Ever since Don Nelson has been a head coach in the NBA, he's lamented the fact that he hasn't had a dominant center. Ever since you've been a Mavericks fan, you've lamented the same thing. And then, just when we all thought we'd die without seeing a true center in a Mavs uniform, rumors began to float that Shaquille O'Neal was coming to town. The Lakers were going to trade him here, people said, because he couldn't play nice with Kobe Bryant. It was a matter of when, not if, people kept saying. But those people were wrong. After a few weeks of reading the newspapers and checking ESPN, we realized something: We'd been duped.