Cosa Nostra
 Blackman To Mavs: Twist The Knife
Mike Fisher -- DallasBasketball.com - Posted: 2004-01-11 00:00:00.000


By Mike Fisher -- DallasBasketball.com
Rolando Blackman clenches his fist, cocks it, and angrily buries it in my belly. The shocking blow delivered, his fist remains in my midsection as he vigorously twists it into me, corkscrewing dangerously near internal organs never before squashed by human hands.
“That,’’ Ro tells me, a devilish smile crossing his thin face as he stylishly extracts an imaginary knife from my maybe-not-imaginary bleeding gut, “is how they kill you, Cosa Nostra style.’’
Great. I ask a question about the Mavs’ occasional struggles and instead I get a lesson in gang-style murder techniques.
MAVS-WARRIORS BOXSCORE
Blackman is specifically talking about how ex-Mav Raja Bell took it to his old club Monday in Utah. Raja, Ro explains to me, didn’t pickpocket the Mavs. He didn’t sneak up behind the Mavs.
“He didn’t backstab us, he got us Cosa Nostra style, right in our faces,’’ Blackman says with admiration.
Bell got his chance for revenge Monday, and exacted it, with a surprising 25-point explosion. Another old friend, the far more explosive Nick “F ‘Em’’ Van Exel, got his chance on Wednesday when the Warriors visited American Airlines Center.
Would Nick, too, twist the knife?
Nope. Not as much as ex-Warriors Antawn Jamison and Danny Fortson did. Both contributed inside, Jamison with 14 points and seven rebounds, Fortson starting the game and offering 11 rebounds in 16 minutes, as Dallas won, 105-99.
And yes, there was some of the much-needed professional-killer instinct on display. For instance:

  • Antoine Walker, usually positioned on the perimeter to help run Dallas’ offense, found himself working frequently inside here. Especially during a nice Mavs’ run in the third quarter, ‘Toine pounded the boards and attacked the basket, finishing with 20 points (only one basket from beyond the arc), eight rebounds and six assists.
  • Steve Nash – the one standout Mav whose grit is never in question – played with a sore back that Don Nelson termed so troublesome he considered giving Nash the night off. Nash didn’t play especially well, but he played especially hard. And Dallas needed him late to make a pair of game-icing free throws.
  • Tony Delk, stepping up into Nellie’s extremely tight seven-man rotation, did his best Van Exel imitation. Nick, who received a nice welcome for his two seasons as the Mavs’ dynamite sixth man, gave Golden State 15 points, nine assists and six rebounds. Delk played seventh man – and pitched in 16 points of his own.
    There is much talk of the Mavs needing to add players who “do the dirty work’’ (a story we’re working on for the coming days); Personally, I’d prefer the guys already employed here – like Jamison, Forton, Walker, Nash, Delk, hell, everybody – stay busy in that department.
    With the win, the Mavs are 20-14 -- nothing to sniff at, to be sure – but a record that projects out to Dallas falling short of the 50-win mark.
    “We’re underachieving,’’ Dirk Nowitzki said this week.
    I still say some of it has to do with the ebb and flow of a season. Remember the unbeatable Lakers, the team that started 19-3 and spoke openly about winning 70 games? They’ve lost eight of their last 11, and six straight on the road, and veterans like Gary Payton make jumping-ship noises.
    Should the Lakers trade everyone, fire the coach and give up the season?
    No more than the Mavs should.
    And so the message is clear. The Mavs need to start assassinating teams. Not just the mediocre teams. Not just the visiting teams. All the teams, all the time. The Mavs need to go all Cosa Nostra on somebody’s ass.
    Somebody’s ass, Ro. Not mine.