Posts Tagged ‘O.J. Mayo’

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NBA: Refs Blew Critical Call In Mavs-Blazers Game

January 30, 2013  ·  8:19PM

HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – All Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban asks for when it comes to NBA officiating is transparency. Well, he got it on Wednesday.

The league released a statement admitting that refs blew a crucial call in the final seconds of the Mavs’ 106-104 loss at Portland. Dallas guard O.J. Mayo was called for a charging foul that gave the ball back to the Trail Blazers with 1.5 seconds left. After a timeout, Portland inbounded the ball in the frontcourt and LaMarcus Aldridge made a game-winning, turnaround jumper.

Instead, the league said, Mayo should have been awarded two free throws with the game tied at 104-104.

“After review at the league office, the video replay confirmed the play should have been ruled a blocking foul as Portland’s Ronnie Price did not get his body directly in Mayo’s path prior to him starting his upward shooting motion,” the statement read. “Mayo should have been granted two free throws.”

The play in question started with 4.5 seconds left in the game. Mayo caught the inbounds pass along the baseline and made a quick move to the basket. As he leaped to the basket, Price slid across the lane, just outside the restricted area and the players collided.

“You really can’t [say] too much without getting a big fine,” Mayo told reporters after the team practiced in San Francisco on Wednesday in preparation for Thursday night’s game at Golden State.  ”Can we play that 3.3 [seconds] over again?”

It was a critical loss for the Mavs, who started a four-game road trip at Portland as they desperately try to climb the Western Conference standings and get back in playoff contention. Dallas, which dropped to 19-26, led the Blazers by 21 points early in the third quarter before Portland began to chip away.

Dallas committed eight of its 16 turnovers in the fourth quarter and Mayo committed three in the period, including the offensive charge.

The league also acknowledged a blown call in Denver’s close win Sunday against Indiana, saying that video replay showed Nuggets guard Andre Iguodala reached in and fouled the Pacers’ Paul George with 2.2 seconds left in the game and the score tied. However, Iguodala was credited with a steal.

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Rick’s Tips: Fantasy All-Stars, Reserves

January 21, 2013  ·  1:54PM




Our friends at TNT will announce the All-Star reserves on 7 p.m. eastern on Thursday before another tasty doubleheader, so I thought I’d get the ball rolling with the reserves lists according to the 8-cat fantasy rankings through Sunday.

Eastern Conference Fantasy All-Star Reserves

NBA.com/FantasyKyrie Irving, Cavaliers: Obviously, Kyrie has very little chance of making the real-life All-Star team, but he’s eighth across 8 categories thanks to 23.1 points, 5.7 assists, 2.0 threes, and 1.7 steals.

Paul George, Pacers: Few players are better in the fantasy gold categories, as George is averaging 2.2 threes, 1.8 steals, and 0.7 blocks — good for 12th across 8 cats.

Jrue Holiday, 76ers: Holiday is 13th across 8 cats and quite possibly this year’s Most Improved Player with 19.4 points and 9.0 assists.

Joakim Noah, Bulls: After a sub-par lockout season, Noah is Noah again, averaging 12.4 points, 10.6 rebounds, and 2.0 blocks to rank 14th across 8 categories.

Brandon Jennings, Bucks: Young Buck’s points and assists are solid, at 18.6 and 5.8, respectively. That said, what vaults him to 16th across 8 categories is 2.0 steals and 1.9 threes.

Chris Bosh, Heat: Quietly, Bosh is 19th across 8 categories with 17.5 points, 7.1 rebounds, 1.4 blocks, 55 percent from the field, and 83 percent from the line.

Paul Pierce, Celtics: Don’t sleep on the great Paul Pierce, who still gets it done at 35 years young. The Truth is averaging 19.0 points, 5.7 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 1.9 threes, and 1.5 steals, keeping him in the top 25 across 8 categories.

Western Conference Fantasy All-Star Reserves

James Harden, Rockets: The Beard is third across 8 categories, behind only Kevin Durant and LeBron James, and ahead of Kobe Bryant, thanks in large part to 25.8 points, 1.9 threes, and 1.9 steals.

Stephen Curry, Warriors: Finally healthy, Curry is stuffing the stat sheet AND helping the Warriors win. Steph ranks seventh across 8 categories with 20.5 points, 4.1 rebounds, 6.6 assists, 3.1 threes, and 1.7 steals. 3.1 threes?!? Talk about the goodies!

Russell Westbrook, Thunder: Durant is first and Westbrook is ninth across 8 categories, making OKC the only team with 2 of the top 9 players in fantasy hoops. Westbrook’s scoring is down to 23.0 points, but his assists are up to a career-high 8.3 per game.

