Better Luck Next Year: Dallas Mavericks edition
As NBA teams are officially eliminated from title contention, theScore NBA freelance writer Andrew Unterberger takes a look back at the highs and lows of their season, along with the biggest questions ahead of 2018-19. This edition focuses on the Dallas Mavericks.
The Good
Dirk, 31,000 and still ticking. There will be a season when Dirk Nowitzki's increasingly creaky bones prevent him from being a useful cog for the Dallas Mavericks - but it wasn't this one, Dirk's 20th in Big D. Though his playing time and shooting volume have unsurprisingly dropped, Dirk still managed 12 points per game on 58 percent True Shooting - his highest such mark since 2013-14 - while leading the league in lowest turnover percentage, with just 45 total giveaways in 67 games so far this season.
Even at this stage in his career, he still rates 15th among centers in ESPN's Real Plus-Minus, higher than Andre Drummond, Steven Adams, and DeAndre Jordan. And of course, every season at this point makes for further Nowitkzi history - this season passing 50,000 minutes played, and 31,000 points.
In summary: Dirk Nowitzki is a goddamn treasure. Every second he plays from now until the day he retires is a gift to NBA fans, and Mavs fans in particular.
Dwight Powell, keeper. "Is Dwight Powell the Mavs' MVP?" NBA authority Zach Lowe asked on his "Lowe Post" podcast on at least one occasion this year. No one ever really cared enough to engage him on the topic, but the argument could certainly have been made: Powell was the Mavs' most efficient big man this year, shooting over 60 percent from the field, turning the ball over nearly as infrequently as Dirk, and actually playing some defense to boot. It took him most of the season to earn enough of head coach Rick Carlisle's trust to be a regular starter, and he doesn't protect the rim like you'd hope for a big man - just one block across his last eight games - but he's increasingly looking like a bargain at $9 million a year.
The last four games of 2017. Nobody would mistake the 2017-18 squad for the league's elite, but for one four-game stretch right before the new year, the Mavs could hang with anybody. They beat the Raptors, Pacers, Pelicans, and Thunder - all likely playoff teams - in succession, and even took the Warriors down to the wire, looking like they'd turned the corner as a team and would at least manage to stay competitive for the rest of the season. It didn't turn out like that, and the playoffs were already well out of reach by that point anyway, but it was a fun flashback to that old feeling that all the Mavs would ever need to be relevant forever was the combination of Dirk and Carlisle.
Dunkin' Dennis. Dennis Smith Jr. may or may not have made good on his summer league promise this regular season - averaging 15 and five is pretty solid for a rookie, shooting 38 percent from the field and 31 percent from three, less so - but the boy definitely gave us some dunks to remember.
The return of McBuckets. You just knew that if Doug McDermott bounced around enough, eventually he'd land on a team where he'd prove useful. Too bad that team was the Mavericks two-thirds of the way through a 20-something-win season. Nonetheless, McDermott has put up career numbers in his 13 games coming off the bench for the Mavs, averaging nearly 10 a night and shooting a sparkling 52 percent from deep. It could be a late-season, taking-inflected fluke, or perhaps Carlisle sorcery - either way, it'll probably be enough for another team to roll the dice on Dougie McBuckets next season when he becomes a free agent, if not the Mavs themselves.
The Bad
History of harassment. As bad as 2017-18 was on the court for Dallas, what will be remembered of this Mavs season was the embarrassment the team suffered off the court, a black mark that threatens to stain the franchise for many years to come. A Sports Illustrated expose published in February shined a light on the "real life 'Animal House'" culture of workplace harassment the team had reportedly fostered, which included a team beat writer being retained after being twice investigated for accusations of domestic violence, and a former team CEO having his highly inappropriate workplace behavior toward female employees repeatedly overlooked.
Though Mavs owner Mark Cuban was outspoken about how unacceptable the revelations about his franchise's workplace culture were, many found his ignorance similarly inexcusable - if not downright implausible, given how involved he's purported to be with team minutiae. Then, of course, Cuban himself came under fire after it was discovered that he faced a police investigation in 2011 after a woman said he sexually assaulted her. The one positive to be taken from the entire mess: According to SI, the Mavs' locker room was perceived by the team's female employees as something of a safe haven from the culture's unprofessionalism, and the players were nothing but highly respectful.
