By the way, Bynum goes 7ft, 290#. Barrea goes 5'10, 170#.

10 games without pay, $250,000 fine, and 6 months of loser management counseling.

yeah, the Mavs didn't react because they were scared

The Mavs are a traditionally soft team. You guys act surprised by this? It doesn't take away from the fact that they're a great team and franchise. They're just soft. Nothing new there.

Why are they soft?

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It's called not having a single enforcer on the team. Not saying they should've taken out Bynum's leg, but it would have been nice to see at least someone aside from an aging Jason Kidd be visibly angry about what happened. It's also pretty telling that the person that talked the most **** during the game was J.J. Barea. But that's the make-up of this Mavs team, I guess.

With that said, it was a completely dirty play and given the stage of the game with the outcome decided, it should warrant a good suspension. He's been playing dirty/immature since his rookie year. See bump against Shaq during the first LA/Miami Christmas game. See "Pass me the ****ing ball!" his first year. They're all on YouTube somewhere. Dude is a first class *****.

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Chandler isn't exactly a softy. The Mavs knew they have a lot more to lose. You retaliate and you risk losing a start for the Conference series.

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The Mavs are a traditionally soft team. You guys act surprised by this? It doesn't take away from the fact that they're a great team and franchise. They're just soft. Nothing new there.

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Multiple people have given you examples of Mavericks ready to go to battle over Bynum's cheap shot. Are you completely ignoring that on purpose because you're wrong?

The ultimate goal is bigger than exacting revenge on some loser who just proved to the world what a piece of trash he is.

It was a big guy cheap shotting a little guy.
It was a black guy cheap shotting a white guy.
Bynum is scum.

The Mavs talked in the huddle to watch out for a cheap shot and not to overreact because the Mavs still have games left to play.

The best thing about the situation IMO, was that 2 plays later, JJ drove the lane without fear showing that he wasn't intimidated by it.

they played smart by not overreacting...they are going off to he conference finals and they need all the players....

they cant risk suspensions at this point...

im sure they can all throw down though

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It was a black guy cheap shotting a white guy

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What? He's a Puerto Rican.

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I'm not excusing the play. Like I said, it was a cheap shot and he deserved to be kicked out and probably suspended for a game. I think people calling for 10 game suspensions are being ridiculous.

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He caused a collapsed lung when he did the exact same thing to somebody previously. Your hockey comparison is a little weak considering most hockey players aren't 3' off the ground at various points throughout the game and they are wearing padding and helmets.

So....keeping your cool, not rushing the court, not acting out of emotion, using your head (etc etc etc) is soft?

Then I'll take it. The Mavs showed maturity.

Oh I get it.

HNIC is just a troll. Nobody is that blind...right?

Nobody is saying run out onto the court and start swinging. Nobody is that dumb. All I'm saying is that there is a way to keep your cool and make it a point to say you're not going to be taking any **** from anyone. If I or a teammate were the victim of a cheapshot that could potentially hurt and disable someone (a la Bynum's), I sure as hell wouldn't "play it cool" by walking away like nothing happened. At some point, you have to acknowledge that plays like that are beyond basketball plays and are acts that are really dangerous. Seeing only Jason Kidd get in Bynum's face is nothing short of embarrassing, at least on at toughness front.

There's a difference between walking away from someone jawing at you and seeing one of your teammates drop to the floor like vintage T.J. Ford and walking away from that.

There was also another play during that game, can't remember which, where the Lakers interior hard-fouled a Mav on the lay-up. The first people to step up were actually Matt Barnes and Lamar Odom! And they were the offenders! It's that kind of mentality that the Mavs lack. The Lakers played rough and said 'Yeah, what are you going to do about it.'

Of course they lost, but that attitude carries over in certain situations. You saw how that collective toughness can power and team through. All you had to do was watch the last Miami/Boston game. Wade's chippy play set the tone. Garnett coming to Rondo's aid. Et cetera. There is a reason why Kendrick Perkins is so revered even though he's a below-average player. Same thing for Tony Allen.

Again, not saying that Dirk should go nuts and start kicking some balls. Derrick Fisher set a pretty cheap blind pick on Luis Scola a few years back and that Rockets team sure as hell didn't lie down like the Mavs did yesterday.

I just think that hitting a record number of three's isn't going to happen every game and the Mavs lack of toughness (comical if you're counting on Tyson Chandler to be an enforcer...he's been soft his whole career) is going to be a detriment in the next series.

Unless of course they actually take something from the last game.

