a Mav uni since the Walker’s, but in the series against the Clippers, he reigned that in completely and simply just missed a lot of them he’s capable of making.

He also made that big one in the closing moments of game 5. It just can’t be said enough how important it is to have guys who can pull off heroics in crunch time.

The difference between Jet and Wesley Matthew’s in these moments it was obvious who has the ‘it’ factor and who doesn’t. I think we all wanted more from KP but he has ‘it’ inside him. I’d hate to let that get away.

[dirkfansince1998]

To add an optimistic thought to the evaluation, for the first time in quite some seasons, all Mavs made it through the season without major injuries or surgeries looming.

Luka will play a bit for Slovenia (qualifiers up to 4 games, maybe even olympics), hopefully staying healthy, shortening his rest but also his slump period before he'll get back to training.
KP is healthy for the first time in 3 off-seasons and maybe he can use it to finally improve, focus on learning more basketball rather than getting his body back to work and become a better player. I would love for Dirk to reach out to him and spend some time together in a certain tiny gym in Germany. I think that would be one of the greatest things Dirk could do to help the Mavs solve the KP situation.
Kleber might play for Germany or rest, based on this article, he was hurting during the playoffs, could not run and needed injections to get ready for the game.
Brunson also healthy might help him to make significant improvement rather than deailing with a shoulder surgery.

I think that´s another underrated aspect of markets like LA, NY or Miami. A lot of guys spent their offseason in those cities. Would be great to see some offseason workouts with the whole crew but more often than not Mavs guys aren´t even involved in the Dallas based workouts. Natives like Turner or Randle are.
All in on more Dirk and Holger. Not only for the euro bigs. One or two weeks with Holger and it felt like the entire team couldn´t miss a FT during his visit.

[Halfnir]

All in on more Dirk and Holger. Not only for the euro bigs.

I think Dirk spending some time with KP exclusively, away from Doncic and all the other players might be able to heal the relationship with the Mavs. Give him back some confidence and prove they still believe in him as a player. Get his shooting touch back, learn a more controlled 3pt shot that needs less space and can be shot closer to the 3pt line and 1 or 2 go-to moves in the post. That's all KP needs to be a dominant offensive player. I think Dirk making this sacrifice of a bit of his summer time would mean alot to Kristaps.

[J0n]

I think Dirk spending some time with KP exclusively, away from Doncic and all the other players might be able to heal the relationship with the Mavs. Give him back some confidence and prove they still believe in him as a player. Get his shooting touch back, learn a more controlled 3pt shot that needs less space and can be shot closer to the 3pt line and 1 or 2 go-to moves in the post. That's all KP needs to be a dominant offensive player. I think Dirk making this sacrifice of a bit of his summer time would mean alot to Kristaps.

If I'm dirk, why would I spend time with this emotionally fragile man? I've got a beautiful ebony queen  and two proud African children to think of. When Dirk looks at KP, all he sees is a Andrea Bargnani with less heart.

This man is 7'3 without postmoves. If the Monstars were to attack, they'd give his talent back. He's basically Steve Novak with less consistency.

[Halfnir]

Because it would:
a, help the Mavs organization
b, player development might be something Dirk aspires to do (at least he said so in the past)
c, Kristaps might be an ideal candidate basketball wise

If it does not match well personality wise or Dirk is not interested in spending the time that's of course up to him, he owes nothing to the Mavs or Kristaps.

[Jommybone]

This thread got weird. Anyway...

1. Really like so many of our pieces. Jalen, Dorian, Maxi keep getting better. Hope that Green might work himself into the same conversation. Great supporting cast. Great value. Very promising group. 

2. Still hopeful for our injured guys. KP may be able to regain some of what he’s lost. DP seemed to be back and maybe on track to continue improving. 

3. Hard for me to get excited about Tim or Josh as starters. But over the cap is a way better option for improving than under. So here’s to bringing em back to shop em. (Who we thought Josh was is exactly the kind of player I think we need. But he didn’t turn out to be that guy.)

4. Can we please find a bully to man the 4?

[Scott41theMavs]

I hope Fif at least likes the soprano and the baritone of this forum.