Mavs Moneyball

Suns at Mavs Open Thread

2008-12-05T00:20:09Z

Discuss the game here.

GO MAVS

Thursday Morning

2008-12-04T15:06:35Z

I'm still being shadowed or whatever at work today so I can't really post.

Quick links for a discussion startup...

- Caplan on JJ Barea

- Sefko compares the Suns and Mavs

- Sefko asked Dirk about Devin Harris

- Sefko's latest mailbag

- Jan Hubbard writes about the Rockets always having a bunch of injuries

Reyshawn Terry Surfaces

2008-12-04T00:34:51Z

About six weeks after being cut by the Mavs, Terry has finally found a home -- Gruppo Triboldi Basket of the Italian second division. Babelfish humorously translates:

Perhaps the destiny has been put of means, as Reyshawn Terry is without a doubt in possession of much more class. Terry, however, it will not be asked for being quickly l ' man of the Providence, but for being that added value that was Quadre Lollis for this system, than from to half January will be able here to count still more on a rate elevated athleticism.

The hope of the society, now, is that which Terry can already come down in field Sunday against the First Veroli of coach Andrea Trinchieri, bureaucracy allowing. In these hours, the strong player of color finds itself to the consulate of Filadelfia in order to demand the approval for l ' Italy.

Anyway, the Mavs don't hold Terry's rights anymore. I'm just posting this because I had been wondering where he was.

Talk Amongst Yourselves

2008-12-03T15:33:03Z

I've got stuff going on at work today which will most likely prevent me from doing the daily links etc..

Talk amongst yourselves.

Mavs "Find Magic", Beat Clippers: Observations and Quotes

2008-12-03T05:07:31Z

"Haahahahahaha, that was awesome" - me, to myself, after Barea hit the
three that turned out to be the game winner.
"Are you kidding me!" - Mark Followill after Jason Kidd got the steal right after Barea's three.
"i want this 2 hours of my life back....." - a Clippers fan over at Clips Nation.
Dirk Nowitzki was messing with that elbow pad/sleeve several times tonight. He was not wearing it in the last game, and I was waiting for him to get rid of it after he missed his first five shots tonight. (Elbow tonight - elbow vs SAC)
In a game that Dallas won by two, and led for less than one minute, JJ Barea was a ridiculous +21. 15 points, 6 assists, 7-11 from the field, and unquestionably my player of the game.
So far, it appears Shawne Williams has no business shooting from outside about 10 feet.
Talk about a turnaround. At the end of the third quarter Dallas was sitting on 68 points, trailed by 13, and had just seen Baron Davis (shocker) make a jumper with 1 second left. Unsurprisingly the AAC was dead silent. After the fourth quarter, Dallas had won, and the crowd wasn't leaving. All the players were in the locker room but the camera clearly showed the fans just lingering. That's the greatest sign of a good game.
Speaking of after the game, can FSN not do the postgame show from the Old No 7 club with people in the background ever again? As I'm writing this some guy has been holding up the shocker for what seems like a minute straight.
This play will surely be lost after that finish, but it wouldn't have been possible if Brandon Bass hadn't forced a turnover with 2 minutes left. He got his finger on a poor Baron Davis pass at midcourt and hit the ball off of a Clipper. Jason Terry scored on the next possession to reduce the lead to one.
Diop airballed another free throw tonight by about 8 inches. He seems to have gotten worse in the last year.

Jason Terry Postgame Quotes:

With two minutes left in the third quarter we were saying it's a long game and let's just stick together. Those guys were hitting shots all night long and it feels like you're never going to get a stop. But we put a little wrinkle in there, the coaches trusted the players, and we went to a zone defense. It took them out of their isolations, we started to get stops, we started to get momentum, and our fans went crazy. The biggest difference in this game was home court advantage. Our fans propelled us to this win tonight.

It's a lineup we seldom use [Kidd, Barea, Terry] because in practice we don't have enough bodies, but one that can be very beneficial to us because now you have three ballhandlers that can create, drive, get to the basket, and kick out for open shots. We did that time and time again in the fourth quarter. Take your hat off to JJ Barea. He he hit a big dagger at the end. It was tremendous. I told Stackhouse in the locker room, 'I don't care who shot that three it was going in'. That's just the way the game was going.

It should be [asked if this win will be one they use/look back on...]. We'll see on Thursday night. We've got a good Phoenix team coming in here. We need to keep our momentum. Our confidence is up at home now. We know any deficit can be overcome. We can come back from anything. Now we've got to come out and get a better start to the game, especially at home. You want to get confidence early and not give them confidence.

