"Hey Baron, need a hand(job)?"
So, just four games into his career as a Bullet, and Josh Howard has torn his ACL and is out for the rest of the season. I can only assume he's currently furiously scouring the phone book looking for a shady doctor to hook him up with medicinal marijuana. Can you blame him? It takes a little while to fully recover from an ACL injury like this. The Bullets almost certainly won't pick up his $11mil option next season, so he'll be an unrestricted free agent, and who will want to spend money on an uncertain knee like this? Wait a second... this is the Bullets team. They'll probably resign him without second thought and try to find a way to give him more money.

But hey, at least his knee isn't made of bendy straws and painter's tape, unlike Tracy McGrady.

Also, we finally have definitive evidence as to exactly why the Kings suck: a decided lack of man-love! (Science!)

Worst of the Night in Pictures:

Yes, I fully realize we already posted this picture. That's not going to stop me from posting it again!!

This fan hit a halfcourt shot for $10,000. Man, even the fans can score against the Pacers.

"67 points?! Damn! I hope that's a typo..."

This boring-ass picture of Kim Hughes should help you further appreciate just how entertaining Mike Dunleavy was

I'm just going to ask it -- where the hell is Keith Hernandez?

"Man, it's weird not having to hide under this towel in embarrassment!"
Nationally Televised Games:
Lakers at Grizzlies: Sigh. If only we could hop into that Hot Tub Time Machine and go back to a month or two ago. You know, before Memphis started to stink like a college dorm room mini-fridge at the end of the year.

All The Other Games:
Hornets at Crabs: Hopefully this game does something to settle the Darren Collison vs. Chris Paul debate. (If Collison keeps it up, could he be valuable trade bait in the summer? Hard to devalue him by keeping him as a backup if he keeps performing.)

Bricks at Celtics: Oh man. Nate Robinson in a revenge game against the Bricks? Knee-Mac is already hurt again? Woo! This is almost making me forget about how old and beat up the Celtics are!

Timberwolves at Heat: I feel about as confident about the Heat in this game as I did about the Bobcats last night.

Frail Blazers at Nyets: Ugh, the Nyets. Why don't they just replace the team logo with a picture of a facepalm?

Suns at Thunder: Alright, finally a legitimately good game!

Pistons at Kings: ...And this one brings us right back down to Earth with some super sloppy basketbawful.

76ers at Warriors: Oh, hell. Well, at least we'll have some funny Don Nelson pictures to post tomorrow if we're lucky.

Labels: Bawful After Dark, Josh Howard, Tracy McGrady

Several people sent in this, ahem, fascinating picture of Yao Ming and Dwight Howard. However, Stephanie G somehow managed to email it to me less than five seconds after it appeared on the Internet. (She must have her Google Alerts set up for "man love" or something.) But you've gotta love any picture where Yao looks like he's taking a dump on the court and Howard is watching like somebody just opened Marsellus Wallace's briefcase in front of him.

Oddly, of all the things going on in this picture, the most inexplicable (to me) is Jameer Nelson clutching at his own man region. I'll just assume he needed a quick equipment adjustment...

Labels: fan submissions, fun with foreign language, Josh Howard, man love, poop humor, Yao Ming

By now, I'm sure you've read or heard about Josh Howard's "The Star Spangled Banner's going on right now and I don't celebrate that shit. I'm black." controversy. I haven't mentioned it thus far because a) it's pretty obvious stupid, even for this site, b) it edges into commentary on race relations, which I generally tend to shy away from, and c) this is America, and one of the founding principles of American life is each person's right to be as big of an idiot as he or she chooses to be. And without that principle, this site might not even exist. You know?

And besides, let's face it: This incident will follow the typical outrage-to-obscurity cycle that these situations always seem to adhere to. To wit:

Phase 1: Intense anger. Commentaries. Editorials. Blog posts about what it all means. Angry e-mails. Etc.

Phase 2: Loud grumbling.

Phase 3: Quiet grumbling.

Phase 4: Random serenades from boo birds that decrease in intensity throughout the upcoming season.

Phase 5: General forgetfulness, epitomized by even astute NBA fans saying, "Remember when Josh said that thing about the National Anthem? What was that again?"

Phase 6: People like me bring the situation up in Worst Evers-style articles and blog posts, or it gets rehashed after some other athlete says something inflammatory about the Anthem, or America, or the President, or whatever.

Sure, there are people who will always and forever hold that single thoughtless statement against Josh, but most people will eventually get over it, especially if he plays well. (Conversely, if he doesn't play well, the remark will be used as Exhibit B in The Case of Where Josh Howard Went Wrong...with his pot smoking admission being Exhibit A.)

Now, the wise and rational thing for the Mavericks organization to do would be to have Josh apologize, issue a few statements, and wait patiently for Phase 5. But if we've learned anything about Mark Cuban, he is rarely wise or rational. In fact, he's a bit of an idiot. (Or maybe more than a bit.) So, naturally, he responded to the strong anti-Josh Howard sentiment to be expected in Phase 1 of the outrage-to-obscurity cycle by posting some of the most vitriolic e-mails he had received about the situation on his blog. Oh, and he included the peoples' e-mail addresses too.

