Tag: Dirk Nowitzki

Buck Harvey: Heat edge: Tonight just the usual hatred

DALLAS — This time, they laughed. This time, Dwyane Wade posed in front of the Mavericks’ bench before LeBron James threw a couple of playful jabs.

And when they came apart shortly after? America loved it.

But there was a time when they cried, and America loved that, too. Those days were not unlike the final seven minutes of Game 2: Chris Bosh was as confused as Erik Spoelstra was clueless then, and James dribbled until he missed.

The Heat overcame all of that during the long season, however, and that’s what should worry the Mavericks tonight.

After this circus of a season, isn’t some embarrassment and failure just the usual for Miami?

James and his teammates have learned to live with standards that apply only to them. Kevin Durant heard far less, for example, in the Western Conference finals. Then, he strapped on an imaginary championship belt after swishing the kind of 3-pointer that Wade made Thursday.

The Mavericks rallied in that game, too. But Jason? Terry didn’t say anything about Durant then, nor did the media, when a few comments could have been said.

One possibility: Durant must have really been strapping on an imaginary diaper.

Then there’s the point that James made about Terry on Saturday. “If (Terry) runs down the court doing the whole wings expanded,” James said, “do we count that as a celebration as well?”

A few people in San Antonio have seen the Jet act and are nodding right now. Terry is far from the model of professional comportment.

“I just think,” James continued, “everything gets blown out of proportion when the Miami Heat does things.”

James brought it on himself. Still, somewhere in the middle of the taunts and the blame, with everyone but South Florida rooting against the Heat, the abnormal became the normal.

Maybe the bottom came in March, when James and Wade missed last-second shots and Miami lost its fifth game in six tries. That’s when Spoelstra, trying to emphasize how much his guys cared, said, “There are a couple of guys crying there in the locker room.”

What followed was all-star schadenfreude, and it went far beyond fans and media.

“Wait ’til I call him, man,” Carmelo Anthony said of Bosh then. “I’ll be like, ‘What are you doing?’”

What were they doing? They were enduring harsh criticism and angry arenas as they tried to contend in their first year together. At times it had to be frustrating, if not maddening, and yet here they are in the Finals.

Here they are, too, as a dominant team that threw away Game 2. Miami has played better for longer in the first two games, and it fits with what the Heat did against the 76ers, Celtics and Bulls before.

So what happens now? Bosh is back to his teary days, shooting 26 percent in the Finals. Spoelstra was out-coached Thursday. James ran no offense in the final minutes before missing threes, which is what he was doing in January. And, having given away such a game, there’s reason to wonder how they will respond on the road under Finals pressure.

Still, Miami has a few things to lean on. One is talent.

Another was there Thursday until the end, which is the Heat defense. Dallas plays defense, too, but not like this. Dirk Nowitzki calls it “almost suffocating.”

Then there’s what Wade said Saturday. “It’s going to be a hostile environment,” he said. “Nothing the Miami Heat are not used to.”

Everything has been hostile for seven months, and maybe that’s their edge now. They’ve been able to set aside their failures, and whatever anyone says about them, and the aftermath of Game 2 fits into that.

They celebrate too much?

They’ve heard much, much worse.

bharvey@express-news.net

Buck Harvey: Blowing up baby: Decision in Dallas

DALLAS — The point guard had aged. The superstar was another year closer to the end, too. And when the No. 2 seed lost badly, the reaction was swift.

“All I see,” wrote a newspaper columnist, “is further proof they need to blow this baby up.”

That was a year ago.

In Dallas.

After the Mavericks had lost to the Spurs.

What has happened since doesn’t deter similar reactions in San Antonio and now in Los Angeles. The Spurs and Lakers are home when they should be preparing for a conference showdown, and, given the age of their players, there’s only one conclusion.

“Dr. (Jerry) Buss has a lot of work to do,” Magic Johnson said last week. “He’s probably going to have to blow this team up.”

That’s the operative phrase this time of year, and for good reason. The mental imagery of lighting a fuse and powering Ron Artest to a far-away place appeals to the mob.

But it’s a visceral reaction more than a logical one, and it’s not an altogether accurate description, either. Most of what would be left of a detonated franchise would be blown mostly down.

Then there is the reality of a modern-day NBA payroll. Just as most of the Spurs are under contracts that make trades difficult, so are the Lakers. Eight of their players who are due to return are over the age of 30.

Like the Spurs, the Lakers also don’t have cap room. Their Richard Jefferson is Artest. Does anyone want Ron-Ron with three years and $21.8 million remaining?

Finding a way to trade for a Dwight Howard, of course, is something else entirely. Otherwise, do you give up on someone — such as Tony Parker or Pau Gasol — just to make a change?

