Quoteboard for Mavericks 120, Jazz 102: "You have to pick your poison with us"

J.J. Barea is back

J.J. Barea: "I was hoping to land here so it worked out great [when Minnesota waived me]. I had to wait, I had to be patient, but it worked out great. I'm happy to be back."

Rick Carlisle: "I thought he played well for a guy who just basically showed up today. He is familiar with our system, so he will fit in. He is in good shape -- he had a great summer playing in the FIBA World Cup championships. We are fortunate to get him back. And with this roster, we have so many guys who can contribute...But he certainly showed tonight that he is a guy ready to go."

Tyson Chandler: "All of a sudden you walk in here, and you've got the giant and the little person back! So I love it. It brings a little of that experience from that team that won throughout the locker room spread out a little bit so we can push this thing."

Dirk Nowitzki: "He's an exciting little player. He's undersized but makes up for it with hard playing, playmaking, shot making. Glad to have him back. You saw the warm reception he got -- the fans know what he did for us, what he meant to the team in 2011. It's good to see him back."

Dirk: "Our game is a lot of movement, a lot of pick and rolls, and he thrives in that. He's very smart with the screen and roll...so that's what he did for us in 2011 and that's what he's going to do for us this year. Making smart decisions with the ball and attack."

Dirk: "I said this morning, I'm going to call Peja and Brian Cardinal back up and see if they still can move somehow. [laughter]"

Lob City is now in Dallas, sorry

Carlisle: "We had good spacing, we threw better lobs tonight and the other night we threw some that were too low or too high. So guys are starting to get a feel for it."

Chandler Parsons: "You have to pick your poison with us. When we get in the lane and create, is the big gonna come up, are we gonna drop it down to Tyson for a lob, we can space the floor with shooters, we have a lot of ways to hurt you. We did that well in the first half and we can't have letups in the third quarter."

Parsons: "It opens up the whole floor for us. When [Tyson] screens and rolls it has to draw in the weak side, so they have to pick their poison. They have to either tag him on the roll and allow a shooter to pull out get an open shot, or we're gonna find him at the rim; he's probably the best pick and roll guy in the NBA."

Tyson: "[The lob play] was very effective. What it does is loosen the defense, once you get a couple of those, the big guy is less likely to help...then all of a sudden you start getting wide open layups and jump shots."

Dirk: "[Tyson's] a leader in the locker room getting everyone pumped; when he's on the floor he's our anchor out there. He finished above the rim, got the crowd into it. That's what he brings."

Dirk: "When the big guy steps up on the drives, we have two great lob guys, probably two of the best in the league in Tyson and BWright. They both play so high above the rim. If the big guy just takes one step over to help on the drive, it's a lob or a kick out for three."

All the Parsons that's fit to print

Carlisle: "I like everything about Parsons. He plays hard; he is decisive with what he is doing. He is going to play his game and by the time the All-Star break rolls around, people are going to look at him and say, 'this is one of the best young players in the league.'"

Parsons: "I definitely wanted to bounce back. You never want to play like I did in the first game, but every player has nights like that. This was a great night for us to be in front of an excited crowd for the first time."

Dirk: "He was great. He looked to attack, missed a couple bunnies around the rim, had some unlucky touches, but we need him to attack and play confident and knock down shots. I thought he was great; he looked to be in a good rhythm, aggressive."

I'm coming home

Parsons: "I love it. The crowd was great, it was always fun coming to play here as an opposing team and it's good to have [the crowd] on our side now. They're probably the best home-court advantage in the NBA. So it's great to be here and they really do help us out."

Tyson: "It's so incredible. I love the people of Dallas, love the fans here. It's been such a warm experience to return."

Tyson: "I feed off of the love and the passion I feel for the fans. The fans here are very passionate about their team and very prideful and I try to express that on the court."

Dirk: "It's always fun to play at home. Opening night is always something special to look forward to; you're always anxious to get the season at home started as well. It's good to be back, good to have the fans back, and hopefully we can make them proud every night at home."

The best of the rest

Parsons: "I felt much better out there today; these guys make it easy."

Carlisle: "[Aminu] played well. He came in with good energy. I decided to go with him first because we needed rebounding. When we sub for Dirk we're going to be a little smaller, regardless....whoever goes in there has got to be ready to fight, block out, go after balls, and Farouq's pound for pound, he and Tyson are the two best rebounders on the team. He did a good job tonight."

Tyson: "Our main focus this year is defense, that's something we've got to pride ourselves on. We have to go into games like this understanding it's about us. It doesn't matter who the opponent is. We have to work on our defense...every night is an opportunity to build."

Dirk: "I think we already showed in preseason how explosive this team can be. We don't have any selfish guys out there; we want to share the ball and look for open shots. Want to play for each other...we're going to be challenged every night defensively and that's the area we need to improve and get better."

Dirk [on how to tell Chandler and Chandler apart]: "We call him Parsons and him Tyson. [laughter]"

Dirk: "Some nights last year we had a big lead, then lost the lead, so everyone had to play more minutes than we would have liked. I think that's got to be one of our goals - if we have a big lead, we're a deep team, we've gotta keep the pedal to the medal and try to keep everyone's minutes lower."

Dirk: "We have a good team but we have to work hard for it every night. Nothing in this league is given."