This is, of course, akin to a pre-schooler trying to get out of trouble for eating paste by pointing at the kid across the classroom who's beating someone up for their lunch money. "You think what Josh said was stupid and hateful? Look at what these people are saying!" But he took it a step further by posting e-mail addresses, pushing the people who had contacted him privately into the public spotlight in order to punish them. Great idea, Mark. Hey, why not post Josh's e-mail address while you're at it. Then people will be able to respond to him directly, just like anybody who reads your blog can now respond to the people who contacted you.

Mind you, the posting of those e-mails was preceded by the following statement: "Josh realizes his comments were wrong, he understands why people are upset. He knows he has made a mistake, has apologized and will work with us . Beyond that, its a private issue." A private issue, huh? So why draw even more attention to it with this blog post? And does Mark really retain the right to declare something private when he's attempting to very publically humilate others?

Who knows. Maybe, just maybe, it's not a question of Josh Howard's personal stupidity. Maybe it's a question of the Mavericks' organizational stupidity.

Labels: Josh Howard, Mark Cuban, stupidity

Dirk could only watch -- literally -- as theBucks closed out the Mavs last Saturday.
Yesterday, I criticized how the Dallas Mavericks handled crunch time in their Saturday night loss to the Milwaukee Bucks. To recap: The Mavs couldn't create shots for Dirk Nowitzki -- the league's reigning MVP -- and their sixth man, Jason Terry, took five of the team's last six shots, mostly off one-on-one plays.

It's not that I think the Mavericks are a selfish team; they're coached to spread the floor and hit the open man, and that's exactly what they do. But it's also true that for the last couple seasons -- basically since Steve Nash left* -- they've ranked near the bottom of the league in assists per game (APG). To whit:

In 2005-06, only one team ranked below Dallas (60-22) in APG: New York (23-59).

Last season, only six teams ranked below Dallas (67-15) in APG: Atlanta (30-52), Boston (24-58), New Orleans (39-43), New York (33-49), Orlando (40-42), and Portland (32-50).

Things have improved somewhat this season**; there are 11 teams below Dallas (9-5): Atlanta (5-7), Charlotte (6-7), Chicago (2-10), Cleveland (8-6), Los Angeles (6-7), Miami (3-10), Minnesota (2-10), New York (4-9), Philadelphia (3-9), Sacramento (4-9), and Washington (6-7).

Notice the trend? I know this snapshot isn't as thorough an analysis as, say, PER or a +/- score. But if you go back and look at league standings on a season-by-season basis, you'll notice that the best teams are (typically) among the league leaders in APG, while the not-so-best teams are (usually) among the league losers.

When a team has a high APG number, that often means that its players get a significant number of open and/or high percentage shots. When a team ranks near the bottom of the league in APG, it tends to mean either one of two things (or perhaps even both): They aren't moving the ball and/or they aren't hitting their shots.

Unlike most of the other teams listed above, we know the Mavs hit shots. They hit lots of shots. They're currently 11th in the league in scoring (102.5) and 8th in field goal percentage (46.2); last season they were 9th in scoring (100.0) and 5th in field goal percentage (46.7). Here's the problem: They have a lot of players who score through freelancing, isolations, and one-on-one play. Dirk loves to catch the ball at the foul line, take a couple dribbles, then spin and shoot. Howard and Terry love to dribble penetrate and either take it to the hoop or pull up for jumpers. Devin Harris, by Avery Johnson's admission, has become a "one-man fastbreak" this season.

I've been saying this for the last couple years, but it's like I'm screaming into silence: The best teams tend to be the teams with the best ball movement. The Spurs, for instance, always seem to rank around the top 10 (they're currently ranked 7th). And while the Mavs are in no way selfish, they simply aren't a great ball movement team. Statistically, they aren't even a "good" ball movement team; they rank among the league's bottom dwellers despite the fact that they're one of the league's elite (and highest scoring) teams.

The Mavs are fortunate that they have players such as Nowitzki, Terry, Harris, Josh Howard, and Jerry Stackhouse, guys who can break defenders down and get their own shot virtually any time they want. But what this means is that, throughout the game, those players have to work harder (and therefore expend more energy) to score than the players on teams that move the ball around for a higher number of open shots. This makes the Mavericks uniquely susceptible to breakdowns in the 4th quarter of close games and (especially) the playoffs. That's because increased defensive pressure tends to kill the teams that rely too heavily on one-on-one play unless they have a dominant low post presence (like a Tim Duncan, or Shaq in his prime), a pure scorer who can put up points against anyone in any circumstance (like a Kobe Bryant), or a superstar who can penetrate and draw fouls in the clutch (like Dwyane Wade now, or Michael Jordan back in the day). The Mavs don't have any of those things, which, in a sense, makes them a (much) better version of the Chicago Bulls.

