Game 15: Los Angeles Lakers (9-7) vs. Dallas Mavericks (10-5) | 101-104 WIN!!!!!!!!

[Razzmatazz_Hopskidillydoo]

I'm guessing Lively will miss a few weeks, best-case. Not sure when Kleber will ever come back...but Powell should NOT be an option no matter what! I'd even call up Greg Brown and give him some minutes as a small-ball center

Lively missing 3 weeks to a month could mean this team would be lucky to get into the play-in.

Whoever underwhelms/plays badly during the stretch of late November to mid December would be the ones traded.

I'd like DP traded, but I don't think it's going to happen.

[Razzmatazz_Hopskidillydoo]

Just saw it was Holmes who got the steal in the late Lebron pass too.  Let’s see if he can build on this.  He was a factor on the boards tonight.  Didn’t see much of his touch inside tonight but that is something he can bring.  Probably will not be a huge help on defense, but if he plays with that energy he should earn minutes.

His only FG is coming from a cut.
That one shot attempt is a semi-hook that looked good.
His offense isn't bad. Not for this game, not the games before he was a Mav.

And as for being not a huge help on D, yes he isn't, but I'd trust him to get more blocks, rebounds, and be more of a deterrent than DP every could.

[dirkfansince1998]

On a positive note. It is encouraging to see them win a game without the usual scoring explosion. When was the last time the Mavs won a game shooting 39.6% FG and 32% from 3. The kind of game the Mavs would have lost last season.

[SleepingHero]

This has to be posted. This has to be in the top 3 passes Luka has ever made right? The fact I'm debating it shows how miraculous Luka can be.

The between the legs to Maxi for the and-1 game winner against MIL. The IND laser to Hardy where Luka bent time and space to make it. The one where he literally does a no Luka and just threw the ball behind his head to THJ for the 3 in the corner. SO many.

Peep Wood failing to make the rotation closeout and left Green wide open for the 3.

[omahen]

Just a reminder. Only a hopeless team blows a 20 point lead to lose a game against an old tired team on a back to back. Not going to happen.

No trying to really defend bad fourth quarter. But it has to be noted that LeBron is the only one old on Lakers roster and he is a "freak of nature". Davis is second oldest and he is 30, so in his prime. Everyone else is younger. Besides, they had an easy wormup game yesterday, as they won by 30+ playing main guys for very limited minutes.

[omahen]

Mavs played good three quarters. Despite not having the best shooting night, they did play some defense, fought hard for rebounds, especially on the offensive end and they only had 4 (!!!) TO for the whole game.

Fourth quarter meltdown felt very much like last season. The offense stopped, it was slow without any movement. Only 3-19 from the field. Luka went cold shooting tough shots. Non Luka-Kyrie guys were 0-7 from the field and 0-2 from FT line. Luckily, we do have two stars and Kyrie delivered when it looked like they will fall apart complitely.

Btw - how was that not a foul by DLo on Luka? I didn't have time to watch all replays, but it looked all hand to me.

[surfpuckmd]

I think this was a great win despite the near collapse in the 4th quarter.  Josh Green played really well.  Richaun Holmes proved useful and did a good job on the boards.  We played a road game against a good team and won.  Our team is reliant on 3-point shooting to win.  We shot subpar from 3 but still managed to win.  That means a lot.

The Lively injury is the big concern.  I really hope we'll acquire another big if we expect Lively to be out more than 2 weeks.  For whatever reason, the Lakers didn't bother to go at the rim with Davis and Lebron much after Lively was hurt.  That was really foolish.  Other teams won't make that mistake.  

Despite the victory, Kidd is a loser.  He may as well have been in the bathroom during the entire fourth quarter.  Apparently, he isn't aware of the coaches challenge rule as he doesn't use it.  He also may not realize that you can call a timeout to allow your team to regroup when things start falling apart.  He bravely ignores conventional thinking by not playing the players who are playing well (in this case, Josh Green).  He then allowed Lebron to get off a clean 3-point shot to end the game rather than foul before the shot.  Fortunately, Lebron missed.  That was lucky.  Kidd is terrible.  