Tim Duncan, Spurs: Duncan is having a turn-back-the-clock season, averaging 17.3 points, 9.6 rebounds, and 2.8 blocks. Shooting 50 percent from the field and 82 percent from the line has helped Duncan rank 10th across 8 categories.

Nicolas Batum, Trail Blazers: Batum is the Paul George of the West, bringing the fantasy gold with 2.5 threes, 1.5 steals, and 1.0 blocks. Batum is currently 11th across 8 categories, and he’s been providing first-round value all season.

David Lee, Warriors: Lee may be the most underrated player in the NBA, what with his 19.8 points, 10.8 rebounds, 3.7 assists, 53 percent from the field, and 80 percent from the line. Lee ranks 17th across 8 categories and he may make his first appearance in the real-life All-Star game.

O.J. Mayo, Mavericks: Believe it or not, Mayo ranks 20th across 8 categories due mainly to his 18.2 points and 2.1 threes per game. After slumping a bit following Dirk Nowitzki’s return, it appears as if Mayo is back on track.

Rick Kamla is an anchor on NBA TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @NBATVRick.

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Mavs Owner: ‘Bank Of Cuban Is Open’

January 15, 2013  ·  12:16PM

DALLAS – Talk about your public offerings. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban didn’t need Facebook to inform the rest of the NBA that everybody not named Dirk Nowitzki on his makeshift roster is officially on the trading block.

“We’re letting everybody know that the Bank of Cuban is open,” the billionaire owner announced Monday night before his Mavericks beat the Minnesota Timberwolves for a third consecutive victory to climb to 16-23. “If it’s the right deal, we don’t mind taking back money. But we’re not going to do a trade just to do a trade. It’s got to be worthwhile.”

Cuban’s declaration came two nights after he said there is a “100 percent chance” that the Mavs will aggressively pursue trades — either as a main trade partner or as a facilitator in a multi-team scenario — as the weeks and days count down to the Feb. 21 trade deadline.

It’s perhaps the Mavs’ best chance to upgrade a unit that last week dropped to 10 games under .500 for the first time since Cuban bought the team in 2000. The Mavs, five games out of the eighth spot in the West, are in jeopardy of not making the playoffs for the first time in 13 seasons.

So don’t discount Cuban’s comments as a crafty PR move. Cuban needs to keep a fan base that has provided a league-best 449 consecutive sellouts going back to 2001 engaged in a team that has had massive turnover the last two seasons and has underperformed since claiming the championship. Consider it also a warning shot to the current players. Since Cuban’s initial comments on Saturday, the Mavs have blown out the Grizzlies and Timberwolves.

Dallas is in position to take on salary because of Cuban’s controversial financial maneuverings following the 2011 championship when he dismantled the title team. Under the more rigid guidelines and more punitive tax of the new collective bargaining agreement that begins to truly bear its fangs next season, Cuban altered his spend-at-all-costs philosophy. Instead, he went for scaling back salary to create cap space, allowing for the pursuit of high-dollar free agents (a move that bombed this summer when Deron Williams re-signed with Brooklyn) as well as the flexibility to make a blockbuster trade (including, and perhaps most importantly, sign-and-trades in the summer that will be off limits to teams above the luxury-tax apron – the point is $4 million above the tax level, which is $70.3 million this season).

Cuban’s belief is that good players with big contracts will become available as teams seek ways to get under the luxury tax for this season and beyond. An example is Rudy Gay, who is reportedly being shopped by the Memphis Grizzlies. Front offices are also keenly aware of the repeater tax that will be levied on teams that chronically spend over the luxury-tax line.

Cuban said he’s been busy poring over rosters, watching players and making suggestions daily to president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson.

Dallas has few assets on the roster capable of netting a major acquisition in a two-team swap. The big question is if Cuban can swing a deal that not only improves his team this season, but also makes long-term cap sense. His club is loaded with players on expiring contracts such as O.J. Mayo, a 25-year-old shooting guard that Dallas wants to pan out for its long-range plans. Guards Darren Collison, Dahntay Jones and Roddy Beaubois, center Chris Kaman and forwards Elton Brand and Brandan Wright are also on one-year contracts.

Veterans Vince Carter (owed $6.3 million through 2013-14) and Shawn Marion (owed $17.5 million through 2013-14) could be of interest to a contender.

Going nowhere, the owner has made clear, is Nowitzki. And that’s not because the sweet-shooting 7-footer is believed to be the only player in the league other than Kobe Bryant with a no-trade clause in his contract.

Cuban said flatly that he won’t trade the 15-year face of the franchise.

