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<div><p><strong>Is Dallas Better Off Without Him?</strong></p><p>By Mike Fisher -- DB.com </p><p>Are the Mavs better because of the departure of Steve Nash? That\'s the question on the table for the experts who are ready to re-focus again on a Dallas-Phoenix showdown. Unfortunately, not only do they come to the wrong conclusion. ... they\'re not even asking the right question!</p><p>Media members, most of whom don\'t watch the Mavs on a nightly basis and who don\'t watch the Suns on a nightly basis, will certainly find the motivation to pay attention this Sunday, April 1, when Dallas visits Phoenix in a nationally-televised game. (It may not be fair that judgments on such things as the quality of the team or the merits of an MVP candidate are made by reporters waiting until they are fed an ABC telecast on a silver platter, but that\'s the way such subjective battles are determined.) The system will work as it did back on March 14, when the Suns won in double-OT. ... and suddenly Phoenix was superior, Dirk was a choker, and Nash? The two-time league MVP was the centerpiece of it all.</p><p>The latter conclusion was the case even before the game, when ESPN.com assembled its pack of experts to answer the question:</p><p>Are the Mavs better because of the departure of Steve Nash?</p><p>Let\'s review their answers with some of our own:</p><p>Greg Anthony said, \"They are. As great as Nash was, he was doing in Dallas the same things he\'s doing in Phoenix. A perimeter-oriented, high-flying offense is not going to win you a title. They\'re better off being apart. In sports, sometimes you get addition by subtraction. Dirk learned to have more of an impact this year by playing like the 7-footer he is.</p><p>DB.com says: It\'s difficult to assume that Dirk and Nash are \"better off being apart.\'\' It\'s an interesting concept, however, and one held by some people inside the Mavs organization: Nash, after getting the big money in Phoenix, re-dedicated himself to improvement, gave up his goof-around summer vacations, got married, etcetera. So maybe the idea works for Nash. But my guess on Nowitzki is he\'d be an even more productive player if the best passer in the NBA was on his team.</p><p>Chris Broussard said, \"The Mavericks (w)ith Nash. ... almost certainly would not be the defensive powerhouse they have become, and that\'s the very reason the Mavericks are legit contenders. We probably saw the best the Mavs could do with Nash during his stint there. Nash is without question the best point guard in the league, but he\'s not the most versatile (in terms of defense and style of play), and that lack of versatility would hinder the Mavs\' move to the type of hard-nosed, defensive-minded team they\'ve become.</p><p>DB.com says: A far-too-rarely-made point. Let\'s narrow it down from Broussard\'s team-wide take to just one player. The Mavs believe Devin Harris is as good a defensive guard as there is in basketball. If Nash was still here, how much playing time would Devin even be getting?</p><p>Ric Bucher says, \"No. They\'re better because they\'ve created a better fit between their coach and their personnel and they\'ve stopped making major changes every year, which was the case when Nash was there. The argument that they couldn\'t play their current brand of D with Nash is superfluous; they never tried while he was there, so we\'ll never know. This we do know: No one tries harder than Nash to be a good team defender and team D is what the Mavs play so well.</p><p>DB.com says: Now, Ric and DB.com are old friends. And only because of that do we feel free to tell him he\'s simply full of baloney. The \"major changes every year\'\' thing? \"Changes\'\' have resulted in a two-year span during which the Mavs have been arguably the best team in the NBA. If you don\'t want \"changes,\'\' then you don\'t want Josh and Devin and Stack and Damp and Diop and JET and every other guy on the roster not named \"Dirk.\'\'</p><p>I don\'t even know what \"superfluous\'\' means, but any suggestion that Nash is \"the hardest-trying defender in the NBA\'\' is just ... well, some other big word that simply means \"dumb.\'\'</p><p>Chris Sheridan says, They\'re better because the rest of the team has matured, and the pieces brought in around Nowitzki have fit. But if they had kept Nash instead of giving that money to Dampier, we might be talking about a 73-to-75-win team.</p><p>DB.com says: We\'ll be careful to not dismiss this notion too quickly. A 75-win team? I have no idea how anybody would pretend to know that. I also am a firm believer in my old \"Chain-Link Fence Theory,\'\' which states that every single cog in a title team is critical, and that the removal of any link -- a coach, a player, maybe even an equipment manager -- can cause the thing to unravel. (In honor of one of Mark Cuban\'s favorite games, maybe I oughta change this to \"The Jenga Theory.\'\') I use the theory to defend Barry Switzer\'s title with the \'95 Cowboys, and I\'ll use it to defend the guys who ARE here and who ARE on an elite winning pace.</p><p>Marc Stein says, No. They\'re better than they were because they\'ve made a string of home run roster decisions since Nash\'s departure to reload around Nowitzki and because Avery Johnson has forced the new Mavs -- starting with Dirk -- to be more accountable defensively than they\'ve ever been before. I will always believe that if Nash had stayed and played for Avery, helped along by the new rules curtailing defensive contact on the perimeter and the presence of Josh Howard as their starry wingman, that the Mavs would have at least one championship and be feared every year. I reject the notion that Nowitzki and Nash had to separate to get this good, as they\'re two guys who get better every year and who would have been challenged like never before by the Lil\' General.</p><p>DB.com says: When Stein talks Mavs, we listen. Let\'s file away his thoughts for the moment until we get to the Trickle-Down Effect.</p><p>John Hollinger says, Of course not. But they did enough good things once they lost Nash -- trading Antoine Walker for Jason Terry, signing Erick Dampier and DeSagana Diop, trading Antawn Jamison for Jerry Stackhouse and Devin Harris -- that they\'re a better team now than when Nash played there.</p><p>DB.com says: We haven\'t said this much this year, but we say it now: Maybe John Hollinger really does understand just a little bit. He screws up the chronology of one of his post-Nash moves (the Jamison-for-Stack/Devin/Laettner deal preceeded Nash\'s departure), but his overall point brings us to the Trickle-Down Effect. Consider all the things that might or might not have occurred had Nash somehow opted to remain in Dallas:</p><p>* As we mentioned before, Devin Harris might have been very slow to develop, playing behind Nash.</p><p>* Jason Terry definitely wouldn\'t be here.</p><p>* Antoine Walker might still be here.</p><p>* The money to acquire Erick Dampier might not have been available.</p><p>* DeSagana Diop might\'ve been force-fed into the starting lineup and over-exposed.</p><p>* Dirk might (I emphasize might) not have developed new facets to his game and his personality, instead relying on Nash as the set-up man and the leader.</p><p>* Nellie, who has said Nash\'s departure drained from him some of the fun of coaching in Dallas, might still be here.</p><p>* Therefore, we\'d probably still be playing SmallBall, relying on offense, and enduring front-office conflicts.</p><p>* Also, therefore and obviously, Avery wouldn\'t be the head coach.</p><p>* In fact -- and we\'ll stop here -- if Steve Nash re-ups with the Mavs in July of 2004, there\'s a little transaction that occured on Sept. 9, 2004, that might\'ve been deemed unnecessary. It was on that day that Dallas signed a third point guard named Avery Johnson. In the same NBA season, six months later, the third point guard became the head coach.</p><p>So what would today\'s Dallas Mavericks look like with Steve Nash? It\'s impossible to know. But back to the ESPN Question of the Day, and the truest answer:</p><p>Are the Mavs better because of the departure of Steve Nash?</p><p>Well, no. They\'re not better BECAUSE of the departure of Steve Nash.</p><p>They\'re better IN THE WAKE of the departure of Steve Nash. Better than they were. Better than every other team is.</p><p>1058am March 27 2007</p></div> |
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