The Devean George on the zone defense.

We just wanted to give them a different look. They were getting comfortable with the man-to-man sets. We were having trouble staying in front of guys and the zone helped us out because they got cold shooting from out far. It bailed us out tonight.

Rick Carlisle:

Well, you know, it was unorthodox. And it was really all night just a search for energy, some spark at the defensive end, and you know the group that ended the game did a great job of scrambling. We were in a zone defense, and just real active. Making things happen. For a four minute stretch we caught lightning and a bottle and found some magic. Barea hit the shot, it was a huge shot, and he was big factor in the entire game, so I'm happy for him.

This has been a place where this team has just gone out on the court and won. It has been tougher this year. Our fans weren't into it early, and we were having a hard time getting them into it. So it just really appears to me that beginnings of games are very important. Digging a point hole is not a great a place to start The Clippers are a team much better than their record, obviously. This trade they made has made them a more dynamic team both athletically and offensively. They are going to be a nightmare for everyone to play, but it makes it harder when you start 9-0.

Are there any signs you can get before the game that the team is going to start off cold the way they did?

That's the most loaded question I've heard in a long time and I'm not going to answer it. But, you know, I really think the personality of our team is important and during this stretch we've got to redefine our identity as a home team. In the past they've just come out here and run over people. But we were up against it the whole game because we were giving up 50% shooting. When we won the six out of seven, during that stretch we were holding teams to 41%. When our defense isn't there it's going to be hard. Especially without Josh who is a difference making playmaker on both ends. I'm not sure where I was going there, but this is an important time and it was a huge win as unlikely as it appeared.

Box Score - AP Recap

Clippers at Mavs Open Thread

2008-12-03T00:40:43Z

Clips Nation - Sefko Preview - NBA.com Preview - Clippers Last 5: LLLLW - Dallas Favored by 11 - Over/Under 199

So Far This Season:
DAL 92 @ 103 LAC

Discuss the game here.

GO MAVS

Arrested Tuesday

2008-12-02T18:01:08Z

I've got nothing right now, so I'm just going to post an Arrested Development clip -- should spark just as much conversation here as anything Mavs related.

Tuesday Morning Links

2008-12-02T15:18:13Z

Seven game home stand starts tonight against the Kaman-less Clippers, and Josh Howard thinks the Mavs should win all seven.

"Not when you're at home, especially with the crowd we have," he said. "We have to get all seven games. I know we got some good teams in here. But we're at home - and I know we haven't been playing that great at home. But things are going the right direction now."

Howard is hopeful he'll be able to play tonight.

"I'm right there," he said. "Tap it in, or it sits there. I'd love to come back [today]. We'll just see how it reacts.

"It's just like coming off a sprain. It's still going to hurt. I just pray to God that it doesn't swell up [overnight] and we'll see how it goes."

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Carlisle on Kidd and Barea sharing the court.

"With J.J. and Kidd together, J.J. becomes the two [shooting] guard and Kidd becomes the point, and Kidd's big enough to guard the other team's two, so it works out," Carlisle said. "I'm not going to hesitate to go back to that."

Who Is Devin Harris?

2008-12-01T23:19:39Z

John Hollinger compares Devin Harris to Kevin Johnson in his Per Diem piece today. I don't think that's accurate. With his drive and dish, drive and score, and drive and pop range of moves, I think he's much closer to Allen Iverson. He's certainly not a point guard like Chris Paul or even Tony Parker.

Wes and I both lamented the loss of Devin and weren't big fans of the trade for Jason Kidd, but I think the jury is still out. It is distinctly possible that the Mavs didn't need an Allen Iverson... they needed a playmaker like Jason Kidd.

That said, I still miss the kid.

I Can't Get A Handle On This Team

2008-12-01T05:23:55Z

I've watched the games, and I've examined the stats. I've waited and waited for some kind of trend to show itself, but I can't wait any longer. We're 16 games into the season, and I still don't have a handle on what kind of team the Mavericks have become under Rick Carlisle. Part of me is thinking (hoping) that this is a good thing.

At the beginning of the season my initial thoughts were pretty simple: What a mess. The Mavs weren't playing at all like a team on either side of the floor. I had significant expectations for the offense and--while giving them a slight pass on defense--certainly expected more than what we saw. I was honestly wondering what the heck system Carlisle was using, because it was more often than not simple chaos.

