2021-2022 MAVS NEWS: 4th in West | WCF loss [ARCHIVED]

[KillerLeft]

Please help me understand why Powell, seemingly a hard worker, saw his stats flat line in the playoffs?

My take:

He's a great vertical spacer and very thoughtful screener on offense, but that's all he's got on that end. Playoff defenses are just too good at taking away your first couple of options (which is what Powell is in all those pnr's he runs with Luka) and Powell has no other way of attacking to punish them. He can't shoot, can't really floor the ball, has no post game, isn't much of a passer, etc. Consequently, during his minutes this past playoffs, the Mavs were basically playing 4 on 5, in a way. 

He's a good defender, especially in this switch-type defense, and was adequate on that end, but not great, even by his standards, and certainly not great enough to offset the huge handicap he caused on offense. 

He has never been a good rebounder. That's where he's truly deficient, imo. I've never seen hands that seem so instinctive and natural catching lobs yet so clumsy securing balls that come to him off of the defensive glass. I personally believe rebounding is the least important of these three areas, but it certainly doesn't work in his favor when one of the other two is such a problem. 

Wood is going to make this team considerably better, imo, simply by providing the kind of varied offensive threat that neither Powell nor Porzingis have been able to provide in this system. If he accepts the role with the right mindset, of course.