Mavs About As Sharp As A Bowlin' Ball

   "We couldn't hit a bull in the ass with a bass fiddle,’’ said Mavs coach Rick Carlisle after Monday’s 98-88 home loss to Denver, sounding like a citified Foghorn Leghorn. In fact, in honor of Foghorn Leghorn – “Boy-ah, I said boy-ah, you’re about as sharp as a pound of wet leathah’’ remains my favorite way to chastise my two sons – my entire review of the loss is channeled through Warner Bros.’ second greatest cartoon character and is best drawled aloud:

  “What's all the whoopin' and hollerin about, boy-ah?’’ – Coming in, Dallas had won 11 of 13. Denver had won 15 of 19. So what is the media reaction when the visitors win? The Dallas Morning News, for one, writes in its online tease:

   Monday's loss to Denver showed the Dallas Mavericks are still not on equal footing with the top teams in the Western Conference.

   Really? We’re that certain? One loss in December – the third loss in 14 outings for a 13-10 team – is enough to carve that in stone?

   “Any of this getting through that little old blue bonnet of yours?’’ – Apparently not, because my man Tim MacMahon of the DMNews chimed right in on his Mavs blog:

   If you want to jump to conclusions based on the homestand, I reckon you'd say the Mavs are probably good enough to get to the playoffs but won't last long. In other words, they are who we thought they were.

    Tim gets credit for adding to the Foghorn Leghorn flavor by using the word “reckon.’’ But otherwise? Hey, we’ve already launched our stat-based wish to upgrade the roster by pursuing Gerald Wallace. That’s a concession that Dallas, as presently constructed, ain’t the Lakers.

    But drawing long-form conclusions based on one bull-in-the-ass night? Unsound.

    “This boy-ah's more mixed up than a feather in a whirlwind.’’ – "Fitting back in?’’ responded the returning Josh Howard. “Me and J.J. bring the same thing to the table. I'm just 6-7. About all I could see just watching the whole time: I'm taller, he's shorter. We do the same things – get to the basket, make jump shots. He's a better 3-point shooter than me. I can post up better than him. That's the difference."

      We love J-Ho. A feather in a whirlwind, indeed.

   “This is gonna cause more confusion than a mouse in a burlesque show!’’ – That is sort of the point of the J.J. Barea-featured 3-PG lineup, right? He’s a mouse in a burlesque show? But here – with the 5-11 JJB once again starting and finishing (until Carlisle emptied his bench) – the Mavs seemed overly reliant in asking Barea to do things that will be more difficult for him now that he’s been fully scouting by opponents. The best example of that is Barea’s fearless scoots to the hoop. He is now being challenged there, by shot-blockers who aren’t underrating him, and on Monday the big reason he was just 5-of-16 from the floor is due to the high number of layup attempts – four? Five? -- that were swatted away.

   JJB was good for a career-high-tying nine assists, so this isn’t a selfishness issue but rather an issue of balance. Barea takes 16 shots while Jason Kidd takes five and makes none? Let me tell you, Denver coach George Karl was a bit surprised that, all things considered, the mouse in the burlesque show kept shooting.

   The mouse in a burlesque show needs some balance. Or maybe it just needs Josh Howard starting and scoring 20?
  “You're doing a lot of choppin', but no chips are flyin’.’’ – For a seven-minute stint in the final quarter, right up until there was about one minute left in the game, Denver managed just one field goal. And how did the Dallas shooters cut into what was a 16-point deficit? By getting it down to 13.

   “Pay attention, boy-ah! I'm cuttin' but you're not bleedin'!’’ – A similar issue when it came to runs: Dallas went on a 26-4 to to tie it at 65 with 4:08 to go in the third quarter. … and then Denver see-sawed the thing right back with a 22-6 run through the 8:51 mark of the fourth period to take an 87-71 lead.

  “Boy-ah, you cover about as much as a flapper's skirt in a high wind.’’ – I heard Bob Ortegel say something at the end of the telecast about Devean George maybe getting some more confidence with his shot. Grand.

   Listen, he made 2-of-9 shots before canning a garbage-time trey. So let’s party! Or. … let’s hope that Devean – who started once again in the hopes that he could wing-defend Carmelo – gives way to a superior answer there. Devean’s task (difficult as it is) was to keep ‘Melo from making eight of his 19 shots for 23 points. He didn’t do it.

   And as far as Devean’s offense goes. … I almost got the sense that Denver was letting him shoot.

   Overall, I guess, you can take your choice: Do you want to congratulate Devean for “shrinking the court’’ on Anthony (‘Melo’s words) in the second half, when he scored three? Or do you want to focus on the first half, when Anthony scored 20?

