SB Nation User Blog: mavic

Interesting article on the top 25 players before the season starts.

mavic — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:38:23 -0000

Dirk has improved to #7 from last year's #12. The mavs are expected to do better this year.

http://blogs.hoopshype.com/blogs/johnson/2009/09/17/the-updated-top-25/

I made a mistake last season and left him off my Top 25. I corrected it right away and I think I made another mistake putting Dirk at number 12. Which brings me to the present. I am wondering if he can eventually move into the top 5. There will never be another Larry Bird. But if he isn’t close, who will? Dirk can flat out play and he works on his game. People are quick to label him soft, but tell me who gets beat up more than him and he still lights you up. I have always stood by the simple fact that great individual defense will never stop great individual offense consistently. I think Dirk proved that last year against Denver when Kenyon Martin got toasted all series long trying to guard him. The one area he needs to improve in, and it has gotten better, is his leadership. He has the talent around him to win the West, but it’s going to take a more rounded effort from him this season. I think he can pull it off. Watch out for the improved Mavericks and the best jump-shooting seven-footer in NBA history."

Marcus Banks for Matt Carroll

mavic — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 20:40:29 -0000

Another trade on the horizon?

Man, a guy goes to the dentist, gets back and it looks like work might be calling again.

According to a couple of league sources and I can't corroborate this with any of my most trusted Toronto folks, Raptors GM Bryan Colangelo's got another deal bubbling, one that would send guard Marcus Banks to the Dallas Mavericks for Matt Carroll, adding a little long-term salary but providing coach Jay Triano with a shooter that he could use deep on the bench.

I'm warned -- and therefore so are you -- that the proposed transaction remains in its relative infancy and if this summer's proven anything it's that nothing's done until it's done. But just as we suspected, Bryan is thinking of moving a salary for one that’s a bit longer but not that much more expensive in the long haul.

Carroll, a 6-6 guard who will be entering his seventh NBA season, has four years left on his contract, he’ll make $4.7 million this season, $4.3 million in 2010-11, $3.9 million in 2011-12 and $3.5 million in 2012-13.

It’s more money and years than Banks has left – he’ll get $4.53 million this year and $4.8 million in 2010-11 – but the way Colangelo has structured his roster financially over the next few years makes the extra cost on the Carroll deal not that large a burden.

What Carroll can bring is to be determined. He’s a good shooter – a career 40 per cent shooter from three-point range – but on a Raptors roster pretty stacked at the wing spots, he’ll be an emergency fallback for Triano.

Banks? Well, Banks never really worked out after being obtained in the Shawn Marion trade last season. He hardly played, was mediocre when he did and then got hurt and missed about the last month of the season.

He didn’t take the team’s suggestion and play in the summer league last month – although he was in Las Vegas to meet with the staff and work out – and the GM’s been trying to deal him for months.

And in another strange twist to Banks’ career, he’ll be reunited with Marion one more time.

They were traded with each other from Phoenix to Miami in the Shaquille O’Neal trade and then moved in tandem from the Heat to the Raptors for Jermaine O’Neal.

Carroll’s bounced around for his entire career. He spent time with Portland and had a cup of coffee with San Antonio after leaving Notre Dame and then spent more than four seasons in Charlotte. He was traded from the Bobcats to the Mavericks at the deadline last season.

http://thestar.blogs.com/raptors/2009/08/another-day-another-raptors-trade.html

Mark Cuban speaks out on his blog

mavic — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 01:33:31 -0000

Mark Cuban reveals his experience during the trade saga and dispels the rumor that he ever wanted to trade Dirk.

"Peter Vescey's ridiculous assertion that Avery asked me to trade Dirk. Even in the Nellie years where we discussed trading every other player on the roster, Dirk was never mentioned. There has never been a discussion of trading Dirk during my tenure, EVER. Vescey's source is an out and out liar."

http://www.blogmaverick.com/2008/02/19/doing-the-deal-and-dishing-the-dirt/