(07-21-2021, 10:14 AM)Branduil Wrote: While that's true, I don't think the Mavs really have many strengths except "Have Luka."
The Mavs haven't really tried to build around Luka yet. They tried to make Luka+KP the core, but it hasn't worked at all so far- mostly because of KP. The Mavs have to actually become some versions of themselves as "Luka's team" before they can even start to think about their best version.
I completely disagreee. I think KP was horribly misused this last year, and he's a better player than just about everyone here gives him credit for. They moved from any kind of meaningful post up for him because of Haralabob and the metrics and gutted a big portion of his game. If they ran half of the action that they ran to get Dirk free and clear on the post, he'd have had a much better year.
My take is they were moving him away from any postup, he pushed back, so Rick said "Here's the one play you can use to get in the post. Slip screen and go or nothing." And that's what they ran, whether we had anyone who could make a timely entry pass or not...it was madness, and honestly, I wouldn't be surprised was designed to get KP to stop wanting to postup. Put a guy in a bad place, make sure he's unsuccessful and then say "see you can't do it." But any person with a basketball brain that watches what they tried to do this last year can see it.
"There are no friends on the court." - Luka Doncic