I think it's also notable that this was a fairly officiated game.  The Lakers generally get a lot of whistle help.  That didn't happen in this game.  Thanks to the officials for a fair game.

[loki]

He bravely ignores conventional thinking by not playing the players who are playing well (in this case, Josh Green). 

He needs you to remember what a basketball genius he is. Us mortals can't comprehend.

[omahen]

He needs you to remember what a basketball genius he is. Us mortals can't comprehend.

To be fair, Green was on the floor in first minutes of last quarter and Mavs went scorless with Lakers reducing 9 points of the lead. Not saying that was his fault. Kidd went than with more offense and stick with it till the end.

[Jason Terry]

Holmes should take all of the Powell minutes once Lively is back. He can rebound and at least make an attempt to disrupt the paint

Hardy needs to be in the G league. Give his minutes and some of Hardaway’s to Exum

Luka
Kyrie
Green
G Will
Lively

Exum
THJ
DJJ
Holmes

I want to see what those 9 guys can do together with extended run. Then once Maxi is back, add DJJ back to the starting lineup to give it some more size

[Chicagojk]

Man, Lively has a chance to be so good. Maybe not all star but a true difference maker. He is just scratching the surface. He has been fine on defense, but to be honest I was expecting a little better. It is the other stuff that is way beyond my expectation. When he gets better on defense with experience and we get better players on defense, he will be a true difference maker.

With Luka and Kyrie defenses need to scramble. That is one reason our centers need to attack the offensive boards. Last night Lively had 4 in 19 minutes and Holmes had 3. That is a huge advantage to get our offense more shots. If our centers can get those second point shots and we limit our turnovers we are almost there. Just get to league average in defense. Can this team get there?

[Chicagojk]

Holmes should take all of the Powell minutes once Lively is back. He can rebound and at least make an attempt to disrupt the paint

Hardy needs to be in the G league. Give his minutes and some of Hardaway’s to Exum

Luka
Kyrie
Green
G Will
Lively

Exum
THJ
DJJ
Holmes

I want to see what those 9 guys can do together with extended run. Then once Maxi is back, add DJJ back to the starting lineup to give it some more size

I disagree on Hardy.  He proved last year he is too good for the G league.  He won’t be stressed to improve.  I admit his minutes have not been good on most nights.  But I like how they are finding way to get him minutes.  I think it is a sign they have expectations for him moving forward.  I think some of his lineups have not helped him but regardless he needs to be better.  His confidence is his greatest strength and his greatest weakness.  Without Hardaway his aggressiveness may be needed.  The way Hardaway is playing it feels like we have too many heat check guys.  So he may need to reduce the throttle a little.  May not be possible with him.  I feel finding minutes for him now may pay off later in the year.

[DanSchwartzgan]

Holmes should take all of the Powell minutes once Lively is back. He can rebound and at least make an attempt to disrupt the paint

Hardy needs to be in the G league. Give his minutes and some of Hardaway’s to Exum

Luka
Kyrie
Green
G Will
Lively

Exum
THJ
DJJ
Holmes

I want to see what those 9 guys can do together with extended run. Then once Maxi is back, add DJJ back to the starting lineup to give it some more size

I think when you look at that second unit you quickly see why Kidd is trying to put Green in that unit instead of DJJ.  There just isn’t enough reliable shooting between Exum, DJJ and whatever backup center is on the floor.  I’d personally start Green as I think there are ways to carve up the rotation to keep enough shooting on the floor.  But, I can see what Kidd is trying to do.  

Ultimately, there are three roles in our top 8.

Center:  Lively backed up by some combo of Powell/Holmes (or Holmes/Powell)

3 & D Wings:  Essentially a rotation of two out of Josh, GWill and DJJ 

Scorers:  Essentially a rotation of two out of Luka, Kyrie and Hardaway

Exum is kind of a ball handling defensive wing.  Maxi, if healthy, is kind of a large 3 & D Wing who gets miscast as a stand alone center.  I don’t know if they are fully members of the top 8 in a playoff series, but they will probably get minutes.