As time went by the team started to look more like a team, but the personnel decisions were decidedly odd. You'd have players not playing for three games, then come in and chalk up major minutes. Diop was part of the solution, and then he wasn't. Green was a star in the making. Then he wasn't. As I said, at least the team was playing more like an actual team. We saw some real defense and the offense looked like it had more of a rhythm.

Still, as the past 16 games have unfolded, the underlying chaos of Carlisle's system is still there. Part of me thinks that Carlisle is treating the Mavs as a 12-14 player unit, as opposed to a core of 5 with three or maybe four coming off the bench. In this way, Carlisle is like a crazier version of Nellie. Nellie would exploit matchups on the floor during the play of the game. Carlisle looks like he is exploiting much more difficult to define team-wide match-ups.

In this way, Carlisle has his core of Dirk, Kidd, and Josh, and then he kind of builds the team around them depending on who they are playing and who may be hot at the time. If that mean Diop sits for 48 minutes, so be it. If that means that Green starts, well that's fine, too. Whatever works.

You can see it in the minute distribution. Against Los Angeles, a tough game for anyone, you'd expect the standard starting five plus three rotation (By the way, that's exactly what you saw out of Phil Jackson). But the Mavs saw 9 players logging at least 15 minutes, and a tenth (Gerald Green) started the game and was on the floor at the end.

We're also seeing some wonderfully strange combinations, such as playmaker Jose Juan Barea on the floor with playmaker Jason Kidd at the same time. Let's be honest, how many of you out there in Mavsland would have realistically predicted those two players on the floor at the same time this season?

I guess I'd be more enthusiastic about all this experimentation if we were seeing some significant trends that illustrated the team was moving conclusively in a positive direction. We are vaguely seeing this on defense, but the reality is that the Mavs defense during the winning streak wasn't that much better than the Mavs defense during the losing streak. They currently have the eighth best defense in the league, which is pretty good, but this is a team that has been top five in the past and with a more athletic team, should be there again.

On offense the team is incredibly inconsistent. There is honestly no trend to be seen. The team is currently 16th in the league in offense, and while I may have said I'd give up some efficiency on offense for a team offense that was more difficult to shut down, a drop to 16th wasn't exactly what I had in mind.

Ideally, what we'd see is what we saw in Sacramento--a smackdown on defense and a machine on offense. Unfortunately, we can't play 82 games against a Kings team without Kevin Martin. What I really want to see is the Mavs start to put together a string of these game performances while continuing to be entirely unpredictable with their roster. That would really rock.

Ultimately, my hope is that this is the future for the Mavs: A team with an almost completely unpredictable roster and nearly impossible to prepare for. Can you imagine trying to lay out a game plan not knowing whether Damp and Diop are going to play 48 or whether Bass and Dirk are going to play at center for 30 minutes? I know, it's easy to overemphasize these things, but that's the main vibe I'm getting from the first 16 games of the season.

As it is, the Mavs are certainly not awful. Their defense is quite good, and, well, the offense is hit or miss but hopefully can get a lot better. About the best news I can say is that this is an odd year for the NBA. There are exactly two teams with a top ten offense and a top ten defense: The Lakers and Cleveland. That leaves a whole bunch of teams that are still finding themselves, including the Mavs.

It's a long season, and it can still go any number of ways. I just wish I had a better handle on which way the Mavs were going.

Sunday SAC Stuff

2008-11-30T18:25:07Z

Last night's game pretty much went according to plan (box score - highlights). I'm not sure what it was exactly, but late in the first quarter with Dallas up 21-18 I felt pretty sure that Dallas wasn't going to trail the rest of the game. The Kings, without Kevin Martin, shouldn't score 80+ against Dallas, and they didn't so job well done.

There was a disappointing element to the game though, and that's how boring it was. Remember when Dallas/Sacramento meant something? That was a fun rivalry. Now Dallas is winning by 20+ without trying, the crowd is quiet, and the arena isn't exactly full. Oh well, I know Dallas will eventually go through the same phase that the Kings are currently in, but for now I'm glad it's them and not us that has faded away.

Mike Fisher points out how easy it was for Dallas.

How easy was it for the Mavs to handle the Kings? Even Devean George played well.

....What, exactly, did LA-lovin' Devean do to earn such praise? He played even with Kings emergency go-to-guy John Salmons.

Yup. John Salmons is their go-to-guy.

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Rick Carisle's play of the game:

Dirk Nowitzki punched the ball away from guard John Salmons, beat him down the court then hurled himself to the floor to flip the ball back to Devean George for a layup.