Again, you guys act like calling the Mavs soft is something new or even offensive. They're not built that way, that's all. They get by with Dirk's superior play and good coaching and bench help.

The Mavs being soft is like saying the Lakers are underachieving or the Timberwolves suck. It's just reality. No need to get bent out of shape over it.

Wow Ninja. Your oversight to what actually happened on the court is stunning. Do you really think it makes a team soft to not overreact when they're up by almost 40 points in a closeout game?

As pretty much everyone else has said, it showed maturity to know what was at stake and not do something stupid.

Do you really think Z-Bo or Durant was watching yesterday thinking "awesome...we can push them around when we play them because they kept their cool and didn't get thrown out at a meaningless point in the game"? Fat chance. They probably were thinking "wow...I hope we don't get down 35 points to them and have to stoop that low".

So jawing around is being tough? Got it!

I'll take the team that physically pushed the other around during the game and kept their cool when the clock was off than some dewshbag that cheap shots a smaller guy 100lbs less than him then takes his shirt off like a high schooler after a fight.

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Again, not saying that Dirk should go nuts and start kicking some balls. Derrick Fisher set a pretty cheap blind pick on Luis Scola a few years back and that Rockets team sure as hell didn't lie down like the Mavs did yesterday.

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How did the Mavs lie down? Carlisle told them the trashy players would start trying ****, and to keep the big picture in mind. TC was ready to do work, which leads to this...

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(comical if you're counting on Tyson Chandler to be an enforcer...he's been soft his whole career)

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He wasn't soft this entire series. He gives up a considerable amount of strength to Bynum, but played him tough all series. He was extremely physical with Bynum all the way around.


I'm not offended by what you're saying, mainly because it's not true. I'm not saying the Mavs weren't soft. Historically they're a soft team. If you've even been watching basketball for the past several months, you'd know that this particular Mavericks team is well aware of that label and has been using it to their advantage. Even TC said he thought the Mavs were soft when he played for NO/Charlotte, and he's the main reason we're moving away from that identity. Intelligently not reacting to some retarded cheap shot isn't being soft, it's actual a veteran move. Bynum wins if we stick him in his ugly face and someone important gets a 2 game suspension.

JET punching people in the nuts or Stackhouse clubbing Shaq over the head didn't make that Mavericks teams not-soft. Just like playing it cool when some idiot showed his true colors doesn't mean this Mavericks team is soft. We just swept the 2 time champions.

HNIC, I hear what you are saying but the problem with getting in a guy's face is that he might throw a punch and start a melee. The Lakers were extremely frustrated and there is no doubt that when you players like Bynum, Artest, and Barnes on the floor that they would be happy to start something since they are not worried about a suspension. Once the melee starts, a Mav player would get involved or step on the court etc and suspensions would be handed out. What do you think Bynum would have done had Haywood or Marion got in Bynum's face, started talkin sh, and bumped him? I'm guessing Bynum would have been more than happy to start punching.

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HNIC is just a troll. Nobody is that blind...right?

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First off, Dirk did jaw at Bynum after the foul. He didn't get in his face but he gave him an ear full on the way by. Somebody stepped between them but I can't remember who it was. I would say the Mavs are smart veterans, not soft.

Second, being soft is debatable. The Mavs folded in the finals, but when you hear players like Kobe and Tracy McGrady saying that nobody could have won that series the way Wade was getting the star treatment starting with game 3, I will give them a pass. There was no way the Mavs were going to win that series when Wade started getting the calls he did. The golden state series was a culmination of a bad matchup and going up against an ex coach that knew the Mavericks strengths and weaknesses inside and out. A soft team doesn't beat the Spurs on the road in game 7. A soft team doesn't come back and beat the Rockets after going down 0-2 in their series around the same time. Matchups play a huge roll in 7 game series and the Lakers haven't faced the Mavs in a series since the late 80's. They are a bad matchup for the Lakers.

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/28784/the-meaninglessness-of-playoff-toughness

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*SNIP*

How could we be so wrong?
In assuming, as so many of us did, that the Lakers had a playoff advantage in poise, we clearly made a whopper of a mistake.

What was that mistake, though, exactly?

Maybe we just didn't have enough information. You think the weather is tough to predict? That's a cakewalk compared to human behavior. Psychological profiling is a dodgy art even for the guy administering the Myers-Briggs tests, with the finest of instruments and insights. From afar, through the TV and post-game interviews, maybe we just don't have the insight we need to creat mental toughness power rankings that are worth a damn.