Nowitzki, whose four-year, $80 million contract expires after the 2013-14 season when he will turn 36, has been consistent in saying he wants to remain with Dallas until he decides to retire. He did recently express skepticism toward Cuban’s plan and went so far as to wonder if it would be in Dallas’ best interest to trade him if it fails to land a star player to build around before next season.

Stay tuned. Plenty of intrigue to come as the Bank of Cuban is officially open for business.

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Rubio Staying Positive On Rough Road Back

January 15, 2013  ·  12:12AM

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DALLAS – For a kid who knows only how to play the game with pure joy, this is pure hell.

The two ugly scars that mar his left knee each measure five inches long, one starting in the middle of his knee cap and jagging down. The other curves around the left side of the knee like a misshapen crescent moon.

As Ricky Rubio pulled up the black, padded knee sleeve that made the permanent markings of reconstructive surgery disappear, he wished the trials that still come with his ongoing recovery, one that wiped out the Olympics and all but 10 games now of this season, could just disappear, too. He softly shook his floppy mane of dark hair and flashed a small, if only brief, smile.

“It’s hard because I still have a little pain and it’s something you have to fight through and get through,” said the 22-year-old Spaniard before the Minnesota Timberwolves lost 113-98 to the Dallas Mavericks, a fourth consecutive defeat for Minnesota and yet another game that Rubio would come off the bench and be limited by a minutes restriction.

“I talk with the guys who had the same injury and they say about a year, a year-and-a-half [after surgery] they started feeling, like, normal,” Rubio continued. “It’s tough when you’re playing with something in your mind; you don’t want to think about it, but it’s in your mind that you’re going slower and you are not who you used to be.

“That’s going to come, but you have to be patient.”

Rubio made his season debut on Dec. 15 against Dallas and played 18 minutes. He dazzled the home crowd with eight points and nine assists, including the highlight of the night, a no-look, behind-the-back bounce pass into the lane to Greg Stiemsma for a layup. It’s about as good as it’s gotten.

Back spasms, likely caused by overcompensation for his knee, took him out of the lineup after just five games. He returned on Jan. 8 and in the four games prior to Monday, Rubio, averaging 3.8 points and 4.6 assists, had made one of 12 shots. His assists dwindled from eight to seven to three to two, all while playing no more than 22 minutes.

“You see flashes, but you can see he is nowhere near like he was last season. He was moving,” teammate J.J. Barea said. “The way he plays he needs to move like he used to move, where he’s faster and he’ll be able to get to pick his spots, get wherever he wants so he can make those passes.”

Flashes came and went Monday night against the Mavs. By the time acting coach Terry Porter subbed Rubio in with 3:20 to go in the first quarter, listless Minnesota trailed 22-11. Rubio and benchmate Barea got the Wolves clicking. Rubio directed an alley-oop pass to Dante Cunningham, drained a jumper and kept a possession alive with a swooping rebound in the lane as the Wolves closed to 39-36 and then 45-41.

But Rubio also couldn’t finish a drive after getting around O.J. Mayo, with little lift leaving his attempt short of the rim. In the final moments of Rubio’s nearly 13 minutes in the first half, Dallas went up 48-41, and then, with Rubio on the bench, 55-45 at the half.

He never got a fair shot to make a dent in the second half. Porter — serving for Rick Adelman while he tends to his wife in the hospital — kept Rubio tethered to the bench for the first 10 1/2 minutes of the third quarter as the Wolves’ first unit mirrored its awful first quarter and allowed the game to slip away. Rubio checked in with Minnesota, reeling from injuries and a rotation in tatters, trailing 87-68.

He finished with six points, six assists and five rebounds, and was a plus-7 — the highest rating among the eight Wolves that played at least 21 minutes.

Rubio’s 2-for-3 shooting night tied his season high for made buckets and figured as his best shooting percentage among the 10 games he’s played, an indication of how brutal it’s been after he averaged 10.6 points and 8.2 assists in a tantalizing rookie campaign before a torn ACL ended it after 41 games.

“It’s hard because you work hard for eight or nine months to get back and it doesn’t stop here,” Rubio said. “You have to work even harder now to get back in shape, to get back to the point you want to be feeling the game again, and that doesn’t come easy.”

Yet, add logging a season-high 27 minutes Monday and a desperate Wolves team slipping down the standings at 16-18, can at least glean some positives as they head back to frigid Minneapolis.

“I tell him to be patient, to keep working on his legs, keep working on his body. It’s going to turn around sooner or later, but he’s got to be patient and stay positive,” Barea said. “And I tell him he’s young. He’s 22, he has nothing to worry about.”

Maybe so. But right now, it’s hell.

