After I heard Stackhouse say he'd be willing to be the 7th man behind Maurice Ager to stay in Dallas, I kind of figured he was serious. The only question was if Dallas management felt the same way. Here is the answer.
"Jerry was great," said Mavericks head coach Avery Johnson. "He was strong all year, he battled, he was a warrior. And this is the same guy who, when we got him here, people said he wasn't going to cooperate. And he's been cooperating with us. He was really a good influence, also, on Josh. We can talk about everything I did wrong, but you need players to also have an impact on other players. I thought Stack had a real strong impact on Josh. Josh had a heck of a year and he battled there until the very end. That's what you need. We needed veteran leadership like Stack and he really tried in that last game. He had an unbelievable (18-point) first half. He made some big shots, but we just didn't have it. I think it would be nice to have him back."
According to Bill Ingram, a lot of teams at the Pre Draft workouts were asking Dallas about Stackhouse. They all got about the same reply.There would be no sign-and-trades, there would be no release, and there would be no negotiation. Stackhouse is going to re-sign with the Mavericks and continue to be their top veteran leader - perhaps even beyond his playing days.
Stackhouse is definitely excited about that.
"This is where I want to be," affirmed Stackhouse. "I’d love to finish my career here in Dallas. There are a lot of good people in this city that I’ve grown friendly with and I would hopefully have some good possibilities of doing some things after basketball. The time will come for me and Mark (Cuban) to have some conversations and get it done. We both want the same thing, and that’s to bring a championship back to Dallas and hopefully we’ll be able to do that."
For those of you have been reading for a while, you know that Stackhouse really drives me crazy some times. (will he ever stop hogging the ball in the final minute of a quarter?) But I have to say, Stackhouse needs to be on this team. He saved the Mavs quite a few times this season. And while I can't give a final verdict until I see the contract terms, the decision to keep him gets a big thumbs up.------------------
Donnie Nelson says no Kobe.
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David Lord has a bunch of trade ideas involving Jason Terry.