The 1-10 start. As bad as the Kings' 1-8 start to the season was, they were saved from the West's cellar in the season's first month by the Mavs, who outdid them to the tune of 1-10 in their first 11 - including a loss to that Sacramento team. For the second straight year, Dallas' season was over before it even really began, and this time even Cuban - who had oft sworn the Mavericks would never tank, especially not as long as Dirk stayed in town - couldn't resist using the T-word when discussing Dallas' season with Julius Erving on the Doctor's podcast.
Seth Curry's lost season. Remember Steph's little brother? Seth Curry proved he also belonged in the NBA during the 2016-17 campaign, when he averaged 13 a game on 60 percent true shooting and cementing himself in the Mavs' starting backcourt. Sadly, Curry suffered a tibia injury in the preseason and was shut down for the season to have surgery on it in February, never taking the court in 2017-18 - costing the team firepower that its bottom-10 offense certainly could've used, particularly in that dire early-season stretch.
Nerlens Noel's halftime hot dog. Not that Nerlens Noel's miserable first full season in Dallas following a contentious, protracted, and ultimately collapsed contract negotiation really needed a signature controversy - but hell, it got one anyway. Nearly two months into a season marked by inconsistent production and playing time for Noel, the still-raw big man left the Mavs' locker room at halftime against the Clippers to snag a hot dog from the media room - a move quickly interpreted as emblematic of Nerlens' struggles to fit into the team's Carlisle-led culture.
The coach tried to laugh it off publicly, but Noel's playing time was slashed even further from there, before the former lottery pick underwent thumb surgery and missed a couple months. He's gotten more regular minutes since returning to the team's lineup in late February, but whether it's possible for the Mavs' relationship with their 2017 trade-deadline acquisition to be salvaged remains unclear at best.
Dirk Novitkzi. As great a moment as it was when Dirk became just the fifth player in NBA history to pass the 50,000-minute mark, the moment was blemished somewhat by the non-spellchecked jersey the German Moses had donned for the occasion. "I guess it kind of sums up our season," the perma-droll 7-footer remarked postgame when asked about the mishap.
The Questions
Is the rebuild officially on? Second to only "tanking" in the words-not-in-the-Mavs'-vocabulary rankings is undoubtedly "rebuilding," but after two years deep in the lottery (and only getting deeper), it's getting tough for Cuban & Co. to deny that more aggressive measures may be due to return the team to contention than signing the likes of Andrew Bogut and Deron Williams. That may mean mostly sitting out free agency again, and more pressingly, it may mean looking to trade the likes of Harrison Barnes, Wesley Matthews, and J.J. Barea - all productive pros who could have more value to a competitive team than a losing one.
Who's worth building around? Like Sacramento, Dallas has a number of promising prospects that have yet to prove themselves as franchise fixtures: Smith seems the most like a core player, but could Curry or Yogi Ferrell (both free agents in the summer) get there alongside him? Is it worth trying again with McDermott (or even Noel?) And is there any upside remaining with Barnes? If the answer to all these is no, not only might the Mavs be rebuilding in the offseason, they might have one of the NBA's longest roads to recovery.
What culture changes need to be made behind the scenes? You can bet that the SI story and subsequent revelations aren't just going to go away in the offseason: The public will demand further changes, and rightly so. The burden of proof will be on the Mavericks, and Mark Cuban specifically, to show that the franchise has gotten its house sufficiently in order. If the heat continues to be turned up underneath Cuban for his purported past ignorance (and reputed past offenses), it'll be fascinating to see if that cleaning ends up reaching the owner himself.
Will Carlisle and Dirk stick around for another year of this? It's been 10 years since Carlisle teamed up with Nowitzki, leading to a whole lot of regular-season wins and career-validating playoff success for both NBA greats. But those wins have dried up and the playoffs are probably years away at this point. How many more years can they stand playing for pingpong balls? And does the franchise need to move on from the two of them before it can really move forward again?
Will the team try again with DeAndre Jordan in free agency?
Break out your Clip Art emojis.
(Photos courtesy: Getty Images)