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Conley Quietly Keeps Grizz Moving Ahead

January 14, 2013  ·  1:05PM

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HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – In print, at least, Mike Conley‘s stats — 13.3 ppg and 6.2 apg — don’t leap off the page like one of Russell Westbrook‘s springboard jumpers or a Chris Paul halfcourt alley-oop.

“Let me ask you this here,” Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins propositioned: “Does being a good point guard, is it only determined by numbers?

“I mean there’s some guys that score a lot of points because that’s their role. There are some guys that get a lot of assists because they have the ball and that’s all they do. But you know, its organizing your team, facilitating the ball. A lot of times Mike Conley will do what he’s supposed to do and throw it into Marc Gasol and Gasol throws the ball for the assist. But he’s done his job. He defends, he gets steals. I think he’s a very good point guard.”

Frankly, so do we.

And, by the way, so does Conley, who is in his sixth season as Memphis’ starting point guard. Season by season, the 6-foot-1 former Ohio State teammate of Greg Oden steadily improves his game. He’s having another fine year, leading the Grizzlies to a 24-11 record and the No. 4 spot in the West heading into tonight’s home showdown against Paul’s Clippers (8 ET, League Pass).

“I do, I do feel like that,” Conley said when asked if he deserves mention among the top point guards, a group that Paul has taken over as the inarguable No. 1. “I think I’ve played well against a lot of the big-time guys and continue to keep getting better each year. But I can’t worry about what people say or if people overlook me. I’ve always been a guy that just goes out there and plays ball and lets everything else take care of itself.”

Paul will be heading to a most-deserving sixth All-Star Game next month, likely as the starting point guard. Fan voting ends tonight and Paul, at last count on Jan. 3, trailed only Kobe Bryant in votes among Western Conference guards. Conley, on the other hand, didn’t register in the top 10. If third-place vote-getter Jeremy Lin, some 46,000 votes behind CP3, makes a late push to get in as the starter, then Paul will be first on the list of seven reserves selected by the coaches (who can’t pick players on their own teams).

Conley would love to make his first All-Star team, but the odds are stacked against him. Deserving talents like Westbrook, James Harden and Tony Parker are likely to be locks, with Stephen Curry and even rookie Damian Lillard making a push, too.

Conley continues to quietly get the job done on both ends of the floor. He ranks second in steals behind Paul and is very close to averaging more steals per game than turnovers (2.38 to 2.59), a rare occurrence that only Paul (2.62 to 2.14) can claim. Conley is also second behind Paul in steals-to-fouls ratio, meaning he stays in front of his man, defends and makes steals far more than he hacks.

With O.J. Mayo in Dallas, Conley has responded to becoming the Grizzlies’ primary 3-point shooter when defenses collapse on post men Zach Randolph and Gasol by shooting the 3-ball at a career-best 38.0-percent clip while on pace to launch about 70 more 3s than in any other season.

“He’s having a really good year,” teammate Rudy Gay said. “The fact that he keeps all of us together, that says a lot about him. We’ve got four other totally different people, all aggressive, all playmakers and scorers, yet he still finds a way to make everybody effective.”

About a year ago, Hollins said his main complaint with Conley is that he can be too unselfish and not aggressive enough in creating his own shot. It’s exactly the area Conley, who could stand to sharpen his overall shooting percentage of 41.6 percent, said he’s improved the most this season.

“Just overall I have a better feel for the game as a point guard, knowing when to be aggressive offensively, knowing when it’s my time or time to get other guys the ball,” Conley said. “That’s really helped me to gauge my game, but also helps my teammates out in a much better way as a point guard.”

As far as a first All-Star appearance goes, Hollins probably has the right concept when it comes to Conley: “It’s not the individual stars as much as it is about your team being a cohesive unit that plays together.”

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Cousins Says On-Court Incident With Carter Was Unintentional

January 11, 2013  ·  12:01PM

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HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – “It wasn’t intentional,” DeMarcus Cousins pleaded after his latest recklessness during the Sacramento Kings’ disappointing overtime loss to the Dallas Mavericks.

Nothing ever is intentional for Cousins, whose heat-of-the-moment forearm to the face of Vince Carter with 41 seconds left in OT and the Kings down two, was reviewed, elevated to a Flagrant 2 and a subsequent automatic ejection. It was Cousins’ sixth foul anyway and as the 6-foot-11 center dragged 29 points, nine rebounds and four assists to the locker room, his team, which had led by 17 points, was left for dead — again.

Now Cousins will await a predictable fine from the league office, which reviews all flagrant fouls. The league office, of course, is quite familiar with the recurring troublemaker. He’s already been suspended twice this season.

“I’m pretty sure that my reputation will come into play with this decision,” Cousins told reporters afterward, slumped at his locker. “But hopefully they realize that it wasn’t intentional.”

