zgolfz85 said:

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hph6203 said:

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He exists in more than a single year. They've been getting crap for falling short while making it close for a while. The entirety of this year was the response to those failures.

That said his attempt to get a KG moment by yelling we did it was corny as hell. Even KG's moment was corny, but people like him/he earned it by toiling away for 13 years before he broke through.

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Oh yeah, super impressive to overcome all of that with a super team. Great championship, but next to GS, this was the most talented roster in nba history. Give me a break. They had enough to win a ship without this roster….with it, would've been one of the bigger disasters ever had they come up short again

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Very brave of them to overcome winning 64 wins in the regular season

zgolfz85 said:

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Hard to hate on Jaylen brown. Dude is a beast.

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I like that guy. Tatum on the other hand …

zgolfz85 said:

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Hard to hate on Jaylen brown. Dude is a beast.

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Yep, would love to have players like him, White, and Jrue on our team...and they have all 3.

Do the Mavericks players have to get better, or do the Mavericks have to get better players?

94chem said:

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Do the Mavericks players have to get better, or do the Mavericks have to get better players?

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We need to drop THJ and a few of our role players neee to get mildly better, but we have to add a 3 and D

Didn't watch tonight's game but am guilty of checking the score just now and reading through this thread. Hate that the season ended the way it did but man what a fun season it was.

Everyone get healthy, everyone get better, and let Nico cook this offseason.

Congrats to the Western Conference Champions. Go Mavs.

Phat32 said:

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Not disappointed in the overall series result but disappointed in how non competitive we were in Boston.

Didn't even look like the same Mavs team except in game 4. They looked completely out of balance in Boston like it was at altitude or something.

Made the series not fun.

Great postseason run but total wet fart ending.

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Yep, really challenging to feel good about it right now. I know the good memories for the year will creep back in, but damn it's tough to get back to a championship competition and not even show up. A couple games with a handful of plays that could've gone either way and been a different story, but really doesn't feel like it. Those bewildered looks from Luka and Kyrie and everyone else are going to haunt for a long time

94chem said:

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Do the Mavericks players have to get better, or do the Mavericks have to get better players?

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I would say some of both

zgolfz85 said:

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Tatum is such a dbag. "What are they gonna say about us now?" Are you ****ing kidding me? They've been the top team all year and the media has worshipped them all year. I ****ing hate when teams try to create some false woe is me us against the world narrative after winning that never existed.

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I couldnt believe he said that ***** Dude is casually forgetting the superteam that his GM assembled. He wants to be Kobe so bad but he'll never get that level of respect

94chem said:

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Do the Mavericks players have to get better, or do the Mavericks have to get better players?

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THJ's expiring contract can be flipped for someone who can be a playoff rotation guy. Probably a 6th or 7th best player type but maybe more considering teams are going to want to be really bad because the 2025 draft is good at the top. Just doing that will make the team a lot better. I'm wondering if we can use him and whatever else to somehow get Caruso on this team. Caruso would be a perfect fit as an elite defender, good shooter, and extra ball handler/playmaker. He would probably be in the closing 5 if he were on the Mavs.

ETA: Mavs don't have much cap space to just add new guys. Any serious player acquisition would have to come by trade. Unless we also find a guy like DJJ that we can bring in on a veteran minimum and that guy just turns out to be a perfect fit.

Lively has room to get better. So does PJ, who is only about to turn 26. He is also playing a completely different role here than he was in Charlotte, so I expect him to work on the catch and shoot 3s and be at least slightly above average in that regard next season. He has a decent looking shooting motion so there is no reason he should not be a better shooter.

Hardy and OMax are young and can grow and be consistent contributors throughout next season. People don't think about OMax probably being a big part of the team going forward. He was a guy that draft people really liked and he did all the right things in the G League this year.

