State of the Mavericks: Does Dallas need to add a third superstar?由Mavs.Ben 发表在Big D https://bbs.hupu.com/688
Dallas might want a third star more than Maverick fans themselves. Last summer, the team pursued Kemba Walker, very nearly successfully — thwarted only by the 11th-hour appearance of a more convenient Eastern Conference suitor in the Boston Celtics. Dallas, I have been told, was expecting to sign Walker prior to Boston’s emergence. Dallas fans, however, were less unified. “He’s polarizing as hell,” I wrote last year. “I must have heard a dozen different opinions about him in recent weeks from Mavericks fans who like, dislike or just don’t have much faith in the planned pursuit of Walker when July 1 arrives.”
That article was titled, “Kemba Walker could be the best free agent Dallas has ever signed. Maybe they shouldn’t.” That has now emerged as the consensus opinion among this fanbase, at least the active online community. When I surveyed fans after the season postponement, 74 percent of the respondents were glad that the team had not signed Walker in 2019. Walker, now a 30-year-old lead ballhandler with a necessarily high usage rate, doesn’t adjudicate Maverick fan feelings towards any third star in any context, of course. But it’s curious; a failed signing of an objectively good basketball player has largely brought sighs of relief from the fan base one year later. It makes you wonder: Do the Mavericks with Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis need a third star?
Inherent in this question is your belief or lack thereof in Porzingis, his stardom and his sustainability. Next week, as we continue digging deep into the complex questions that Dallas will face while attempting to build a dynasty, we will take a deeper look at him. Let’s assume, for now at least, that he is what most expect he can be: a reliable second scorer, a floor spacer, a rim protector, a good-if-not-great defender, all while staying healthy enough. Likewise, let’s assume Doncic is who we think he is: a once-in-a-generation offensive maestro and top-five player in this league. (There’s little doubt in that prognostication, incredibly.)
With those two players on the team, did the Mavericks need Walker? Do they need Giannis Antetokounmpo? Do they need Bradley Beal? Even if you balk at the word need, what would the pursuit of such a third star mean for the team’s team building future? This is the question at hand.
First, though, let’s examine history.
What’s the history and future of basketball star trios?
Basketball of the 20th century thrived on trios. Hell, in 1962, the Boston Celtics sent four players to the All-Star game and repeated it 13 years later. Philadelphia accomplished the same feat in 1983. But those are outliers: the 76ers, for example, had Moses Malone, Julius Erving and Maurice Cheeks start the 1983 All-Star Game while someone named Andrew Toney snuck onto the reserves. Toney had a successful eight-year career and averaged nearly 20 points that season, but we can all acknowledge he wasn’t a superstar like the other three. Anyway, basketball was different then.
The 2000s started with a trio-duo duel; the Spurs trio and the Lakers duo combined for five championships in a six-year span. Detroit won the one outlier championship without any superstars, you could argue, although it had four players awarded as All-Stars. 2006 happened. San Antonio nabbed another. Boston won with a Big Three. Los Angeles took the next two with a Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol duo. Dirk Nowitzki won his with a team so devoid of a real second star that it’s hard to even say who was the second-best player. And you know how the rest of the decade went, with the league contenders reacting to Miami’s star trio by attempting to build their own. Golden State was ultimately most effective, including two consecutive seasons of a Big Four thanks to unprecedented salary cap hijinks.
What’s a superstar, anyway? We know the traditional archetype as a high-usage volume scorer, but we also know you can’t realistically fit three such players on the same team in today’s modern game. The third star either gets relegated to a smaller role (Kevin Love and Chris Bosh) or has always played it (San Antonio’s Manu Ginobili and Oklahoma City’s James Harden) or never fit the archetype anyway (Ray Allen and Klay Thompson). Allen did spend more time on the ball in his Seattle days, to be fair, even if his core game was always that of an elite off-ball shooter. Completely atypical stars like Draymond Green muddle this conversation even more. But the bottom line is I cannot name any successful offenses with three true dynamos in the past two decades. In fact, it seems like Oklahoma City came closest – and, fearful of that uncertain dynamic, traded away Harden the moment before he would have demanded his proportional share of the ball and salary cap.
It largely seems, then, that Big Threes are inaptly named Big Twos with a famous third-best player smushed into a more convenient, non-star role. Sometimes, it’s for the best. Bosh’s development into a 3-point shooter and defensive destroyer was mesmerizing to watch, for instance. He became a more complete, interesting and respected player for his transformations in Miami. Had Walker signed last summer, Porzingis might have been the Bosh. But in the aftermath of Golden State’s brief gamification of the league, with its two high-usage stars and two more non-archetypal ones, we have seen a hard yank back towards duos. It’s now LeBron James and Anthony Davis; Kawhi Leonard and Paul George; Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving; Russell Westbrook and Harden; even Jayson Tatum and Walker. The third stars of yesteryear were often used for their elite shooting and defensive exploits, or their secondary creation and second unit scoring, which are skill sets you can find from players who have never made All-Star teams. It doesn’t make the Big Three model wrong in its time. It does, perhaps, make it obsolete.