It never is. When the Kings and Mavs played in Dallas a month ago, Cousins, jockeying for position, swung his fist in a backward motion and landed a direct shot in the groin area of O.J. Mayo. Cousins claimed that, too, was unintentional. Mayo disagreed and said Cousins has “mental issues.” The league disagreed and suspended Cousins for one game.

This time, “Boogie” turned himself into the victim.

“I swear, no matter how hard I try, some type of way it happens,” Cousins said. “It’s frustrating. Like no matter how hard I try, they find a way.”

The answer made little sense in response to a question posed about not allowing this incident to become a setback after he’s put up monster numbers over the last couple of weeks, and just as trade rumors swirl.

This is what the Kings are grappling with on a daily basis, an undeniable talent who is irrevocably immature. It’s darn near getting impossible to live with him, yet life without the potential cornerstone leaves the franchise with what? He’s 22 and he’ll figure it out eventually, right?

A follow-up question came to Cousins: Are you frustrated with yourself?

“I wouldn’t say with myself because I know I’m trying my best,” Cousins said. “I mean I can’t sit here and point the finger at other people, and I know some of these decisions, I got to make better decisions.”

This poor decision came well after the Kings had already imploded in the fourth quarter and were lucky to be in overtime thanks to Isaiah Thomas banking in a game-tying 3 at the buzzer. With a chance to tie late in the OT, the ball went into Cousins in the paint and three Mavs collapsed on him. Cousins was stripped, the ball bounced around, squirted out the side and was recovered by Dallas’ Shawn Marion.

As Cousins rose up — sandwiched between Mayo behind him and Carter in front — he shoved his right forearm into Carter’s chin. As Carter (who might have embellished just a bit) started to fall backward, it was almost as if it clicked inside Cousins’ head that this was not good, and he quickly cradled Carter to the floor as if tucking him into bed.

The foul was then reviewed and upgraded.

“But come on, like, give me a break,” Cousins said. “I just know that wasn’t intentional. Come on, man.”

The officiating crew, after viewing multiple replays, thought otherwise. Just guessing that the league office will, too.

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Following The Script, Hornets’ Gordon Closes Out Mavs

January 6, 2013  ·  1:43AM

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DALLAS – As far as the New Orleans Hornets are concerned, the season started Saturday night, Jan. 5, with a 99-96 overtime victory over the Dallas Mavericks.

“It kind of is,” said Hornets guard Eric Gordon after his first start of the season and after he scored eight of his 14 points — and the Hornets’ final eight points — in the OT. “We’re still a little bit banged up health-wise and we’re still trying to get there, but I would say this is the type of win that kind of does something for us.”

No kidding.

Hey, 1-0 looks a whole lot better than the 8-and-20-whatever that the official standings will have you believe. But forget the standings when it comes to this scrappy, intruiging group of young kids trying to make it work in NOLA. Even before Saturday night’s big road win, as players dressed and stretched in the visiting locker room, a freshness and exuberance could be sensed.

For one, the 6-foot-3 Gordon was returning to the lineup for just his third game and his first start of the season. He was given the previous game off to rest after playing two games in his long-awaited comeback from a knee injury that followed him to New Orleans from the Los Angeles Clippers in the Chris Paul trade.

And whatever happened with Gordon after the trade, his lingering injury and his Phoenix-or-bust ambitions during the offseason mean nothing now to his growing teammates.

Second, Hornets coach Monty Williams, for the first time this season, trotted out the starting five he envisioned from the start: Emerging point guard sensation Greivis Vasquez, Gordon, Al-Farouq Aminu, Robin Lopez and No. 1 pick Anthony Davis. That quintet’s average age is 22.8 and allows Williams to utilize the 20-year-old Austin Rivers from his rightful spot off the bench.

Vasquez, remarkably the old man of the group in just his third season at age 25, and the reigning Western Conference Player of the Week, could barely control his enthusiasm to finally start — and finish — a game next to Gordon, a man of considerable scoring ability.

“What Eric is going to bring to the table is we have been in games without him and now he can close those games out for us,” Vasquez said prior to the game. “He can be our closer. That’s what he does for us.”

Cue the Gordon highlight reel.

After struggling through a rocky shooting night, Gordon rode the coattails of Vasquez’s monster, 15-point fourth quarter that rallied the Hornets to an 89-89 tie after regulation. The underrated Vasquez, stuffing the stat sheet again with 25 points, nine assists, seven rebounds and a lone turnover in 41 minutes, had a chance to win in it regulation, but a screen failed to set him free and he never got a clean look as the clock expired.

