GT: Mavs @ Hornets Mon Nov 17th 7PM EST

[fatlever]

figured this game would be a loss, but obviously didnt expect us to lose by 30 at home.

first of all, credit to the mavs organization for building, what looks to be, a team capable of a deep deep playoff run. last year i probably would have said they should break up that team and start over. amazing what great shooting, a defensive anchor, great coaching and good role players can do when it all gels. i never would have guessed that monta ellis would be part of such an amazingly unselfish and efficient offense. well done mavs.

we are a giant mess defensively. its really hard to believe just how far we have fallen off defensively since last year. this team looks more like the dunlap bobcats than the team we saw last year.

this team really misses MKG, both defensively and effort.

biz turned back into a pumpkin tonight. he just got roasted by brandan wright, who looked terrific.

hendo scored well. he still is frustrating to watch due to his habit of passing up open shots so he can take a few dribbles to get his jumper off. but, certainly he has to play ahead of PJ for a while.

how do other teams defend that pick and roll with chandler bombing to the rim for lobs? we looked like a team that had never seen such witchcraft before.

kudos to vonleh. glad we hit the vonleh threshold again, down 30, in the 4th quarter with 6 mins to play. lets see if the vonleh threshold moves a little after this game.

after thinking the entire game that our defense was the worst part of our team, we muster only 80 pts at home vs a team that was playing at a fast pace. both sides of the ball are equally concerning.

4-7 now, next 8 games hopefully we can get 2 wins to put us at 6-13. then we can start the slow process of climbing back towards .500. that being said, w/out some massive improvements in all facets of the game we have no shot at getting to .500. we've already played 3 of the worst teams in the league in NY, LA and the bucks and we are a kemba buzzer beater away from being 0-3 vs that bunch.

[JDR720]

Clifford should make a "3 second" rule.

If you hold the ball for more than 3 seconds and dont do anything useful with it you get benched (pass, shoot etc) including Al on his 15 second post isolation ball holding episodes.

[Liver_Pooty]

I'm not a Kemba hater, but he needs to go to the James Harden school of contact initiation and then drive the ball 30-times per game. He is too quick off the dribble to generate such little offense for himself.

Ive been saying this for two years, but he wont. Oh well.

[fatlever]

so... maybe rod higgins was actually the brains of the whole operation.

[catch20two]

how do other teams defend that pick and roll with chandler bombing to the rim for lobs? we looked like a team that had never seen such witchcraft.

The only way to defend it is to go under the screen and or have a help side man from the wing that can disrupt the roll man. When the big is capable to set a good screen and roll properly it's almost indefensible.

[yosemiteben]

we are a giant mess defensively. its really hard to believe just how far we have fallen off defensively since last year. this team looks more like the dunlap bobcats than the team we saw last year.

hendo scored well. he still is frustrating to watch due to his habit of passing up open shots so he can take a few dribbles to get his jumper off. but, certainly he has to play ahead of PJ for a while.

how do other teams defend that pick and roll with chandler bombing to the rim for lobs? we looked like a team that had never seen such witchcraft before.

we've already played 3 of the worst teams in the league in NY, LA and the bucks and we are a kemba buzzer beater away from being 0-3 vs that bunch.

Solid post, just a few responses to some of your points.

Completely agree about the defense. I really thought we'd see improvement bringing Lance aboard. Really surprised to see us struggle so much.

Had the exact same thought about Hendo. How does a player make a fade away jumper with a hand in his face his favorite shot and constantly turn down uncontested jumpers?

Also had the exact same thought about that PNR lob. When they set the double screen up top with Chandler and Nowitzki and then you roll Chandler, I really don't know how you stop that unless you have a huge SF that abandons his man.

Bucks are actually 5 - 5 with wins over Memphis and Miami, so they have been surprisingly solid. Would love to have had their schedule though.

