SB Nation User Blog: Walter Sobchak

Mavs Playoff Beard Group

Walter Sobchak — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:04:39 -0000

Join it:

If you love the Dallas Mavericks, or "the Big D," beards, playoffs, the Eiffel Tower - anything - you can join in on the fun. We are growing beards until the Mavs lose in this year's playoffs. It could be after 4 games. It could be in the 2nd round. If we're lucky, we could even become Lakers fodder for the WCF. But do we really think David Stern is going to let anything outside of Kobe vs. LeBron happen? Didn't think so. So join us, grow a beard for a few weeks (or if you're a lady, don't shave the legs or pay a European tribute to Dirk and leave the pits growing), and laugh as Timmy, Tony, Pops and Manu in a suit flop and cry their way through the first round against your loveable Mavs!

Dallas Mavericks - Best Team Ever?

Walter Sobchak — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 21:59:19 -0000

What Could Have Been...

I don't know why I did this to myself, or better yet why I want to pass this misery along to all of you, but I had a little free time a few days ago and came up with this:

Players we drafted and in parentheses, players we passed over either immediately after or pretty close after:

1980: (Kiki Vandeweghe - refused to sign, forced a trade)
1981: Mark Aguirre + Rolando Blackman - NICE picks
1982: Bill Garnett (Fat Lever)
1983: Dale Ellis (Clyde Drexler) + Derek Harper
1984: Sam Perkins (Charles Barkley) + Terence Stansbury (John Stockton)
1985: Detlef Schrempf (Karl Malone) + Uwe Blab (Joe Dumars) + Bill Wennington (AC Green or Terry Cummings)
1986: Roy Tarpley + traded pick (Arvydas Sabonis) + traded pick (Dennis Rodman or Mark Price)
1987: Jim Farmer (Reggie Lewis)
1988: traded pick (Brian Shaw) + Marlon Wiley (Steve Kerr)
1989: Randy White (Tim Hardaway or Shawn Kemp) + Pat Dunham (Cliff Robinson)
1990: traded pick (Elden Campbell)
1991: Doug Smith (Terrell Brandon or Dale Davis) + Mike Iuzzolino (Darrell Armstrong)
1992: Jim Jackson - the only option here
1993: Jamal Mashburn - same thing + Eric Riley (Nick Van Exel)
1994: Jason Kidd - great pick
1995: Cherokee Parks (Michael Finley)
1996: Samaki Walker (Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash, Jermaine O'Neal or Peja Stojakovic) + Darnell Robinson (Ben Wallace)
1997: Kelvin Cato (Brevin Knight) + Chris Antsey (Bobby Jackson)
1998: Robert Traylor (DIRK!!!) + Bruno Sundov (Cuttino Mobley) + Greg Buckner (Brad Miller)
1999: traded (Shawn Marion - although I think this was for Finley or Nash) + Wang Zhi Zhi (Manu Ginobili) + Gordon Giricek (Raja Bell)
2000: Courtney Alexander (Hedo Turkoglu) + Donnell Harvey (DeShawn Stevenson) + Eduardo Najera (Michael Redd)
2001: traded pick (Gerald Wallace or Tony Parker) + Kyle Hill (Carlos Arroyo) + Kenny Satterfield (Jamario Moon)
2002: traded (Carlos Boozer) + Sekulares? (Luis Scola)
2003: Josh Howard - great pick
2004: Devin Harris + traded pick (Kevin Martin) + Pavel Podkolzin (Delonte West) + Vasiliuos Spanoulis (Andres Nocioni)
2005: traded pick (David Lee) + traded pick (Jose Calderon)
2006: Mo Ager (Paul Milsapp)
2007: Renaldus Seibutis (Ramon Sessions) + Reyshawn Terry (Marc Gasol)
2008: traded (George Hill, Kosta Koufos or DeAndre Jordan) - this is the Devin Harris pick for last year

Now there are quite a lot of traded picks that hurt, but we probably received some good players in those trades. But look at how awesome we could have been with Vandeweghe, Blackman, Aguirre, Drexler, Derek Harper, Barkley, Stockton, Malone, Dumars, AC Green, Tarpley, Rodman and Sabonis in the 80's?

or Shawn Kemp, Cliff Robinson, Elden Campbell, Dale Davis, Darrell Armstrong, Jim Jackson, Jamal Mashburn, Nick Van Exel, Jason Kidd, Michael Finley in the 90's?

or Kobe Bryant, Ben Wallace, Brevin Knight, Bobby Jackson, Dirk, Brad Miller, Cuttino Mobley, Shawn Marion, Manu Ginobili, Raja Bell in the 90's transitioning to the 2000's?

or Hedo Turkoglu, Michael Redd, Tony Parker, Carlos Boozer, Josh Howard, Devin Harris, Kevin Martin, David Lee, Jose Calderon, Paul Milsapp, Marc Gasol, DeAndre Jordan in the late 2000's?