“He’s for sure underrated and he’s going to be a big-time playmaker,” Gordon said. “He’s definitely underrated and he’s just getting better and better with every game.”

Gordon, unfazed by a 1-for-9 shooting night in regulation, turned the final 1:49 into a clinic of late-game execution. His driving layup cut Dallas’ lead to 94-93. Then he drained a 3-pointer to put the Hornets up 96-94 with 1:18 to go. Mavs forward Shawn Marion tied it at 96-96.

After missing a 3-pointer for the lead with 39.9 seconds to go, Gordon got a reprieve when O.J. Mayo, cold all night, missed a pull-up jumper (plus two earlier open corner 3s in overtime). Gordon went to work on undersized Mavs point guard Darren  Collison.

Gordon pump-faked at the top of the circle and Collison bit. Gordon leaned forward, drew contact and heaved a shot that hit the backboard square and dropped in with 4.7 seconds to play. He completed the 3-point play to close it out just as Vasquez envisioned.

“Our record really doesn’t identify who we are,” Vasquez said. “We have been in games and because our inexperience really gets to us, teams have been able to beat us the last two minutes of the game. But it is a learning process. I tell you, we have this vision that we are going to be a great team, and that takes some time. In the NBA, it’s too cruel, it’s cold-blooded. You’ve got to understand that you have to have really a strong mindset because it’s not going to be easy. We’re going through that.”

And on this night they persevered when they could have folded multiple times. After leading 25-19, Dallas bridged the first and second quarters with a 13-0 run. The Mavs led by 11 in the third quarter and with Dirk Nowitzki having made his debut in the starting lineup in his seventh game back, they looked to be salting away a game they desperately needed before embarking on a three-game road trip.

But Nowitzki, who finished with 20 points, would be held to three points on 1-for-5 shooting in the fourth quarter and overtime. Instead it was Vasquez and the 24-year-old Gordon taking charge.

Asked before the game what he hoped to get from his first-time starting five, Williams, the Hornets’ impressive 41-year-old coach said,  “Wins.”

He got one. More importantly his young, clawing team finally got rewarded for their effort and got a glimpse for once of what a closer looks like on their own squad. For the first time in the 20th game this season that New Orleans trailed after three quarters, they pulled one out.

“Eric is a player that most people on the East Coast and even here don’t get to see because the Clippers didn’t play on TV as much, or at all when he was there,” Williams said. “But he’s a guy that can score the ball. He can shoot 3s, he can attack the basket, he can get to the free-throw line.”

Gordon did all three in the final 1:49 Saturday night, the first night of the rest of the Hornets’ season.

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Dirk’s Return Progressing Slowly And Failing To Spark The Mavericks

January 1, 2013  ·  5:41PM

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DALLAS – With his team almost unrecognizable in its personnel and its play, and the first surgery of his career having delayed his 15th season by two months, Dirk Nowitzki’s patience is being tested like never before.

The Dallas Mavericks are laboring to complete the most basic tasks on a nightly basis and are enduring blowout losses at a rate that doubles any other team in the league. Nowitzki, now five games back in uniform, might be starting to round into form, but he has so far been unable to spark a more consistent team game as he strangely comes off the bench for the first time since he broke into the league as a mop-headed 19-year-old.

“Obviously, Dirk is not ready,” said San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, whose club walloped the Mavs on Sunday for a second time in the span of a week with Nowitzki in the lineup. “He’s not Dirk Nowitzki basically, one of the greatest players that’s ever played, so it’s going to take time for him. Everybody’s just trying to figure out their place and work around him and get back into a rotation. It’s very, very difficult when you have a guy like that out and then he comes back.”

Suddenly the unimaginable is racing toward reality. With still 50 games remaining as the Mavs head to Miami Wednesday night after stopping a six-game skid at Washington with a 103-94 win on New Year’s Day, urgency is already setting in as two enduring streaks are effectively endangered.

Nowitzki, averaging 8.2 points after scoring in double figures (11 points on 5-for-7 shooting) against the woeful Wizards for the first time since his return, will likely see his 11-year run as an All-Star end. That one won’t sting nearly as much as potentially missing the playoffs. The franchise he magnificently led to its first championship some 18 months ago is in jeopardy of seeing its string of 12 consecutive playoff appearances come to an inglorious halt.

Having lost nine of 11 games — and just 1-4 in Nowitzki’s return — Dallas sits at 13-19 and out of a playoff spot in the heated Western Conference. The idea of holding down the fort until Nowitzki got back was long ago blown out of the water. The hopeful notion — perhaps from fans more than the organization — that Nowitzki would provide an instant jolt and galvanize Dallas’ bottoming-out rotation is proving faulty as he’s averaging just 20.8 minutes a game as a reserve.