Gafford and DJJ probably are what they are (assuming we bring DJJ back). Maybe DJJ can get slightly better at 3s, but he's been playing the same role for a while and has been in the league for 8 years. Hopefully Exum stays an elite shooter. He was so valuable in the regular season. When he got hurt, it really hurt the team.

And of course a big one is will Luka take his conditioning seriously to where he can consistently give more effort on defense and where he won't be injured come playoff time.

M.C. Swag said:

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What a season. The Mavs lost, but this season was anything but a failure.

Tough way to go out but if you told me in October the Mavs would win the Western Conference and compete in the NBA Finals, I'd have called you a liar. Since Nico made those trades, the Mavs were on a 60 win pace and packed up THREE 50+ win teams in the playoffs despite never having home court. That's a helluva run.

This team has enough to compete again next year and I'd put them against any team in the West. It's unfortunate that they ran into the Celtics who had the 4th best Net Rating of ALL TIME, because I think the Mavs would have beaten every other ECF champion the last 3 seasons.

Glad we got to enjoy this ride!

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It was an awesome roller caster of a season.

The Mavs have the pieces to be an elite regular season team. We are pretty deep with guys who can do lots of different things and having two great rim-protecting centers is a perfect blueprint. At this point I'd call it a disappointment if the Mavs aren't one of the top 3 seeds. And I'd also have to know who the top 2 teams are and what their seasons looked like to know if I should be disappointed that the Mavs weren't a top 2 team.

And if Luka is healthy, the team is capable of beating anybody in the playoffs.

IMHO, we need a lot more offense from the front court. Whether that's a stretch 4/5 or someone who can score points in the post. I'm optimistic that guy is already on the team. Lively has a good shooting motion and might be able to hit some 3s. He's also a great passer from the post. If he can toss in a few moves down low to get consistent scoring, then he's really all you'd need. PJ Washington tries to do all those things, he's just not big enough. Gafford has great post defense and dunking ability, but I'm afraid that's his peak.

I really hope Luka opts out of the Olympics and gets his body right from a recovery and weight loss standpoint. If he can lose 15-20 and maintain, that dude is a lot more athletic. Speed isn't his game, but just having that lesser weight will also help alleviate a lot of the injury potential.

ramblin_ag02 said:

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IMHO, we need a lot more offense from the front court. Whether that's a stretch 4/5 or someone who can score points in the post. I'm optimistic that guy is already on the team. Lively has a good shooting motion and might be able to hit some 3s. He's also a great passer from the post. If he can toss in a few moves down low to get consistent scoring, then he's really all you'd need. PJ Washington tries to do all those things, he's just not big enough. Gafford has great post defense and dunking ability, but I'm afraid that's his peak.

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Agree with this. Maxi isnt a good enough shooter to be the 5-out center. If lively can develop a 3pt shot that would do wonders for the team.

The mavs really need some additional playmaking on this team. Someone who can handle the ball and shoot. Paul George is too pricey but maybe Alex Caruso?

Huge success this season indeed. Unfortunately, I think OKC and SA will be much elevated next year and likely pretty consistent for Minnesota. I think both LA teams will continue to taper off and we could see SAC or NOLA really elevate with a key move or two. Going to be very tough to get back to a deep run, but we'll see.

NOLA will always be hampered by Zion's inability to stay healthy. SA will be better but they would have to make a really nice signing for me to consider them for the play-in. They are really bad outside of Wemby and this year's draft won't help them this year, if at all. SAC is losing their 3rd best player in Monk.

The West will be defined by Dallas, Denver, Minnesota, and OKC. Minnesota will be a good regular season team because Gobert is a good regular season piece, but they are a team that can be figured out in the postseason.

The team I am looking at most is OKC. They have so much future draft capital and they need to strike while Chet and JWill are on rookie deals. They can use Giddey and any number of picks to acquire good players. They also have $35 million in cap space this offseason to just spend.

Do we think Memphis is a playoff team again with Ja Morant back?

Ja is such a wild card that it makes it hard to project anything for them. It's possible he doesn't play in the NBA again. Even with Ja, they are outside of the top 4 to me.