[Flip Murray]

Went to the game tonight. First of the year. Don't have much to say about us but I will say that watching dirk play in person, I don't really know how to put it, the way he moves without the ball it's like basketball poetry. Paid good money for my seats and a blowout game but watching him play was worth it. He didnt even have that great of a game but it didnt matter. What an amazing player. I'm glad I got to see him live once before he retires

[Braggins]

I'm not a Kemba hater, but he needs to go to the James Harden school of contact initiation and then drive the ball 30-times per game. He is too quick off the dribble to generate such little offense for himself.

Ive been saying this for two years, but he wont. Oh well.

He actually did the year Dunlap was our coach and played that way in high school and college. He hasn't been going to the basket nearly as aggressively as he traditionally has since the beginning of last season. I have some theories as to why this is the case but people will say I'm making excuses.

[Braggins]

It is absurd how much more sophisticated the Mavs offense is compared to ours. This absolutely has to be a coaching/system issue. The Mavs set on ball hedge screens all over the place and constantly have players coming off single or double off ball screens. They even set screens on transition plays and run an amazing secondary break. They do things like set multiple staggered hedge screens in transition and the half court and all sorts of different ball screens. We do almost none of this. We can't play defense even though we are supposed to be a defensive team with a defensive minded coach and we can't take advantage of our offensive weapons because our offensive system is 20 years behind what current good teams are doing.

[Radu_Hornets]

I am a more skilled basketball player than Bismack

Yeah ... I mean, of course we basically all are better "skilled" than him.

But That's not what I ask him to do. I want him to defend the fuc**** paint and get rebounds. It was a bad game for him tonight.

I want him to watch 1000000h of DeAndre Jordan Video, even on a screen while doing cross fit if he wants to. Working with Al Jefferson is not going to do no sh*t, because he will never have the offensive skillset Al has. The only thing Big Al can teach him is bad defense. And we could actually saw it tonight...

[Texas Chuck]

You guys made me depressed just reading through this thread....

I haven't watched you guys all year, but I wouldn't put too much into this game. You guys are fresh off a West Coast road trip and I've always believed the first home game back is basically a road game anyway. Plus Dallas just does this to teams. We've now had a 30 point lead in 4 games this year. The Warriors have done it 2x, 9 other teams have done it once and that's it. Our offense, when its humming, is just a thing of beauty. We have shooters all over the court, we have multiple guards(and Parsons) who can get into the lane, we have 2 bigs who finish everything, and I haven't even gotten to Dirk yet who is putting up big numbers in small minutes.

I was disappointed in how little effort the Hornets as a whole exerted once Dallas got the lead up close to 20. There was still plenty of time, Dallas defensively can be had, and Clifford should know that we have been by far the worst 3Q team in the Association(tho it is trending better lately). It's hard for me to know what to make of you when your best player by a mile was Hendo.

Was amused to learn that Marvin Williams still hasn't shot a FT this season. I mean, really? I thought you guys got a tremendous bargain with Lance and I still think he will be good there, but Marvin Williams has to be one of the worst signings of the off-season. Some of you had been warning me that Big Al wasn't having the same kind of year, but yikes I don't know that I've ever seen him look that bad. Looked gassed almost from the jump. Chandler/Wright just dominated your bigs last night.

[Flip Murray]

It is absurd how much more sophisticated the Mavs offense is compared to ours. This absolutely has to be a coaching/system issue. The Mavs set on ball hedge screens all over the place and constantly have players coming off single or double off ball screens. They even set screens on transition plays and run an amazing secondary break. They do things like set multiple staggered hedge screens in transition and the half court and all sorts of different ball screens. We do almost none of this. We can't play defense even though we are supposed to be a defensive team with a defensive minded coach and we can't take advantage of our offensive weapons because our offensive system is 20 years behind what current good teams are doing.

Good call although there were times tonight where I think we genuinely had the worst 5 man offensive lineup in the entire NBA. ****, at one point I think Biz, Zeller, Henderson, Roberts and Pargo were on the court together and I think there were some ridiculous ones with Maxiell too. We really missed Neal tonight too. Damn, though I wish we had the capability to run just one play like the Mavericks. I think Chandler makes them completely unstoppable (it helps that we can't guard PnR). They were running stagger screens where Dirk would be on one side and he would flare out for a little baseline midrange jumper. Completely unguardable. If dirk's man got sucked into the paint at all, easy jumper for Dirk, if they didn't come into the lane then easy alley-oop for Chandler. If we somehow magically defended it they would swing it around to Parsons for the corner 3. That play worked every time they ran it.