“It’s not pretty right now, obviously,” Nowitzki said. “It’s not pretty defensively, it’s not pretty offensively, not pretty on the glass. So we got to keep on working and keep on plugging and eventually we’ll work ourselves out of it. I’m going to work myself into better shape, obviously, and can help a little more. But right now I’m not helping that much.”

Adding to the difficultly of a quick and smooth return is that Nowitzki isn’t returning to a familiar situation. Dallas added nine new players this season and his teammates are relative strangers in terms of floor time together. Before missing the first 27 games of the regular season, Nowitzki played in only the preseason opener in Berlin.

Now he must adjust to a new backcourt consisting of the erratic Darren Collison, yanked as the starter 14 games in and reinstated only after Derek Fisher quit the team after a month, and O.J. Mayo, who is mired in an ugly six-game slump.

In 2008, Nowitzki pleaded with owner Mark Cuban to trade penetrating, low-assist point guard Devin Harris for savvy veteran Jason Kidd, believing the cerebral assist man would elevate the offense and create opportunities for Nowitzki that didn’t require the constant burden of grinding, one-on-one isolation work.

With a return to a Harris-type point in Collison, Nowitzki is faced with a clear adjustment in styles and increasingly limited time to make it work.

“The thing I think Dallas is missing is passers,” said Denver coach George Karl, whose Nuggets blitzed Dallas by 21 points last week. “I’m just saying Jason Kidd and Jason Terry; the Dirk-Jason Terry connection was incredible in the fourth quarter. Jason Kidd has a way of making everybody pass the ball the correct way.”

Nowitzki’s time with the starters, the group he’ll eventually join, has been sporadic. He’s getting shots up, 37 in the last four games, but only 13 have gone down (35.1 percent). His hot shooting Tuesday night in just 17 minuets is the most encouraging sign to date. Still, Carlisle said he won’t rush Nowitzki into the starting lineup until he’s ready to play 30-plus minutes.

“I’m not very good right now so I’m not going to worry about anybody else,” Nowitzki said of adjusting to his new backcourt. “I’m worried about getting myself halfway into game shape. That should be able to make stuff easier for my teammates if I start making plays and start having a little lift on my jumper and make some defenses pay for sucking in, then I think it’s going to open up a lot of stuff for the other guys.

“Darren is the best, I think that’s obvious, when he attacks, when he gets to the rim, when he gets in the paint, and that’s when he makes stuff happen. So that’s his game and we’ve got to adjust to that.”

While it’s convenient to say it’s still early in the season, the clock is ticking.

Over the last five seasons, not including last year’s lockout-shortened one, it has taken 46, 50, 48, 50 and 42 wins to sneak into the playoffs as the West’s eighth and final seed. Last season, if extrapolated to 82 games, would have required 45 wins.

So take 45 as the magic number to get in this season and Dallas would need to go 32-18 the rest of the way, or somehow manage to accrue one fewer loss than it did in the first 32 games.

So much of that climb up will fall on Nowitzki. Yet that’s certainly nothing new for the franchise’s longtime lone superstar.

Missing the playoffs would.

“We got to stick together,” Nowitzki said. “I mean, when it’s tough, it’s tough. Sometimes guys will go sideways a little bit and you got to circle the wagons and keep them together, pull them back in if somebody in a timeout is not listening or not focused or pissed at himself or at somebody else; stick together, this is not the time to go separate ways.”

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Mavs’ Carlisle Threatens Suspensions To Jolt His Cratering Team

December 31, 2012  ·  9:46AM

DALLAS – Patience in Big D is running as thin as Mark Cuban‘s wallet back when he could barely afford to holler at the refs from the nosebleed section.

After another blowout loss Sunday night, a 111-86 pasting by the San Antonio Spurs, desperate Dallas Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle, one week after ripping his club’s effort in a 38-point trouncing at San Antonio, spoke of implementing radical steps, specifically suspending under-performing players, as a means to jolt his reeling team.

“I’ve got to be inventive and find ways. I don’t have a better answer than that,” Carlisle said. “In the last week, I’ve literally had to scream in the face of two guys in practices and shootarounds to get the point across. And I will do that and I will continue to do that.

“If I have to start suspending guys for not doing things they’re supposed to be doing on the court, I’ll do it and you know, Mark and I will get into it about that, but somehow things have got to change, and it just can’t be about it’s a tough schedule. It just can’t.”

Actual suspensions might not fly, but the notion itself lends to a level of desperation that proves how quickly the season is slipping away. Carlisle can certainly choose to sit underachievers on the bench, not that he has many options in which to turn.