ETA: But yes, at least in the play-in and a likely 5 or 6.

I was thinking somewhere in the 5-6 range as well. The West is so stacked.

geez, forgot about memphis. didn't mention denver earlier either cuz they're just denver and going to be good for a long time. damn, the west is absurd.

The NBA needs to address the East/West imbalance. There are like 5 contenders in the West and only 1 in the East. It has been like this for seemingly 2 decades. Balance the schedules and let the top 16 teams face off, teams have travel down to a science at this point. It's not like the old days.

jeffdjohnson said:

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The NBA needs to address the East/West imbalance. There are like 5 contenders in the West and only 1 in the East. It has been like this for seemingly 2 decades. Balance the schedules and let the top 16 teams face off, teams have travel down to a science at this point. It's not like the old days.

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It's been longer than that, even when the Bulls were winning titles the West was the much deeper conference. Once the Pistons and Celtics fell off in the early 90s the East was a one or two contender conference annually for the rest of the decade. Meanwhile you had the Suns, Rockets, Sonics, Jazz, Trailblazers, Lakers and Spurs at various times all being legit contenders.

The West has been much deeper than East consistently for over 30 years.

Bronny won't make it until pick 58 or whatever it is. A lot of buzz that Phoenix will take him late in the first.

jeffdjohnson said:

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The NBA needs to address the East/West imbalance. There are like 5 contenders in the West and only 1 in the East. It has been like this for seemingly 2 decades. Balance the schedules and let the top 16 teams face off, teams have travel down to a science at this point. It's not like the old days.

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Truth since the origins of Texags (and before). The Southwest division could be really strong for a number of years, and the bottom of the EC will help inflate the EC top team records.

An NBA expansion to Seattle and Vegas would mean two "weaker" teams to the West, depending on the expansion draft and FA cap rules, and it would also send either Minnesota, Memphis or NO to the East, but that is pretty insignificant.

Iowaggie said:

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jeffdjohnson said:

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The NBA needs to address the East/West imbalance. There are like 5 contenders in the West and only 1 in the East. It has been like this for seemingly 2 decades. Balance the schedules and let the top 16 teams face off, teams have travel down to a science at this point. It's not like the old days.

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Truth since the origins of Texags (and before). The Southwest division could be really strong for a number of years, and the bottom of the EC will help inflate the EC top team records.

An NBA expansion to Seattle and Vegas would mean two "weaker" teams to the West, depending on the expansion draft and FA cap rules, and it would also send either Minnesota, Memphis or NO to the East, but that is pretty insignificant.

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By expansion, you mean the Mavs getting moved to Vegas because gambling won't pass in Texas. Won't that just be swell.

I actually thought about this the other day. All along I've thought the new owners must have some inside knowledge about legalized gambling in Texas coming soon, but what if they don't care about keeping the team here and just move them?

Seems far fetched based on the size of Dallas and the good support they have, but who knows.

T dizl televizl said:

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I actually thought about this the other day. All along I've thought the new owners must have some inside knowledge about legalized gambling in Texas coming soon, but what if they don't care about keeping the team here and just move them?

Seems far fetched based on the size of Dallas and the good support they have, but who knows.

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0 chance they move from the 5th largest media market to the 40th. Especially since Dallas has had consistent fan support the last 25 years. It would be a step down in every category to re locate to Vegas.

M.C. Swag said:

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T dizl televizl said:

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I actually thought about this the other day. All along I've thought the new owners must have some inside knowledge about legalized gambling in Texas coming soon, but what if they don't care about keeping the team here and just move them?

Seems far fetched based on the size of Dallas and the good support they have, but who knows.

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0 chance they move from the 5th largest media market to the 40th. Especially since Dallas has had consistent fan support the last 25 years. It would be a step down in every category to re locate to Vegas.

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Why would they care about media market? Butts in seats and gambling will thwart any local tv media deal.