Or, here's another radical theory. Maybe there is no such type of person. Maybe the playoffs were never anything but basketball. Maybe it's not that we're doing a bad job identifying the players with the special gifts of mental toughness, but that there are not such players.

Maybe who wins is really not about exciting war stuff like who has the resolve, but about boring basketball stuff like who closes out shooters, who gets the good rebounding position, who spaces the floor, moves the ball, runs the best pick-and-roll, and all that basketball stuff.

Maybe Dirk Nowitzki and the Lakers conspired, in other words, to not just invert the mental toughness scale, but to destroy it.

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Do you really think Z-Bo or Durant was watching yesterday thinking "awesome...we can push them around when we play them because they kept their cool and didn't get thrown out at a meaningless point in the game"? Fat chance. They probably were thinking "wow...I hope we don't get down 35 points to them and have to stoop that low".

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Perfect example. I don't think anyone here will argue that Zach Randolph is playing with more confidence than any other player in these entire playoffs, right? Why is that?

1. Because he is now part of a scrappy, unified team who are reflect his DGAF personality.

2. He's always had the talent that warranted a spotlight. And what has been the biggest talk coming into the playoffs this year? Kendrick Perkins and his toughness and value to a team. Z-Bo took the challenge and said '**** this. Perk isn't that tough. We're going to show him and the rest of the league that we're not afraid of him.' And bam! What's happening right now? That toughness lead to confidence and that confidence lead to W's.

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"Perk’s good, but all Perk can do is foul me. That’s the only thing he can do. The best thing about his defense on me is to foul me...He can’t (stop Randolph). He’s too slow. He’s a big body. He can foul. I don’t think nobody in the league can stop me. Not only Perk. I tell Perk to his face. I already told him before."

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So are you really telling me that Randolph isn't watching yesterday's game and salivating. I'm telling you right now that if the Mavs pull Memphis, we're going to see that kind of bully ball that hasn't been seen since early 2000's Shaquille O'Neal.

I am watching Outside The Lines, and just saw another replay. Dirk actually got up in Bynum's face and had a lot to say.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBfvmJIxwPQ&feature=player_embedded

I also think you need to re watch the play. Nowitzki runs at Bynum from half court to get in his face as Kidd is running in from the wing. And then as Bynum is walking off the court, Brian Cardinal is physically holding Tyson Chandler back, and the whole bench is chirping without jumping on the court and getting suspended.

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Nowitzki runs at Bynum from half court to get in his face

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Dirk ran? Watch it again. He took like 4 steps. He barely powerwalked. He certainly didn't run. And he didn't really get in Bynum's face. He lightly pushed on Bynum's elbow as Bynum was walking away from him.

Regardless, HNIC would have you believe he and the rest of the mavs were hiding behind Carlisle's skirt. Not the case.

I think the first Mav/Lakers game next year during the regular season might be pretty interesting if Bynum is still with the Lakers. I could see some pretty hard fouls on Bynum at that time. That being said, I wouldn't be surprised if the Lakers trade Bynum and a box of bubble gum to Orlando for Howard.

If the Mavs would have retaliated, this board would say that they were dumb and have to be smarter than that. I wouldn't worry about it.

Dirk and Kidd both yelling at Bynum:


I saw the play live and I've seen the replay many times, but this was the best angle of Dirk coming to his defense. I should have taken a video of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l95q5N9tFJw
Watch this. Softie Pau Gasol demonstrates the proper technique for an awkward white euro getting in someone's face.

[This message has been edited by Guitarsoup (edited 5/9/2011 2:29p).]

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Dirk ran? Watch it again. He took like 4 steps. He barely powerwalked. He certainly didn't run. And he didn't really get in Bynum's face. He lightly pushed on Bynum's elbow as Bynum was walking away from him.

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Watch this. Softie Pau Gasol demonstrates the proper technique for an awkward white euro getting in someone's face.

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What is your purpose for posting in this thread? To say that Dirk only slightly got into Bynum's face, instead of full on, all-the-way in his face?

Okay. Point made. Good contribution.

[This message has been edited by Judge (edited 5/9/2011 2:38p).]

Thats the kind of sh** that will get your a** traded. I wouldn't be surprised for Buss to ship em off and swing a deal to get Howard from the Magic.

GREAT SERIES FOR THE MAVS! Shameful that crap like this had to take away from how great you guys played, but hey that is ESPN for ya

I am a Rockets fan but I was very impressed with the play of JJ Barea and Terry. I have always felt that Terry is a bada** 6th man and it is definitely a luxury to have a guy off the bench who could start for many other NBA teams.

Good luck to you guys against OKC/Memphis