Dallas Mavericks: Baby Mavs A Ton Of Fun To Watch
By Ti Windisch
Although the Dallas Mavericks usually try to build through acquiring veterans, the youth movement has made the Baby Mavs a fun team to watch.
The Dallas Mavericks are not supposed to be fun this season. With a core consisting of veterans like Andrew Bogut and 300-year-old Dirk Nowitzki, Dallas seemed like a team that would stagger from the beginning of the season to the end.
To open the season, the Mavericks started Deron Williams, Wesley Matthews, Harrison Barnes, Dirk and Bogut. They gave up 130 points in a loss to the Indiana Pacers.
Then, something interesting happened. Many of the old vets got hurt. For two consecutive games the Mavs have started Yogi Ferrell, Seth Curry, Wesley Matthews, Harrison Barnes and Dirk.
Those two games were against the San Antonio Spurs and Cleveland Cavaliers, two of about four teams that have a shot to win the NBA Finals this season.
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The Mavericks are 2-0 in those games after beating the Cavaliers thoroughly on Monday night. At one point Dallas went with a lineup of Ferrell (who is a rookie whose only prior NBA experience is 10 games with the Brooklyn Nets this year), Curry, Matthews, Barnes and Dwight Powell.
Dallas Mavericks
Aside from Matthews, all of those players are 26 years old or younger. These kids in Dallas can play though, as evidenced by the Mavericks’ demolition of two of the best teams in the NBA in the last two days.
Dallas probably won’t keep beating juggernauts like the Spurs and Cavs, but even if they stink for the rest of the year at least Mavs fans have a real silver lining to this season.
These young players are bringing life to Dallas and paving the way to the Mavericks being good again in the not-too-distant future.
Don’t forget, Dallas holds its own pick in the star-loaded 2017 NBA Draft. As it stands now, the Mavericks have a 37.8 percent chance of getting a top-three pick and a 11.9 percent chance of getting the first overall pick, as per Tankathon.
Those odds might get worse if the Baby Mavs keep winning–Dallas is quietly 7-3 in their last 10 games. Somehow, the Mavericks are just four games out of eighth place in the West. In addition to going young, Dallas has benefited from going small as well.
This team could end up making a real run … or the rest of the West could beat down the youngsters in Dallas for the next 34 games. Either way there’s a light at the end of the tunnel here–either a playoff berth or a top pick sounds pretty good right now for Mavs fans.
The best part of this pleasant turn of events is that Dirk is still involved here in Dallas. He gets to lead this young group through both veteran presence and actual basketball–he nailed a big three in the fourth quarter against Cleveland that helped seal the deal.
Seth Curry is hitting 42 percent of his threes and doing a terrific job as a secondary creator/knockdown shooter in Dallas.
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Yogi Ferrell was making huge plays on both ends against the Cavaliers–he drew an offensive foul on Kyrie Irving with some terrific baseline defense and managed five points and two steals in the fourth quarter alone in that game.
Harrison Barnes has been doing a great job as a starting power forward, and Wesley Matthews is starting to look better after his Achilles rupture back in 2015.
Much of the credit for anything this team does has to get back to Rick Carlisle at some point though–no matter the circumstance, Carlisle continues to work his magic on the Mavericks.
The early-season Mavs were a disaster, but the team has life right now. It’s hard to see Dallas continuing to win most of their games, but crazier things have happened then a bunch of young players (plus Dirk) excelling under one of the best coaches in the NBA for a few months.
Even if that doesn’t happen though, in simple terms this team is just fun to watch.
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Tuning in to see Bogut and D-Will wasn’t very appealing, but watching Ferrell, Curry, Barnes and Powell run around is a blast. If this keeps up, the Mavs might become a League Pass team to watch for dedicated NBA junkies.