Four straight losses. Four spots dropped in the standings. A four-game, East Coast road trip looming that ends at Detroit and Boston.
Mark Cuban even lost his request for Denver's J.R. Smith to be disciplined by the league for throwing an elbow at Antoine Wright.
In short, not a good week for your Dallas Mavericks.
And it could only get worse.
Earlier today, the National Basketball Association lifted $25,000 from Mark Cuban's pocket for comments Twittered after Friday night's game against the Denver Nuggets. Tweeted the Dallas Mavericks' owner, "how do they not call a tech on JR Smith for coming off the bench to taunt our player on the ground?" The player, of course, was Antoine Wright, with whom Smith had an altercation in January resulting in ... wait for it ... a $25,000 fine slapped on Cuban for getting upset with Smith. Ten minut
The NBA is a bunch of nit-twitts.
Over the weekend the league fined Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban $25,000 for his "criticism" of officials via Twitter, the real-time social network that allows schmucks like you and me to be flies on the walls of the rich, famous and exhibitionistic. Or to simply tell the world that you do, in fact, have a severe case of the Mondays.
After Dallas' gut-gouging loss to the Denver Nuggets Friday night - don't know about you, but I find it extremely easy to
Dirk's getting double-teamed. What's your excuse?*Unless Mark Cuban smears Swine Flu on Tony Parker, I'm afraid the desperate and prideful San Antonio Spurs beat the Dallas Mavericks tonight, forcing a Game 6 Friday night at American Airlines Center. Why? Because home teams down 3-1 always win Game 5. Because Greg Popovich has won 75 percent of his games when facing elimination, best all-time. And because there's that nagging "internal devil" thing with the Mavs.
*Deferential Dirk: O
Mavs' fans, prepare to be nauseated.I sincerely hope I'm wrong about this, but I have a feeling we're all about to get really pissed. Watching the most athletic - and by far the most animated and arrogant - team in the NBA knock the Dallas Mavericks out of the playoffs could be very painful.
Get out your hate hats, Game 1 against the Denver Nuggets is Sunday at 2:30.
If you haven't seen a lot of Nuggets' games this season, just wait. A week from now you'll look back at
Better late than never, a happy tune.Now that, my friends, was a basketball game. A playoff basketball game, with everything on it.
Delicious.
Considering they still won't win this series, the Mavericks had every reason to fold. And after the week he's had, Dirk Nowitzki had every reason to pout.
Instead?
Dirk produced one of the grittiest performances in franchise history, willing the Mavericks out of a sweep with 44 points, 13 rebounds and one victory that feels more
No Jason Terry. No Gatorade dump. Hindsight, they say, is 20/20. Sometimes, unfortunately, so is foresight.
On Friday, May 1 I picked the Denver Nuggets to eliminate the Dallas Mavericks in five games. Last night it came to pass, in the form of Nuggets 124, Mavs 110.
Dirk Nowitzki was as gritty as he was great. But Jason Terry never arrived, Josh Howard spent the series hobbling and the Mavericks had no answers for Denver's relentless energy and superior athleticsm. And, lest we