"That was a defining play in this game," Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. "That was an effort play, where you got a max player going down on the floor.

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Hubbard says the Mavs still aren't where they need to be but have improved dramatically.

The two victories over winning teams came in San Antonio and Houston. But each team was missing a major player. The Spurs were without Manu Ginobili and the Rockets played without Yao Ming.

Still, despite no quality wins against teams at full strength, the Mavericks are playing better than the team that lost a game to the Los Angeles Clippers.

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Carlisle with a Josh Howard update.

"I'm hopeful. I'd like to say that I'm optimistic, but really it's up to Mother Nature at this point. I know that he's doing everything he can do in terms of treatment to try and condition the ankle as it progresses. But I don't have a crystal ball right now. Obviously the sooner the better for us."

And Jason Terry is not one of the people who think Dallas playing well without Howard means anything.

"I mean, we're still not all the way put together. J-Ho [Josh Howard] is out. He's a big part of what we do. I mean, how can we even judge where we're at when you don't have your All-Star out there with you?

"I'm not using that as an excuse. It is what it is. We're doing a decent job of banding together. It says a lot about this team. It says we're playing hard."

Mavs at Kings Open Thread

2008-11-30T02:21:15Z

Discuss the game here.

GO MAVS

Saturday Morning Links

2008-11-29T17:10:08Z

Hubbard has some quotes from Carlise about how well Jason Terry has been playing off of the bench.

"He’s been able to give us a real scoring punch off the bench," Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. "The great thing about him is he’s willing to do whatever to try and win. If I have him coming off the bench we can keep his minutes reasonable and still get a real weapon coming off the bench. And it’s great for the soul of our team to have a guy who’s that unselfish when it comes to that kind of stuff."

-------------------

Jerry Stackhouse didn't travel to CA with the team after having surgery on his foot.

"It requires a short period of complete inactivity," Stackhouse said by text-message Friday night. "I hope to be moving again early in the week."

------------------

Anyone know what Reyshawn Terry is up to? As far as I can tell, he still isn't playing basketball anywhere.

Lakers Top Mavs: Quick Observations and Postgame Quotes

2008-11-29T08:01:23Z

Gerald Green scored the first and last points of the game.
Devean George and Antoine Wright got the Kobe assignment. Wright definitely seemed to a better job. The +/-, George -17 and Wright +12, surely the difference wasn't that great right?
Dallas shot 29 3's. Most of them were good shots and they made 45% which is fantastic, but that's uncomfortably high...
How good was Barea tonight? 10 points, 9assists in 20 minutes. I made note of this in the game thread, but it was like one of his D-League games.
Rick Carlisle's postgame quotes:

"Well, there's a huge rebound differential and if you look at the free throw line there's a big difference there. Umm, you know the Lakers are one of those teams that statistically when they don't look like they're playing they can still find ways to beat you. Are undoing was the second half of the third quarter -- When they went on a run and we just didn't have any answers. We hung in and gave ourselves a chance, but you know Kobe made some very difficult shots down the stretch and I thought Ariza was probably the major difference in the game. The things he did offensively and defensively were difference makers.

Our bench did good things. We expect them to play well. That's their job. We need that every night. Barea did some really good things for us from a playmaking standpoint. And we had some other guys play well durng stretches. But that six or seven minuter period, late third early fourth, was our undoing.

I can't remember the last time I saw an NBA team only commit 8 fouls in 48 minutes, but maybe these guys are that good defensively. It's a little hard to believe, but I'm not going to complain about the officiating, but I thought we played an aggressive game and we could have gone to the line a few more times.

With the Dallas Mavericks you're not interested in moral victories. We're interested in winning games. We had an opportunity and let it slip away. Give the Lakers credit. They did what they had to do to take the game away. We're very disappointed, but now we've got to regroup for tomorrow night."

Box Score - AP Recap - Game Flow

Mavs at Lakers Open Thread

2008-11-29T02:30:04Z

Forum Blue and Gold - Sefko Preview - NBA.com Preview - Lakers Last 5: WWWWW - LA Favored by 10.5 - Over/Under 206

So Far This Season:
LAL 106 @ 99 DAL

Discuss the game here.

GO MAVS

Quick Friday Catchup

2008-11-29T01:31:49Z

Still no word if Josh Howard will play tonight, but he did shoot around with the the team today. I'm guessing he plays but we'll see...

-----------------

Dirk credits the five game winning streak to everyone just being more comfortable.