“Whatever coach decides I’m behind him,” Mavs forward Shawn Marion said. “Let him decide on what he wants to do. Whatever he decides I’m with him and that’s what it boils down to.”

The Mavs have lost nine of 10 and six in a row. The margin of defeat in the last six is 19.1 points. The Spurs beat them twice by 38 and 25. Denver beat them by 21. Miami and Memphis each won by double digits. The one game the Mavs competed, they couldn’t hold a fourth-quarter lead and lost to Oklahoma City by six in overtime.

Spurs guard Manu Ginobili had this critique of Dallas’ effort Sunday night in front of home fans that sat through another loss rather than watch the Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins in a do-or-die NFL game: “They were not very inspired.”

At 12-19, Dallas needs an immediate about-face or risk the franchise’s record 12 consecutive trips to the postseason officially being moved to the endangered list by mid-January.

“January is make or break for this team,” one Mavs player said.

Said Carlisle: “It’s not what this organization has been about since Mark bought the team and this is a stretch that is unprecedented, really. It’s bad and we have to fix it, and it starts with me. So I’m taking the blame for it.”

Dallas sits in 12th place in the Western Conference, four games out of the eighth and final playoff spot. Their season point-differential continues to balloon in the wrong direction. At minus-4.8, it is better than only Sacramento (minus-5.0) and New Orleans (minus-5.9). Only Houston (103.8) allows more points than Dallas (103.1), but the Rockets are scoring seven more points a game.

Dirk Nowitzki returned four games ago yet the Mavs have lost them all with the 7-footer coming off the bench and struggling to knock down shots. Compounding the problem is O.J. Mayo‘s confounding, ongoing slump. 

Dallas begins 2013 at Washington on Wednesday. A loss to the 4-24 Wizards would send Dallas crashing to rock-bottom with a Thursday night tilt looming at Miami.

“We got to get some dog in us. We got to get some fight in us right now,” Marion said. “We got to find a way to get it going because this [expletive] sucks.”

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Struggling Mayo Must Turn It Back On

December 30, 2012  ·  1:21PM

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DALLAS – O.J. Mayo‘s bid for a first All-Star nod is spiraling down the drain during this most difficult month of December. But is Mayo simply in a rut or is he shrinking in these last five games against top competition and when his Dallas Mavericks need him most?

“He’s in a stretch of games here against some of the best teams in the league, some of the best defensive teams in the league that are heavily game-planning for him,” Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. “He’s the No. 1 target defensively, so there’s a certain amount of patience you’ve got to have. And look, we’re taking a guy who was a backup on a good team last year and basically thrusting him into a starring role on a team, and this is an adjustment period. And one of the painful things about an adjustment period is you’re going to go through some ups and downs.”

As the Mavs slide down the Western Conference standings, having lost five in a row and eight of nine heading into tonight’s survival-mode game against San Antonio, Mayo’s production has fallen off a cliff. In order, Miami, his old Memphis team, San Antonio, Oklahoma City and Denver have essentially shut him down.

During the five-game skid, Mayo is averaging 8.8 points. His incredibly hot 3-point shooting, which had him over 50 percent for much of the season, has vanished. He’s 3-for-23 (13.0 percent) beyond the arc and 16-for-53 (30.2 percent) overall from the floor. He showed signs of breaking out Friday against Denver, hitting his first three shots and finishing 6-for-13 for 15 points.

However, most disturbing during the last five games are his 24 turnovers, six each in the last three games. Some of them inexplicably just slip off his palm for dunks the other way, as was the case late in Thursday’s overtime loss at Oklahoma City. To make matters worse, Mayo then fouled Kevin Durant for a key three-point play to aid the Thunder’s rally.

“We’ll get some pine tar for that, put it on the ball,” Carlisle joked because it’s about all he can do with this perplexing issue.

Mayo averages a team-high 3.23 turnovers a game and seven times in the last 12 games he’s had at least five turnovers, including nine in an OT loss at Boston.

The thought is that once Dirk Nowitzki gains steam and becomes more of an offensive threat than he has been in his first three games since returning from October knee surgery, defenses will have to retreat on Mayo and he’ll find more open spaces to operate, thus improving his shooting and diminishing his turnovers.

After carrying the scoring load for the first quarter of the season, the Mavs, at 12-18, are desperate for him to have a breakout game tonight against the Spurs and stop the bleeding.

“He’s in a lot of different situations this year and I’ve got to be careful about putting him in ones that he’s not ready for yet,” Carlisle said. “Generally speaking, he’s an attacking player that wants to make good things happen immediately and sometimes there’s an element of patience and discipline that have to be exercised, and he’s learning about that. That’s as simple as I can put it.”

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