GAME 49 DIRKIE: Ka-Powell Wins! (40%)

[SleepingHero]

https://twitter.com/dallasmavs/status/14...C1rqEpAAAA

[Hypermav]

DP taking the punches in the neck and with his mind control defeated the Blazers.

[dirkfansince1998]

All around team effort. Luka and Brunson with playmaking master pieces. Bullock hitting 3s. Voting for Powell. He makes so many plays that won´t show up in the boxscore. Face first defense for the win.

[SleepingHero]

Powell really made a lot of impact plays tonight. He actually would've been my first choice but I decided to go with Luka due to his unreal passing tonight.

He really controlled the entire game while he was out there and he picked apart Portland time after time with no look lobs and behind the back PnR passes.

[ballsrchr]

Doncic with a workman like triple double.  Brunson with a double double and 20 points.  KP with....22 points...and not much else.  DP has some bulldog in him, worked like hell,...and got the most ridiculous foul called on him when McLemore collided with Nurkirk.  Unsuccessful challenge!  Come on, man!

Anyway...I'm giving my Dirkie to DP...even though I sort of want to give it to Luka.  But isn't his what we expect from Luka?  No, it's not fair, but there it is...

[Tyler]

Powell's Dirkie was well earned, although Bullock was also tempting with his hot 3-point shooting.

BTW, is your starting backcourt combining for 35 points, 26 assists (with only 3 turnovers), and 16 rebounds good? I feel like that's good.

[ThisIStheYear]

Luka was the best player, but in the spirit of the award, I voted Brunson on the curve. Bullock and Powell deserve massive credit too.

[cow]

Dorian the Explorer

[MrGoat]

Dwight Power. I said some things about his play earlier in the season that I am starting to regret

[SleepingHero]

Another interesting observation from this game was Kidd's lineups. Felt like Luka was out there for much longer stretches. Basically the entire first quarter, and besides a 2 minute rest, the entire second quarter as well. This continued with 12 min 3rd quarter but by then the Mavs put the Blazers away and Luka rested. 

KP also played the entire 1st quarter. Usually Powell enters around the 7 minute mark to give him a rest.

[burekemde]

Luka and Brunson tandem, once again.

[dirkfansince1998]

Another interesting observation from this game was Kidd's lineups. Felt like Luka was out there for much longer stretches. Basically the entire first quarter, and besides a 2 minute rest, the entire second quarter as well. This continued with 12 min 3rd quarter but by then the Mavs put the Blazers away and Luka rested. 

KP also played the entire 1st quarter. Usually Powell enters around the 7 minute mark to give him a rest.

Felt like more Luka and some Frank was Kidd´s answer for the who replaces THJ question.

[KillerLeft]

Felt like more Luka and some Frank was Kidd´s answer for the who replaces THJ question.

Tough to tell tonight because he extended the rotation in a way that felt more like it was about Portland than it was about THJ's injury. 

I think it's pretty clear that Ntilikina and Green are duking out for minutes, however, and they both look ready for more, imo. 

Gonna need Bullock's shooting now, more than ever.

[DanSchwartzgan]

 
BTW, is your starting backcourt combining for 35 points, 26 assists (with only 3 turnovers), and 16 rebounds good? I feel like that's good.

Our backup center (which happened to be a combination of two people) was 20/8 on 100% shooting and was +25 in 25 minutes.  BBall Reference shows per game O and D rating and  Box +/-.  Powell's numbers were 208/101 and 12.9 on the Box +/-.  Chriss was 241/119 and +27.7.  I probably should have voted for Powell.

Tell me if you've heard this story before.  Luka and KP shoot 36% and 44% from the field.  The shooting percentages for the rest of the rotation players were 57, 56, 60, 100, 62, 75, 100 and 50.  Answer: no, you've not heard that story before.  That's how you get 35 assists.  To me, the best version of Luka isn't an MVP candidate because he's scoring in the low 20's instead of nearly 30 but leads the league in assists.  That Luka would need better teammates (or to play the Portland D every night).

I thought it was interesting that Chriss got worked into the lineup tonight.  Kind of random.  If that three keeps falling, he can be something important in a year or so.

I gave my Dirkie to Frank since the award is about raising one's game.  He soaked up 15 of the THJ minutes at +10 and hit two timely 3's.  I thought it was interesting that Frank brought the ball up quite a bit allowing Brunson to play off the ball (in the THJ role) some.  

I just love how hard Powell, Green and Reggie work on D, but Hardaway was so often the weakest link of the bench unit that it didn't always show in the numbers.  Add to that the shot hunting (THJ gonna get his) and I could imagine it being kind of frustrating for that trio to play so hard next to Hardaway.  Adding Frank to that group really raises the defensive intensity.  Shots came in the flow of the game for the most part.  We'll see how that works against better D's.

[Jommybone]

I guess I just have too high of expectations for Luka. His pedestrian triple double doesn’t even get him consideration in my mind. 

Jalen’s 11 assists to 0 turnovers (assist to turnover ratio of infinity) catches my attention, as does his 9/15 shooting and 2/3 from deep. But his extraordinary efficiency against lightweight defenses has also become the norm. 

Dwight, on the other hand, has been disappointing for most of the season. At least to me. Not tonight. The efforts that Dirkfan called “face-first” defense, the near perfect offensive efficiency (15 points on 5 FGAs), the full stat sheet (2 steals, 2 offensive rebounds, + a block). An impressive 18 mins from somewhere you didn’t really expect much. Bravo!