Dallas and Cents: 12/5/12

The Dallas Mavericks take on the Los Angeles Clippers tonight, in the late game of an ESPN double-header. Dallas fared pretty well in their last national television foray into Los Angeles, when they beat the Lakers on opening night. With rest and lots of practice time to initiate new faces into the team's gameplan, we'll hope Dallas can make it 2 for 2.

• There will be at least one old face at the arena playing on the other team. In light of all the reasons the Lamar Odom experience screwed Dallas(and the reasons seem to grow in number each passing day), seeing Lamar Odom do well tonight against the Mavs would be about the 600th twisting of the knife in our collective body.
• Getting back to current Mavericks, Tim McMahon writes that Derek Fisher, who will make just his second start in as many games since leaving his couch, "determined to earn the Mavs' respect".
• Meanwhile, Jeff Caplan has some revealing insight on the perspective of Darren Collison, who predictably is not happy about losing his starting job, and doesn't think he got "a fair shake". Collison himself makes a point to mention that his teammates agree with him. There have been rumblings of discontent from other Mavs this year(most notably a while back from the polite but competitive Elton Brand), which given all the quality individuals on the team I think just shows that chemistry is overrated and generally only as high as the number in the win column. Hard to get along when you're losing, nice guys or not.
• Eddie Sefko has another chat up from yesterday at the DMN, where he covers many topics, but a highlight might be his tidbit about Dallas being "active players at the trade deadline". Sefko also apparently wants Dallas to trade for Pau Gasol, which I don't see as a particularly good fit, on the team or on the payroll.
• After Saturday's game, Rick Carlisle called Elton Brand's performance "vintage Brand", and I hope we see a lot more of it. Brand may have a tough challenge against the athletic Clipper frontcourt, though Blake Griffin has been underperforming somewhat so far this season.
• More Gothic Ginobili player capsules, this one on Darren Collison, with guest Derek Fisher-outrage.
• Not Mavs related, but a funny recount of the crazy "anything can happen" nature of the NBA, this time playing out in the form of the 1-13 Wizards beating the defending champs in a game where the home Washington crowd greeted the visiting team more warmly than the home team. Oh, and then this happened.
• Hey, while were on a roll with laughing at other teams, might as well bring up the greatest play by play call ever. Made especially funny if you know the quote of origin.
• Newsflash: Donald Sterling was cheap.