A Few Thoughts on Mavs 110, Raptors 102

[TXBamanut]

Thank you, mavsluvr, great to see you back.

Thanks, dcon.

I read your post-game write-up and I watched the 10 min condensed game from League Pass.

My primary observation from the condensed game replay was that I have not seen ball movement like that from the Mavs all season.  This was a relief!  I was growing concerned with the team's growing dependency on Luka to both initiate and finish the offensive plays.  From what I saw, we played a style of bball in this game that I hope we would be progressing to.

Agreed that this is what they are working toward. Glad they are making some progress. If they expect to make a playoff run, they can't just run Luka one on five every time. 

To IGT's comment above about the physicality of the Raptors and our ability to hang in there with them.  I total  agree.  When people were throwing pitchforks about losing to the Knicks, I felt that they were a bad match-up for us since they have too many physical power-forward types.  Before the season started, I was hoping the Mavs would pick up Ed Davis, or the likes thereof, who would complement our main front-court rotation of KP, Maxi and DP.  Yeah, the Mavs want to win with skill and BBIQ, but that does make us vulnerable to certain types of teams, and this has been the case for 15+ years.  I remember us getting punked by the Nuggets (when they were the Thuggets) in the playoffs, any team Matt Barnes was on, etc.  The only time I thought we were the more physical team consistently was the 2010-2011 team when we had lay the wood Haywood, Tough Juice and D-Steve + Tyson Chandler, and Kidd was physical.  The Mavs, namely Donnie, always vies for skill first, regardless of physical stature.

Yes, luckily for the Mavs, the NBA today is much more about skills and speed than power. But there are still a few teams that rely on big, burly guys, and teams like the Mavs might be a little ill-prepared to deal with them. 

Finally, the Raptors.  Man, this team is good.  Just think - they were missing Lowry, Ibaka, and they are still pretty deadly.  Oh, and.. they had 2 guys from last year that were pretty good two - KL and DG.  They were STACKED last year.  It's kinda of a shame that KL left such a good group, would have been interesting to see what they could have done if he stayed.

Agreed. 

This has the feel of one of those "sports karma" situations where you think that you just upgraded and then find out how good you had it.