    “Nice kids, but about as sharp as a sack of wet mice.’’ – Honest to God, the acquisition of Chauncey Billups (for A.I.) might go down as one of the sharpest deals of all time. The fit (Chauncey is a hometown guy), the talent (he was certainly superior to J-Kidd on this night), and most of all the guidance. … ‘Melo and J.R. Smith are two of the wettest mice in the NBA, both of them taking shots with no apparent regard for or understanding of the situation. … K-Mart is like that, too (preferring to block shots into the stands rather than into teammates’ hands) and that Birdman Andersen looks like Amy Winehouse in a headband. … but then Chauncey pulls it all together.

    “Now that's no way for a kid to be wastin’ his time, readin’that long-haired gobbledegook.’’ – The press clippings say that Dallas’ bench is unmatched. Denver’s bench must not read that long-haired gobbledegook, because the Nugz’ backups outscored Dallas ’ bench 37-32. J.R. Smith’s 25 points did most of the damage, easily offsetting Jason Terry’s 19.

   Going into Monday night, the Mavericks’ bench had outscored the opposing bench by an average of 19.6 points per game in the previous 13 games. But somebody’s going to have to help Terry out here. Josh’s numbers weren’t fully cooked. Bass was ineffective. And ‘Gana Diop is suddenly invisible.  

   “My foot's getting hotter than a sweat-band in a fireman's helmet." – Josh Howard returned to action after missing 11 games with that bum ankle. J-Ho entered the game with 1:05 to go in the first quarter and passed the 14-minute test with seven points, two rebounds, two assists and some plunges into the paint that suggest he’s not too worried about his ankle.

    Meanwhile, Carlisle saw enough to suggest that Josh might soon be ready to return to the first team.

    “There's no way he can have any kind of rhythm,’’ Carlisle said. “But. … he looked sound so those are all good things. We've got to build on that and get him back to where he needs to be -- in our starting lineup.’’

    Added Josh: “It felt good. There was some discomfort, but it’s stuff I can work through.’’

    But. …

    “Now cut that out, boy-ah, or I'll spank you where the feathers are thinnest.’’ – Josh’s seven points came on 1-of-5 shooting. When he entered the game, the Mavericks were down eight. His reaction to the situation – again, the situation being that Dallas was behind and he hadn’t played in a real game in almost a month?

      Josh launched an errant 3-pointer.

    “Pay attention to me, boy-ah! I'm not just talkin' to hear my head roar.’’ – The Mavs apparently paid special attention paid to the issue of Denver’s defensive switching in terms of gameplanning.

   Unfortunately, admitted Jason Terry, “we didn't handle the switches well.  That's something that we had worked on and practiced on a couple of years ago.  It's something that you have to be prepared for and we just didn't come physically prepared to play tonight. … They do a lot of switching. That’s something that shouldn’t be effective against us.’’

    “Makes more noise than two skeletons fightin' on a tin roof!’’ – Or not, in the case of American Airlines Center, which made very little noise at all. Snowy night, Monday night, Cowboys-win hangover. … but c’mon, people!

    “That boy-ah's as strong as an ox, and just about as smart.’’ – I’ll let George Karl say it better than I can (though not as well as Foghorn Leghorn can) about J.R. Smith:

   “I think J.R. needs to comprehend that when you have the lead, turnovers is one of your worst enemies. That's what bothered me. I can handle his crazy shots, because he makes a lot of them, but it's his decisions with the lead that are very wasteful.’’

    “That boy-ah’s about as subtle as a hand grenade in a barrel of oat meal.’’ -- The singer Ludacris was courtside. He was in town to attend the birthday bash being thrown for Terrell Owens. And by Terrell Owens.

     “What's the big idea bashing me on the noggin with a rollin’ pin?’’ – Credit the Nuggets with yet another ingenious attempt at controlling Dirk Nowitzki: Carmelo Anthony, in particular, beat up The UberMan with a rollin’ pin. Well, almost.

    Dirk recorded his 11^th double-double with a game-high 27 points, and he pulled down 10 rebounds. But in the final quarter, the main reason Dallas couldn’t get over the hump was the insanely physical approach ‘Melo used on Nowitzki. It was the sort of wrasslin’ match you see in the paint between behemoths – but it was occurring between two superstars, on the perimeter and on the wing, Dirk trying to establish position and ‘Melo simply hugging him, with both arms wrapped around him, repeatedly. 

     The Rollin’ Pin Defense. Nice.

    “As bare as a hoochie dancer’s midriff.’’ – Did the Mavs really score only 14 points in the paint?  Did I hear that right? Erick Dampier had more rebounds (15) than his whole team had points in the paint?!

     “That gal reminds me of the highway between Fort Worth and Dallas: No curves.’’ – Denver has rarely known the route to a victory in North Texas: Dallas lost for just the third time in its last 20 home meetings with the Nugz.

    “The snow's so deep, the farmers have to jack up the cows so they can milk 'em.’’ – Snow in downtown Dallas? Time to go home.

630am dec 16 2008