The Outlet 2.03: As the Clock Tolls, it Tolls for McGee
As advertised in our Prognosti-ranking series, we’re bringing our formerly retired series of daily vignettes — titled “The Outlet” — back for the playoffs. “Don’t call it a comeback.” Though, you can call it series 2, as we are in the title. Every day (or, rather, every day we aren't doing a larger and grander piece), we’ll try to share two or three short vignettes from our collective of writers ruminating on the previous day’s events. In this case, the previous few days. Should be a fun time. Today’s Outlet covers the depressing blowout of the Dallas Mavericks on Thursday as well as JaVale McGee's brilliant game against the Lakers on Friday.
- "Only at Nightfall: a Dirge for the Dallas Mavericks." by Alex Dewey.
- "JaVale McGee and the Imagination of the Imperfect." by Aaron McGuire.
Click the jump for the two pieces.
• • •
Only at Nightfall: a Dirge for the Dallas Mavericks
Alex Dewey
Only at nightfall, aethereal rumours
Revive for a moment a broken Coriolanus
--T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land
Last night their room-temperature pagoda of the Mavericks' weird, asymptotically aging superstars had its paper walls defaced and torn and its foundations set to flame. What remained was a distinctly depressing funeral pyre.
It wasn't sudden. The walls had bent and the supports had splintered before the walls fell totally. They tried, yes, but during the season, you could see the utter dependence of their offense on Dirk. Rick Carlisle lacked Barea or a functioning Odom or Chandler to go to, so the easy baskets, the garbage baskets, the restful baskets, were simply missing most nights. Their backcourt of Delonte and Beaubois and Terry and Kidd and Carter sounded great (all players you can respect if not necessarily love), but take energy, consistency, defense, and pick at most two for each player, and consider that you can only have two players or so at a time from the five. Yeah.
So the Mavs had a very good backcourt that nevertheless left a burden to the frontcourt (a burden of both energy and play-making). And unlike last season, the frontcourt couldn't deliver. Despite having legitimately fine personnel, the Mavericks found that without the dominant interior presence of the DPoY, their otherwise stout defense couldn't handle an all-out assault by a team like the Thunder with three penetrators with range and a physical frontcourt that wears you out, if nothing else. You could see the dependence of the Mavs' defense on crafty Shawn Marion holding down the perimeter (much credit to him), but this time it was one against three, and three won.The next line of defense couldn't handle the two inevitable leaks.
You could see Jason Kidd giving us shades of his prime this season (seriously, he could probably get a 9-10-10-10 line in the right circumstances) and Delonte West (of course) doing his straight-up-baller act, but it just wasn't enough and the frustrations - there from the beginning of the game - only mounted to a palpable sense of anger over a lost season. I was, truth be told, a little bit happy about it as it happened. I am a Spurs fan. I should celebrate, right? Jason Terry infuriated me for some reason - as he often does - by cutting the lead to 13 with a signature awful 3. But it stopped soon enough, and I can't say that I feel like gloating or even celebrating.
It was a simple equation: There just wasn't enough firepower and there wasn't enough extinguisher. And as for Dirk? Wanting; pyre, ensue. Durant's game-winner in Game 1 was a fluke, but Game 1 as a whole was the larger fluke, and I feel legitimately sad to say that the Mavericks in retrospect didn't stand much of a chance in this series, and that they were about as good as their record. I thought they had more in the tank, but there it is. I have some nostalgia, now - which is to say, in the adage, mild depression - over the once-great Mavericks now fallen. And though I tried to talk myself into celebrating their demise, I couldn't do it. I now hope they have a decent offseason for their troubles. It'd be worth it, just to continue this wonderful, maddening rivalry whose days are clearly numbered.
• • •
Page 1 of 3 | Next page