Or, you could argue, makes any team who successfully adds a third star a rising dynasty.
How would Dallas even acquire a third star?
Dallas is committed to nearly $110 million in salary next season if Tim Hardaway Jr. deploys his player option. I don’t have any read on whether he will opt in or not and, at this exact moment, I doubt he knows, either. We also don’t know how the league’s postponement and the pandemic’s financial uncertainty will affect free agency. Either way, Dallas will likely be unable to sign a major free agent whenever this year’s free agency period occurs. It’s a weak free agency class, anyway.
In 2021, Dallas has about $84 million committed to players. (That number could increase if they use the mid-level exception this offseason.) It would be the final offseason with Doncic on his rookie contract, meaning it would be the final offseason with the flexibility that contract provides. While $84 million isn’t enough space to sign someone to a max contract – you would need $25 or $30 million if the salary cap remains around $100 million, which a smart coworker says is likely through cap smoothing – it is low enough to reasonably make room. You could try moving Dwight Powell or Maxi Kleber, both likely to still be useful players, to shed $11 million or $8 million, respectively. You would certainly have enough room if you dealt them both. Seth Curry’s $8 million should be very moveable, too. If Giannis Antetokounmpo says he wants to be a Maverick, you make the emotionally hard decisions to trade away good role players for little in return to create the necessary cap space.
Does Antetokounmpo want that? I have no idea. There are other potential targets next summer, of course. Jrue Holiday, if he declined his player option, would be 31. Kyle Lowry and Mike Conley would both be available, too, but they would be 35 and 33, respectively. Evan Fournier would be going into unrestricted free agency while Lonzo Ball would be restricted. Antetokounmpo is the only superstar on that list. Much can change, but it doesn’t seem like Leonard or George would decline their options to join Dallas. Victor Oladipo is the most fascinating name in the 2021 free agency pool to me. Could you trust his health and believe that his only successful season is duplicable? Today, certainly not. In 12 months, perhaps.
But Antetokounmpo is the clear superstar. It’s slightly gross and certainly unhelpful to keep speculating about his future plans, so let’s just acknowledge him and move on. Bradley Beal seemed like an obvious second choice before he signed an extension that will keep him employed by the Wizards until 2023. Could Dallas trade for Beal? It would require sending Washington about $22 million in salary, which could be done with Hardaway’s opted-in contract next season plus Justin Jackson or Delon Wright. But it doesn’t seem too likely that Washington would agree. Why would they? It’s not a ransom, doesn’t include a promising young player and isn’t going to improve the team. Jalen Brunson probably isn’t good enough to fit that second criterion, and I hate always mentioning his name in these scenarios since Dallas likes him plenty. We know transactions can transform from unlikely hypotheticals to Shams Charania tweets within days, sometimes hours, in this league, but I do not have high hopes for Beal on this team, however.
The $19 million that Hardaway could opt into next season would be a great contract, numerically, to match other teams and make deals happen. But Hardaway was crucial this season. For Beal, yes, you would deal him. How many other available young players are better for this team than Hardaway, though? You could argue about Aaron Gordon. The whole league has its eye on the Philadelphia situation and their non-complementary star duo. Remember that Hardaway has averaged 17 points this season as a starter while hitting 43 percent of his 3s. He’s still only 28. If he picks up his option, I feel confident that production isn’t flukish.
These aren’t clear paths to adding third stars; they’re more like vague ideas of various paths that could exist somewhere out there, untraveled upon yet. This league mocks those who try predicting it. But there are some ways and outcomes, however slight, where Dallas could sign another star in the next year.
Does Dallas need a third star?
Let’s return to Kemba Walker, an undisputed star who could have been better than any free agent Dallas had signed in its franchise history and yet a player that three-fourths of the fanbase, at least by our survey, was ultimately glad to not sign. Walker is 30, for starters. He and Doncic finished last season with the first- and fourth-most touches after the All-Star break. There were timeline, usage and defensive concerns involved with Walker’s questionable fit. But some of those same concerns could have materialized if Dallas had managed to sign Bradley Beal next summer. Even Antetokounmpo would be a curious fit next to a ball-dominant Doncic, who possesses the ball for nearly nine minutes every game this season, second-most in the league. Antetokounmpo is so obviously talented that the duo would figure it out, and some of this question is about Doncic, who could very well be asked to slightly reduce his touches in the coming years. (That’s another topic we’ll dive into later in this series.)