I read in the Dallas Morning News that Avery Johnson has actually admitted that the Mavs' ball movement (or lack thereof) has been a problem in the past and he's trying to fix it. I would guess that's why Dirk's shot volume has dropped (from 17.2 per game to 15.6) and his assist numbers have gone up (from 3.4 per game to 4.1). It's also why Jason Terry got sent to the bench in favor of Devon Harris. But the more things change, the more they stay the same. The Mavs actually had a solid assist total against the Bucks (26), but their fourth quarter rally featured a lot of mad dribbling and one-on-one play (particularly by Terry, who, for all his talent, isn't Kobe Bryant).

When I brought this up last season (on a Mavericks message board), I was accused of nitpicking. I was told, rather strongly, that the Mavericks are such a great team their one minor weakness could easily be overlooked. And maybe it can. But in my opinion, the ball movement thing continues to be the team's Achilles' heel***, and unless Avery Johnson can coach the problem away, or Dirk transforms into a clutch scorer/foul-drawer, you can probably expect more end-of-game failures and playoff collapses from the Mavs.

*The 2003-04 season was Nash's last with the Mavericks. That year, Dallas ranked 3rd in the league in APG (despite the prescence of ballhogs like Antoine Walker and Antawn Jamison). Phoenix, with Stephon Marbury running the point, ranked 25th. In 2004-05, Nash signed with the Suns and Phoenix promptly rose to third in the league in APG. The Mavs, on the other hand, fell to 26th. Coincidence? Me thinks not.

**I realize that it's only been a month, so this is a smaller statistical sample.

***I'm sure somebody's going to read this post and say, "Well the, why doesn't the team with the best APG win the most games and the championship every year? Well, just because a team has good ball movement and an efficient offense doesn't mean they themselves don't have their own Achilles' heel. For the Suns, for instance, it's been their lack of interior defense and low post scoring. Every team has strengths and weaknesses. The Mavs have plenty of strengths. And they also have, I think, one or two glaring weaknesses.

Labels: assists, ball movement, clutch, Dallas Mavericks, Devin Harris, Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Terry, Josh Howard, Milwaukee Bucks, Phoenix Suns, Steve Nash

Answer me this: Was anybody really surprised when Brad Miller punked Devin Harris the other night? Miller may have a pretty face, but he also has a history of setting teeth-rattling picks and committing bone-jarring fouls. But he's a Big White Center. That's what Big White Centers do. It's been standard procedure since the days when "Jungle" Jim Loscutoff was roaming the hardwood.

What actually was surprising was Josh Howard's reaction, namely sprinting 80 feet downcourt and delivering a flying elbow the the back of Miller's beautifully cornrowed coconut.


Howard claims he was just protecting his teammate from a dirty play. I guess his mother never taught him that two wrongs don't make a right, since blindsiding somebody with a sucker punch to the head is about as dirty as it gets. And you know what? He wasn't "protecting" anybody from anything. It's not like Miller had Harris in a choke hold or anything. There's a difference between protection and revenge.

The word out of Dallas is that this isn't the first time Miller has taken a shot at Harris. Harris claims that it's happened three other times, and that he was even knocked out of a game one of those times. Personally, I think Harris is a bit of a drama queen. Watch the video closely and you'll notice that he puts a little extra mustard on his fall. You'll also notice that things had calmed down right before Howard's sneak attack, but Harris still decided to take an extra shot at the dazed Miller after said sneak attack.

This is nothing new for Miller, though. Back on January 12, 2002, Shaq responded to a hard foul* by taking a clumsy swing at Brad Miller's head. The only reason Brad's still among the living is that Shaq missed, although I understand the gust of wind generated by Shaq's arm was equal to a Category 3 hurricane and actually killed three people in the crowd. Like Howard, Shaq took his cheap shot while Miller's back was turned. What's up with that?

*The foul was actually committed by Charles Oakley, who also hit Miller in the face on the same play. That's the reason Miller was stumbling away from Shaq, which helped him to avoid Shaq's clubbing blow. I'm not sure whether Shaq new who had actually fouled him, but I'm guessing that, if he had known, he wouldn't have taken a swipe at Oak.

The video is great. Shaq tries to hit Miller, Miller retreats in abject fear, Shaq lumbers around like a rampaging bear, Ron Artest and Charles Oakley jump on Shaq's back, and Miller somehow ends up shirtless. Best of all, Chicago's hometown announcers Johnny "Red" Kerr and Wayne Larrivee call the action. The funniest line belonged to Larrivee: "Shaq is violent!"


One last note: Brad Miller has been in two relatively serious confrontations during his career. Ron Artest was his teammate both times. Coincidence? Maybe Artest just brings The Crazy with him?

Labels: Brad Miller, Chicago Bulls, Dallas Mavericks, Devin Harris, fights, Josh Howard, Sacramento Kings, Shaq