[mrknowitall215]

I stopped dedicating my leisure time to watching this team tentatively almost 5 games ago. Watching the same thing over & over again expecting different results when Clifford is still running the same gameplan is in theory the definition of insanity. I told all of my friends that laugh at me for being a Bobcats/Hornets fan that it was going to be a slow start to this season because of the coaches stubbornness. I already knew that Marvin Williams starting at power forward wouldn't yield successful results, that Brian Roberts wasn't the upgrade at backup point guard that we needed, that Lance Stephenson would be a detriment if we didn't keep him on a leash, and that 'Alfense' would be on every opposing team's scouting report & it was only wishful thinking that Clifford would expand the offense into something more elaborate

[Radu_Hornets]

I stopped dedicating my leisure time to watching this team tentatively almost 5 games ago. Watching the same thing over & over again expecting different results when Clifford is still running the same gameplan is in theory the definition of insanity. I told all of my friends that laugh at me for being a Bobcats/Hornets fan that it was going to be a slow start to this season because of the coaches stubbornness. I already knew that Marvin Williams starting at power forward wouldn't yield successful results, that Brian Roberts wasn't the upgrade at backup point guard that we needed, that Lance Stephenson would be a detriment if we didn't keep him on a leash, and that 'Alfense' would be on every opposing team's scouting report & it was only wishful thinking that Clifford would expand the offense into something more elaborate

It's just like you knew it all...

[yosemiteben]

I stopped dedicating my leisure time to watching this team tentatively almost 5 games ago. Watching the same thing over & over again expecting different results when Clifford is still running the same gameplan is in theory the definition of insanity. I told all of my friends that laugh at me for being a Bobcats/Hornets fan that it was going to be a slow start to this season because of the coaches stubbornness. I already knew that Marvin Williams starting at power forward wouldn't yield successful results, that Brian Roberts wasn't the upgrade at backup point guard that we needed, that Lance Stephenson would be a detriment if we didn't keep him on a leash, and that 'Alfense' would be on every opposing team's scouting report & it was only wishful thinking that Clifford would expand the offense into something more elaborate

Congratulations?

[HornetJail]

You guys made me depressed just reading through this thread....

I haven't watched you guys all year, but I wouldn't put too much into this game. You guys are fresh off a West Coast road trip and I've always believed the first home game back is basically a road game anyway. Plus Dallas just does this to teams. We've now had a 30 point lead in 4 games this year. The Warriors have done it 2x, 9 other teams have done it once and that's it. Our offense, when its humming, is just a thing of beauty. We have shooters all over the court, we have multiple guards(and Parsons) who can get into the lane, we have 2 bigs who finish everything, and I haven't even gotten to Dirk yet who is putting up big numbers in small minutes.

I was disappointed in how little effort the Hornets as a whole exerted once Dallas got the lead up close to 20. There was still plenty of time, Dallas defensively can be had, and Clifford should know that we have been by far the worst 3Q team in the Association(tho it is trending better lately). It's hard for me to know what to make of you when your best player by a mile was Hendo.

Was amused to learn that Marvin Williams still hasn't shot a FT this season. I mean, really? I thought you guys got a tremendous bargain with Lance and I still think he will be good there, but Marvin Williams has to be one of the worst signings of the off-season. Some of you had been warning me that Big Al wasn't having the same kind of year, but yikes I don't know that I've ever seen him look that bad. Looked gassed almost from the jump. Chandler/Wright just dominated your bigs last night.

I think Al needs a breather- he's looked worse on this road trip than he did when he was shaking off that ankle injury last year. He looked like Sean May out there last night. I wonder if he ever touches a basketball during summers because he is garbage in November every season, but this worst I've ever seen him and he's supposed to be fully healthy right now. Al won't play like this all season, but he simply hasn't even tried to play defense so far. It's hard for me to say this, but there are nights where I seriously think he's been a complete detriment on both ends because he's a step slow, forcing shots on offense and snoozing on defense. He has less spacing than last year, which is a major issue, but there is no excuse at all for him being this apathetic.