Ultimately, I have posed a question that has no real answer. No, Dallas doesn’t need a third star. And yes, if they were to sign one, it would need to be the right type of star player. Yes, Dallas can win a championship with Doncic and Porzingis as its best two players – an unproven theory but a rational one. But no, having Doncic and Porzingis as your two best players likely doesn’t make Dallas this decade’s new dynasty. I guess that’s the goal, right? Undisturbed dominance? In that context, then, of course the Dallas front office wants to pursue Antetokounmpo.
Teams can aim big without compromising more conservative plans; they can also be overambitious and double down on uncertain gambles. For example, not using this summer’s mid-level exception on a quality veteran who can improve the roster because they want to preserve cap space for Antetokounmpo. That would be foolish. It’s a repeat of how the team missed out on drafting Antetokounmpo in the first place. But keeping up with Alex Saratsis, Antetokounmpo’s agent, throughout the year after establishing an initial relationship when Kostas Antetokounmpo was on the team? That’s good, smart business. There’s nothing wrong with that.
If you made me the omnipotent god of basketball transactions, I would place an established, veteran point guard like Holiday or Conley on the Mavericks today. It’s the team’s largest hole, a starting-caliber creator who’s mature enough to settle into the background when Doncic’s dominating. It’s a skill set that Dallas needs more than a specific archetype; if you could find that secondary creator with off-ball skills in a wing, sure, go for it. I prefer smartly crafted teams over dynasties floating one tier above the rest of the league, but the front office’s job isn’t appeasing local basketball writer Tim Cato. I enjoyed the 2011 championship for delayed gratification that felt entirely earned, but I have still criticized the front office for choices made prior to and following the title. Understanding that their job is to pursue the most super third superstar in existence is crucial to writing about this team.
So, if you forced me to answer once and for all? No. I believe the team’s smartest path forwards is building a smartly constructed team of role players and starters around two stars which, if done correctly, would cause the team to arrive at contention status within one season and three. And I believe they have accomplished some of that already with the roster they have. But I also believe that the front office isn’t content with plans that humble. They would prefer to seek immortality. Which is fine, I suppose, as long as it’s not the only acceptable path forwards.
https://theathletic.com/1877210/2020/06/18/state-of-the-mavericks-does-dallas-need-to-add-a-third-superstar/
Dallas might want a third star more than Maverick fans themselves. Last summer, the team pursued Kemba Walker, very nearly successfully — thwarted only by the 11th-hour appearance of a more convenient Eastern Conference suitor in the Boston Celtics. Dallas, I have been told, was expecting to sign Walker prior to Boston’s emergence. Dallas fans, however, were less unified. “He’s polarizing as hell,” I wrote last year. “I must have heard a dozen different opinions about him in recent weeks from Mavericks fans who like, dislike or just don’t have much faith in the planned pursuit of Walker when July 1 arrives.”
That article was titled, “Kemba Walker could be the best free agent Dallas has ever signed. Maybe they shouldn’t.” That has now emerged as the consensus opinion among this fanbase, at least the active online community. When I surveyed fans after the season postponement, 74 percent of the respondents were glad that the team had not signed Walker in 2019. Walker, now a 30-year-old lead ballhandler with a necessarily high usage rate, doesn’t adjudicate Maverick fan feelings towards any third star in any context, of course. But it’s curious; a failed signing of an objectively good basketball player has largely brought sighs of relief from the fan base one year later. It makes you wonder: Do the Mavericks with Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis need a third star?
Inherent in this question is your belief or lack thereof in Porzingis, his stardom and his sustainability. Next week, as we continue digging deep into the complex questions that Dallas will face while attempting to build a dynasty, we will take a deeper look at him. Let’s assume, for now at least, that he is what most expect he can be: a reliable second scorer, a floor spacer, a rim protector, a good-if-not-great defender, all while staying healthy enough. Likewise, let’s assume Doncic is who we think he is: a once-in-a-generation offensive maestro and top-five player in this league. (There’s little doubt in that prognostication, incredibly.)
With those two players on the team, did the Mavericks need Walker? Do they need Giannis Antetokounmpo? Do they need Bradley Beal? Even if you balk at the word need, what would the pursuit of such a third star mean for the team’s team building future? This is the question at hand.
First, though, let’s examine history.
What’s the history and future of basketball star trios?
Basketball of the 20th century thrived on trios. Hell, in 1962, the Boston Celtics sent four players to the All-Star game and repeated it 13 years later. Philadelphia accomplished the same feat in 1983. But those are outliers: the 76ers, for example, had Moses Malone, Julius Erving and Maurice Cheeks start the 1983 All-Star Game while someone named Andrew Toney snuck onto the reserves. Toney had a successful eight-year career and averaged nearly 20 points that season, but we can all acknowledge he wasn’t a superstar like the other three. Anyway, basketball was different then.