Gasol was awful against Dallas. But he also took the Lakers to three Finals, two of which they won. In Game 7 last season, he merely ended with 19 points and 18 rebounds.

But logic doesn’t apply in the moments immediately after failure. The Spurs and Lakers were the two best in the Western Conference in the regular season, yet all it took was a few weeks to determine they are so old, there is nothing worth saving.

A year ago, the Mavericks faced the same. Unlike the Spurs and Lakers, they had never won a title. And when they fell again as a favorite, as a No. 2 seed, they made for blow-up material. The consensus at the time was that only Dirk Nowitzki and the promising young guard, Roddy Beaubois, were salvageable.

“(Nowitzki) had very little help,” the columnist continued then, “and has to be looking at a returning JKidd, Jet and Shawn Marion and wondering: How is this supposed to be better?”

The Mavericks reacted, instead, as both the Spurs and Lakers will try to now. The Mavericks evaluated what they had, and what was possible to change — just as every team does every year.

This time, though, they found the kind of shotblocker the Spurs could have used, Tyson Chandler, and an additional 3-point shooter in Peja Stojakovic. Beaubois watched on the sidelines, too, as JKidd, Jet and Shawn Marion made a few plays.

The Spurs will find this harder to do than the Mavericks and Lakers because of finances. On Sunday, after all, the team with the league’s second-highest payroll swept the team with the highest.

But both the Spurs and the Lakers will take the same approach. They will understand they weren’t the top seeds by accident, and that the playoffs are often about matchups and timing. They will look to see where they can find help, yet with the idea that their core of talent is too valuable to simply discard.

Blow up that baby?

They wish the Mavericks had.

bharvey@express-news.net

Mavs set to answer rest or rust question

By DOUGLAS PILS
dpils@express-news.net

The Dallas Mavericks seek to solve a never-ending debate Tuesday in the Western Conference finals.

Tipping off against the Oklahoma City Thunder or Memphis Grizzlies, it will have been 10 days since the Mavericks swept the two-time defending champion Lakers.

The riddle: Is it better to rest, or did Dallas lose valuable momentum only a six-game playoff winning streak can provide?

Pundits belabor the question. Players and coaches deflect it. Only the games answer it.

Since the NBA made the conference semifinals a best-of-7 test of wills in 1968, 18 teams have reached the conference or NBA Finals with a sweep while their next opponent fought to close out a six- or seven-game series.

The sweepers are 10-8 in the following series, and eight won NBA titles. However, the sweepers have lost the past three.

Last year, the Magic blanked the Hawks only to fall to the Celtics, who took six games to beat the Cavaliers.

In 2009, the Cavs routed the Hawks before losing to the Magic, who battled seven games with Boston.

In 2005, the Heat swept the Wizards, then lost in seven to the Pistons, who had a six-game win over Cleveland.

The last conference semis sweeper to advance past a team that faced a challenge was the 2003 Nets, who beat the Pistons after they had survived the 76ers in six.

Then the Spurs beat the Nets in the NBA Finals.

The Spurs are the most recent of the 10 winners to claim the title. In 1999, they swept the Lakers, then the Blazers, who had a six-game series with the Jazz, before hoisting their first Larry O’Brien Trophy.

As for the riddle, Dallas has nine players with 10 or more years in the league, so the rest theory seems to fit.

But consider how Dallas knocked out Los Angeles. It made 20 of 32 3-pointers in Game 4. Does a team smoking the nets at that rate really want rest? The chances of Dallas coming back anywhere near that hot seem remote.

Two characteristics of the eight teams who lost the next round and the two winners who failed to win the title are lack of championship experience and/or running into a team of destiny.

Aside from the four sweepers noted above who failed to win it all, the other six are the 1978 and 1985 76ers, the 1968 and 1989 Lakers, the 1996 SuperSonics and the 1998 Jazz.

Philadelphia in 1985 and L.A. in 1989 weren’t far removed from titles, but they fell to the Celtics, who were in the middle of four straight Finals, and Chuck Daly’s Pistons, respectively.

Point guard Jason Kidd, a 17-year pro and member of the 2003 Nets, is the closest thing Dallas has to championship experience, but it won’t face a team that has any in the Western finals.

That leaves the destiny part of the equation. We won’t know until later if the Thunder or Grizzlies fit the notion, but teams usually don’t leap from No. 4 or No. 8 seeds to titles.

Destiny could be Mavs star Dirk Nowitzki, 32, trying to erase his name off the list of great players without a title.

Hakeem Olajuwon was 31 when he got his first. Kevin Garnett was 31.

However, it’s more likely that the team of destiny — the one with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh — will be waiting in the Finals, making the riddle’s solution pointless.