At least we hit on Dirk...that was huge.

Giving up vs. Going for it

Walter Sobchak — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 07:20:45 -0000

True, I had to wait to post this until after the game tonight, as I wanted to see how we would play on the road against a very good team. I'm happy to say I can still post this, as we absolutely trounced a very good Magic team on their home court.

I've seen a ton of posts lately clamoring for trades, whether it be a "Howard and Stack for Barnes and Shaq" deal, a Terry for whatever we can get swap, or even the preposterous "Dirk for LaMarcus Aldridge and a bag of change" idea. I have to say I've been against most if not all of these ideas. Why? Because we would be giving up a very good, very useful commodity for less in return, with the idea that we can get younger and reload with the free cap space in 2010. The problem I see with trading off guys like Josh, Jet and Dirk is that there really isn't much out there in the league that interests me as far as the two positions of need that we really have: (1) a young impact PG/SG that can score at will and take over games and (2) a young, athletic C that can score in the post consistently. And even if we were able to pull off a deal for, say, a Chris Bosh, we would only be guaranteed (sure we could try to sign him to an extension...but that's at best a 50% chance) a year and a half of Bosh's time, and we would open a gaping hole at SF. Josh is our best trade chip, because he's still relatively young, has plenty of talent, and he has a team option vs. a player option at the crucial part of his contract - 2010 - but those things are all very valuable to the Mavs as well. And he has yet to play his best basketball of the past year...something I think we will see very soon. If we're going to try to trade anybody, it's got to be Dampier and Terry, two very hard-to-trade contracts that will be for players on the downside of their career. And I just don't see that happening - and I'm fine with that, as they both do very good things for this team.

So what this team can do in the meantime is sit back and try to trade Stackhouse for whatever we can get in return or if the right team comes calling, trade Bass for a higher pick in the next two drafts or someone useful in the future that may be blocked right now, since Bass will be a free agent after the season is over. The fact is, there really aren't that many useful PGs to be had in a trade out there. Kyle Lowry and Mike Conley come to mind, but what would it take to get one of those two? And while prying Raymond Felton for Stack and Diop would've been absolutely outstanding, I have a hard time believing he's the long-term answer for us at PG to take us back to the championship. It's just a dry market out there. Any trade involving Howard is going to get us limited return in value, and I don't want to make that move.

So I guess what it all boils down to, is if you really want to stick by Mavericks basketball - both in the present and future - I think you should enjoy the fact that the season isn't over, the present hasn't passed us by, and there is still plenty of basketball to be played. This team has won 3 in a row, including two on the road against a very decent team and a very good team, and is playing with passion and precision on offense now that Kidd fully has the reigns. Even after the worst month in the last few years of this team's history, they're firmly entrenched in 7th place behind a Boozer and Kirilenko-less Utah and a reeling Suns team, and are only half a game out of 6th, a game out of 5th, two games out of 4th and three games out of 3rd. A strong finish could easily propel this team past Houston with their constant injury problems, and past Denver and Portland, two teams I have a hard time believing are better than this squad. And maybe a slow first half building towards a peak at the end of the year is just what this team needs heading into meaningful games compared to a strong year and toning it down before the playoffs.

Eddie Jones - GONE

Walter Sobchak — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 21:35:26 -0000

hadn't seen anybody else post this yet, which is surprising, because this to me is some major news, but apparently Eddie Jones has (maybe) been traded to Indiana with 2 second rounders for Shawne Williams:

http://mavsblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2008/10/eddie-jones-moving-on-to-indiana-maybe.html

WIN...BIG FREAKIN WIN.

apparently, I need a lot more words, so here's some interesting thought for discussion: if we get Williams, and he's in good shape, does Bass become a 3, or is he traded for a big time SG?

Ian Kinsler - future All Star

Walter Sobchak — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 22:28:57 -0000

40 games in a row without an error, and in 145 post-All Star Break at bats, here are the kid's stats:

.331 Average
.394 OBP
.490 Slugging
only 4 homers and 7 doubles...
8 of 10 stolen bases
27 Runs
20 RBI
only 22 strikeouts

He's on pace for at least a 20/20 season and with a full healthy year could've possibly approached 30/30 status. I can't name an AL 2nd baseman I'd rather have on my team...is Kinsler a future All Star and Gold Glover?

In addition, if Washington could work this kind of magic with Kinsler's defense and approach at the plate, can he do the same for Hank Blalock now that he's back in action?