"I think it's just a comfort level with what we're doing," Dirk Nowitzki says. "That's really it. We didn't really know what to run, what we were comfortable with in the first couple games.

"Now, we know what to do out there a little more. When you're comfortable on the court, it shows. We're able to put ourselves in position where we can make plays and make shots."

----------------

Rick Carlisle on the Lakers.

"They've been dominant," Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. "Look at their statistics and they appear to have no weakness. They've got length, and they play both ends of the floor. We have a very low margin for error offensively and defensively against them because they're the best right now."

---------------

Jason Kidd bought everyone customized headphones.

Think they're cool and want a pair of your own? You can buy them here -- only $1,100.00.

Happy Thanksgiving Links

2008-11-27T19:11:42Z

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

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Sefko has an article on Diop trying to raise his intensity the last few games.

Caplan writes about Antoine Wright.

"I think he's earned the right to start the next game," Carlisle said Wednesday, a day off before today's Thanksgiving practice and flight to LA. "It's just what position he's going to be playing."

And JFE comes to the defense of Jerry Stackhouse. She starts the article off by saying she's friends with him because he was always on her radio, and then I just sort of skimmed the rest.

Art Garcia on Stackhouse

2008-11-26T16:20:20Z

Art has an article up on NBA.com about Stackhouse wantintg to get traded to a team where he can get minutes. There's nothing groundbreaking in there, but he does have some quotes from Stackhouse that I haven't seen anywhere else so I figured I'd post it. He also speculates that Toronto, Atlanta, and Philly are teams that could be interested.

7&7 Morning Links

2008-11-26T14:27:48Z

Sefko recaps the game saying Dallas is having some breaks go their way during the five game winning streaks, and Caplan focuses his recap on Antoine Wright.

Wright who notched a season-high 12 points in the second quarter, had several of those on Tuesday, and he also attacked the rim and scored rather than loft 3-pointers.

"About the only time he didn't finish," Carlisle said, "was when it looked like he was tired. ...We couldn't have won this game without Antoine's overall effort at both ends. He really kept himself ready."

--------------------

Caplan has a Josh Howard update.

"It's a lot better, but still day-to-day," Howard said. "I'm very eager. I've just got to get my foot together first and make sure I come back at full strength."

Howard said the injury restricts his ability to cut, which is a significant part of his game.

"An athletic guy like myself, I want to be able to play the game the way I can," Howard said. "As soon as I get that range of motion back, I'll be good."

--------------------

Mike Fisher has his game observations.

Lost in all the late-game heroics will be Erick Dampier's clever decision to absorb a charge rather than attempt to block a driving layup by Danny Granger.

Erick Dampier drew a game-changing charge. Then came a solar eclipse. And then Hell froze over.

Mavs Get Back to .500: Postgame Quotes

2008-11-26T05:51:31Z

Antoine Wright:

On suddenly playing 40 minutes.

Exhuasting. Coach has stuck with me and told me to just continue to work and my chance would come.

Carlisle has said nobody has grabbed the SG spot by the horns....

Whatever happens at that two position, guys just have to come in ready, focused, and know what the game plan is.

How does it feel to be back to .500?

It feels good to be .500, but now we have the Lakers.

It was your sons 4th birthday and you had a career night scoring 24 in 40 minutes. Do you think he brought you good luck?

I don't know if it's good for me because now he's going to be so excited and I'm tired.

Rick Carlisle:

We were getting stops and rebounds [late] which was a big problem early in the game. Then Terry and Kidd made play after play. JET got to the basket - he hit jumpers. Kidd hit two huge threes. Our veterans willed us to a win - is what happened. You've got to give credit to them.

Antoine Wright played tremendously well. As much as this looks like an iny-miny-miny-moe game with the two guard spot, there's logic to it just in regard to the defensive matchups coming into the game. We had a lot of respect for Marquis Daniels and felt he would be the best guy to guard him. He had a great defensive and offensive game. Very happy for him.

We really needed to get this win somehow. We were having a lot of diffculty early. We gave up 13 offensive rebounds in the first half -- I think 8 in the first six and a half minutes which is unheard of. We'd become a better rebouding team, but they were long rebounds and Indiana was just quicker to the ball.

The second half we talked about getting the tempo reasonable for us and working the game back and staying with it. That's what our guys did. We were hoping to cut into the lead a little bit earlier than the last few minutes of the fourth, but whatever you can to do to get a win in this situation, when you're trying to get back to .500, is whatever you have to do.

They're not all Rembrandts.

Box Score - AP Recap