Lance and Kemba have to figure it out. I know they're capable, but neither has looked good so far. MKG being injured has a huge impact on our defense (we saw it last season- our hot January-April stretch coincided with the only stretch of the season where MKG+Al were healthy). Also being down Neal (who's shut me up so far) and now Hairston is really making it tough, considering Henderson hasn't played much either and Marvin and Roberts are garbage.

I seriously can't believe we shelled out $9.7M on Marvin and Roberts. I had maybe the lowest expectations out of anyone on this board for them, and they've still sorely disappointed me. Pathetic. Our raw 18-year-old Noah Vonleh has shown more heart and raw ability than Marvin and would probably produce better than Marvin, and Jannero Pargo is so much better than Roberts it isn't even funny.

More than anything, this team misses McRoberts. He was a fantastic glue guy on both ends of the floor and made everything click. Marvin has been terrible, but he isn't bringing any of the intangibles either. Lance is trying too much to be the facilitator, and while he has a ton of ability there, we need him to assert himself because his teammates aren't dragging their own weight. Clifford hasn't made enough adjustments so there is some blame for him, but there's only so much you can do when nobody is giving 100%.

I think we need a stretch of games against teams we can beat to try and regain some momentum, especially after that horrible road trip. We play the Pacers (4-7) and the Magic (5-7, damn the Magic have a better record than us???) next but if we can't figure something out then, we're probably losing at least 6 games in a row because we play @Miami, and then host the Clippers, Blazers, Warriors, play the Hawks in Atlanta, and host the Bulls. What a brutal start to the season.

Once we're 6-13 (or worse- we might lose to the Pacers and Magic too at this rate), we have to play New York, Boston, Memphis, Brooklyn, Cleveland, and Phoenix before we have a sizeable stretch of games against below .500 teams. The good news is that we may have a super easy two months following this horrible start. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see this team be at about 7-18 in about a month, which is bad, but not the end of the world, considering we'd be lucky to reach .500 against these teams even when we're clicking.

But, your Mavericks have been incredible. The only reason I finished watching this game last night is because the offense brought back flashes of the 2001-2011 teams I loved so much. Dirk is still kicking, can't believe the Mavs stole Chandler for zero value again, Ellis is actually playing team basketball again, Parsons was a solid pickup, and even your bench guys like Aminu and Wright look very good. Nelson and Felton could be pretty good once they've got their legs under them. You're a lot closer to a repeat of the 2011 team than I ever imagined with the West as wide open as it is. Bring back Jason Terry and Shawn Marion and you might work that magic a second time.

[fatlever]

we may have seen the peak of one of the best offenses the league has ever seen.

Zach Lowe ‏@ZachLowe_NBA 49m49 minutes ago

Gap b/w Dallas' No. 1-ranked offense and CLE at No. 2 = gap b/w No. 2 and No. 15. So, yeah. Mavs straight murdering defenses.

Rick Bonnell ‏@rick_bonnell 37m37 minutes ago

@ZachLowe_NBA Last night they were the best NBA offense I've ever seen. Ball-movement, quality of shot, execution.

[BlackOutBuzz]

Definitely think there's something to the fact that Hendo was basically the only one who came to play. Almost like the other guys were exhausted after a strenuous west coast trip against a few top teams in the west.

Or something like that.

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM Forums mobile app

[fatlever]

last night was the 6th game (out of 11) that clifford has said the team did not play hard. he mentioned the first 4 games of the season, golden state and the mavs.

its s trend. mkg didnt play in 4 of the 6 (including the NY game when he missed the last 3 quarters and was clearly the only player who showed up that night in the 1st quarter)

[MPM]

He looked like Sean May out there last night.

How dare you disparage McMay like that.

Seriously, Al was beyond non-existent last night. He looked horrid. Would have much rather had a healthy Sean May out there.