[Jakeospikez]

Yea Hardy averaged almost 29ppg on 54.6/49/88 with 9 3s/g last year, he doesn't need to go back there.

[ItsGoTime]

I posted something similar to what Dan is saying above a couple days ago on Discord. The way I see our current team’s best playoff rotation is:

3 guard rotation:
Luka/Kyrie/Exum
The superstar combo is obvious. Exum is the defending ball handler that should look best next to 1 on Luka or Kyrie as they get rest. In the playoffs his spot will not get a lot of minutes on the court, but they will be very important minutes to fill.

2 SF rotation:
Green/DJJ
The weakest spot in our rotation. I’m starting to see that Green might be best used off the bench, problem is also that DJJ is as well. DJJ looks like he might have improved his 3 shooting. This is great due to him being a SF or smaller sized player. With the assets we have, this year is not the moment to upgrade this spot. 

3 Bigs rotation:
GWill/Maxi/Lively
Due to Maxi regression and injury issues and Lively being a rookie, this is a very close second to the SF rotation. I think it needs at least an upgrade to Maxi, but in the playoffs, I think it would also be best for Lively to be a 9 or 10th man until at least the ref bias against young players subsides.

[SleepingHero]

[mvossman]

Holmes looks like a legit backup center. Not sure why we didn't see more of him with Maxi out and Powell struggling, especially in the midget lineups. I think Powell would be best served playing next to Maxi when he comes back. Back in the day those two worked really well together as the frontcourt in our second unit.

[youzigizag]

Holmes looks like a legit backup center.  Not sure why we didn't see more of him with Maxi out and Powell struggling, especially in the midget lineups.  I think Powell would be best served playing next to Maxi when he comes back.  Back in the day those two worked really well together as the frontcourt in our second unit.

I dont care about practice reps and what they say about Holmes.   I dont care if he is uncapable of grasping the defense...

I would like to see more of this guy before we move him before Powell.  

I have a hunch he is more of what we need than Powell is.

Love Powell.  Dont want to move him.  But dont want to move some other guy that is possibly more of what we need in place of Powell.

Eye told me last night Holmes is better.  Small sample size.   But I think Holmes' pre-Mavs history should be taken into account here.   I think he is MOST LIKELY still a better player than Powell.

Come at me.

[SleepingHero]

I dont care about practice reps and what they say about Holmes.   I dont care if he is uncapable of grasping the defense...

I would like to see more of this guy before we move him before Powell.  

I have a hunch he is more of what we need than Powell is.

Love Powell.  Dont want to move him.  But dont want to move some other guy that is possibly more of what we need in place of Powell.

Eye told me last night Holmes is better.  Small sample size.   But I think Holmes' pre-Mavs history should be taken into account here.   I think he is MOST LIKELY still a better player than Powell.

Come at me.

2 years ago half of this board (*myself included) were lobbying throwing a 1st to SAC for Holmes in the hopes he'd be an upgrade for Powell. Last night showed what we all had hoped. Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut there were multiple other times this season where Holmes looked completely washed. 

Which is closer to the real Richaun only time will tell. I agree that he needs more reps and we need to see more. 

There I came at you

[Ghost of Podkolzin]

2 years ago half of this board (*myself included) were lobbying throwing a 1st to SAC for Holmes in the hopes he'd be an upgrade for Powell. Last night showed what we all had hoped. Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut there were multiple other times this season where Holmes looked completely washed. 

Which is closer to the real Richaun only time will tell. I agree that he needs more reps and we need to see more. 

There I came at you

It was 3 years ago and a whole other lifetime of Holmes in SAC.  When I found out he tanked because he was falsely accused of domestic violence, I really started cheering for him.  Then the preseason and early season season performances had me thinking he is $12m/yr dead money.

He showed he still has it.  I don't care if he never has a shot attempt, if he rebounds and protects the rim like this, I gladly say how wrong I was.