Jon Barry Said What?

by Wes Cox on Jan 24, 2009 12:53 AM CST in News

OK, here's the setup. It's the middle of the first quarter, and Dirk has started the game three for three. Jon Barry decides that it's a good time to point out the one thing causing the Mavs inability to win it all. Summarizing:

'Dirk is off to a hot start and you'll notice that they were all jump shots. And that's really the Mavs problem. Dirk, their star, their best player, doesn't get to the free throw line enough.'

Let's just ignore the general premise of his statement that the Mavs issues have anything to do with Dirk, who at times has looked a little disinterested this year, but who is also top 5 in scoring and has carried the team for large stretches. Barry wants to say that Dallas shoots too many jump shots? No problem. He wants to say that Dirk sometimes isn't aggressive enough offensively? No problem. But to say the problem is the number of free throws Dirk attempts is absolute insanity.

Dirk is scoring 26ppg this season and he's doing it while shooting 47.7% - actually little low by his standards. He's shooting at a higher percentage than Dwyane Wade, Paul Pierce, and Kobe Bryant.

And you know what else he's doing? He's getting to the free throw line. He always has. He's 15th in the league this year at FTA per game. Last year he was 11th. He's finished top 15 in that category since the 04/05 season when he was fifth. For a better a perspective on where he stands compared the league "greats", coming into the Detroit game, Dirk had attempted just 16 less free throws on the season than Kobe and done so in one less game.

On the list of things Dallas could improve to most help their chances, Dirk shooting more free throws isn't even top 20. Thing like playing defense and "showing up" are slightly more important to this team. Dirk can keep being Dirk.

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Jon Barry is clueless

As an analyst he should know the only reason why Dirk is such a great offensive player is because he can score both from jump shots and also from getting to the rim. He leans a little too much to the mid-range shot these days, but he's still going to the line.

JEFF TEAGUE TIME.

by jonthefon on Jan 24, 2009 12:56 AM CST reply actions

wow, that was a fast comment.

www.mavsmoneyball.com

by Wes Cox on Jan 24, 2009 12:58 AM CST up reply actions

most national guys are idiots

if dirk hadnt had his teeth knocked loose about 50 times, they’d still be calling him soft because he is white and european

by kumizi on Jan 24, 2009 1:30 AM CST reply actions

Yeah

I don’t know why you’d get too worked up over this. National guys are almost invariably very generic in all their commentary and “analysis”.

I will say, however, that Barry and Miller are among the absolute worst in sports. They are terrible, and this is just another example. To play devil’s advocate, though, I think his actual point, very inartfully-put, was that Dirk doesn’t drive enough—a criticism we hear often from simpletons who believe a 7-footer only has value playing under the rim.

And, in fact, Dirk does get a lot of his fouls (if not the majority) on his vastly-underrated ability to cause contact on the jumper. He actually gets screwed pretty frequently when he does drive, probably because of his reputation as a shooter.

So, that’s all to say that Barry had about 5% of a good point, and 95% of annoying, uneducated filler commentary.

by brettgardner on Jan 24, 2009 1:43 AM CST reply actions

Stupid, asisine comments like this one are precisly why I don’t watch the game on ESPN or TNT unless I just have too. Thank God I didn’t have to tonight! I’ve learned over the year of watching basketball that just because someone was a “former player” does NOT automatically make them a good commentator or analyst. All you got to do is read or listen to some of the idiot comments that Magic Johnson has made over the years to know that! While I will agree that the Mavs have flaws as every team does, but Dirk Nowitzki is certainly not one of them.

by Cynthia56 on Jan 24, 2009 4:58 AM CST reply actions

Yes, that comment already disturbed me during the live game

I think Barry said both that Dallas is going nowhere because their star player is a jump shooter and he is not getting to the line enough. Both of which is idiotic since the label “jump shooter” is not a good critique when the jump shooter in question has been hitting his jumpers almost like they were layups during the ongoing game as well as the season and his career. And as Wes pointed out Dirk does get to the line a lot plus converts 90% of his FTs leading to a very high number of points from the line. That critique was futile.

by Norsktroll on Jan 24, 2009 10:43 AM CST reply actions

anyone who tries to single out dirk as being the problem on this thing

is a GD idiot, and I plead to them to cheer for someone else… because i hate that person….

people who want to blow this team up and trade dirk…idiots… yah lets trade our superstar who is STILL top 5 in the league in scoring, besides only having one other consistent scoring threat on the entire team… lets trade the guy who has carried this team most nights.. lets blame it on the guy… lets put together a package for a bunch of crap like minnesota got for garnett… yah the twolves are a lot closer to a championship now arent they?… if we trade dirk we put ourselves so far away from a title its not even funny… if we wait it out and just deal with medocrity for the next couple of years… then there COULD be light at the end of the tunnel in 2010…

and while waiting for 2010 may seem ridiculous, because we aren’t guaranteed anything… its the Mavs best chance to get back to an nba title contender…

this probably wasnt the right thread to post this.. but i wanted to bitch because the nba makes me bitter and angru

"I may not be a class act, but I'm an American."
-- Ron Artest on wanting to play for the Olympic team

by zkmavz on Jan 26, 2009 2:43 PM CST reply actions