The 2000s started with a trio-duo duel; the Spurs trio and the Lakers duo combined for five championships in a six-year span. Detroit won the one outlier championship without any superstars, you could argue, although it had four players awarded as All-Stars. 2006 happened. San Antonio nabbed another. Boston won with a Big Three. Los Angeles took the next two with a Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol duo. Dirk Nowitzki won his with a team so devoid of a real second star that it’s hard to even say who was the second-best player. And you know how the rest of the decade went, with the league contenders reacting to Miami’s star trio by attempting to build their own. Golden State was ultimately most effective, including two consecutive seasons of a Big Four thanks to unprecedented salary cap hijinks.
What’s a superstar, anyway? We know the traditional archetype as a high-usage volume scorer, but we also know you can’t realistically fit three such players on the same team in today’s modern game. The third star either gets relegated to a smaller role (Kevin Love and Chris Bosh) or has always played it (San Antonio’s Manu Ginobili and Oklahoma City’s James Harden) or never fit the archetype anyway (Ray Allen and Klay Thompson). Allen did spend more time on the ball in his Seattle days, to be fair, even if his core game was always that of an elite off-ball shooter. Completely atypical stars like Draymond Green muddle this conversation even more. But the bottom line is I cannot name any successful offenses with three true dynamos in the past two decades. In fact, it seems like Oklahoma City came closest – and, fearful of that uncertain dynamic, traded away Harden the moment before he would have demanded his proportional share of the ball and salary cap.
It largely seems, then, that Big Threes are inaptly named Big Twos with a famous third-best player smushed into a more convenient, non-star role. Sometimes, it’s for the best. Bosh’s development into a 3-point shooter and defensive destroyer was mesmerizing to watch, for instance. He became a more complete, interesting and respected player for his transformations in Miami. Had Walker signed last summer, Porzingis might have been the Bosh. But in the aftermath of Golden State’s brief gamification of the league, with its two high-usage stars and two more non-archetypal ones, we have seen a hard yank back towards duos. It’s now LeBron James and Anthony Davis; Kawhi Leonard and Paul George; Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving; Russell Westbrook and Harden; even Jayson Tatum and Walker. The third stars of yesteryear were often used for their elite shooting and defensive exploits, or their secondary creation and second unit scoring, which are skill sets you can find from players who have never made All-Star teams. It doesn’t make the Big Three model wrong in its time. It does, perhaps, make it obsolete.
Or, you could argue, makes any team who successfully adds a third star a rising dynasty.
How would Dallas even acquire a third star?
Dallas is committed to nearly $110 million in salary next season if Tim Hardaway Jr. deploys his player option. I don’t have any read on whether he will opt in or not and, at this exact moment, I doubt he knows, either. We also don’t know how the league’s postponement and the pandemic’s financial uncertainty will affect free agency. Either way, Dallas will likely be unable to sign a major free agent whenever this year’s free agency period occurs. It’s a weak free agency class, anyway.
In 2021, Dallas has about $84 million committed to players. (That number could increase if they use the mid-level exception this offseason.) It would be the final offseason with Doncic on his rookie contract, meaning it would be the final offseason with the flexibility that contract provides. While $84 million isn’t enough space to sign someone to a max contract – you would need $25 or $30 million if the salary cap remains around $100 million, which a smart coworker says is likely through cap smoothing – it is low enough to reasonably make room. You could try moving Dwight Powell or Maxi Kleber, both likely to still be useful players, to shed $11 million or $8 million, respectively. You would certainly have enough room if you dealt them both. Seth Curry’s $8 million should be very moveable, too. If Giannis Antetokounmpo says he wants to be a Maverick, you make the emotionally hard decisions to trade away good role players for little in return to create the necessary cap space.
Does Antetokounmpo want that? I have no idea. There are other potential targets next summer, of course. Jrue Holiday, if he declined his player option, would be 31. Kyle Lowry and Mike Conley would both be available, too, but they would be 35 and 33, respectively. Evan Fournier would be going into unrestricted free agency while Lonzo Ball would be restricted. Antetokounmpo is the only superstar on that list. Much can change, but it doesn’t seem like Leonard or George would decline their options to join Dallas. Victor Oladipo is the most fascinating name in the 2021 free agency pool to me. Could you trust his health and believe that his only successful season is duplicable? Today, certainly not. In 12 months, perhaps.
But Antetokounmpo is the clear superstar. It’s slightly gross and certainly unhelpful to keep speculating about his future plans, so let’s just acknowledge him and move on. Bradley Beal seemed like an obvious second choice before he signed an extension that will keep him employed by the Wizards until 2023. Could Dallas trade for Beal? It would require sending Washington about $22 million in salary, which could be done with Hardaway’s opted-in contract next season plus Justin Jackson or Delon Wright. But it doesn’t seem too likely that Washington would agree. Why would they? It’s not a ransom, doesn’t include a promising young player and isn’t going to improve the team. Jalen Brunson probably isn’t good enough to fit that second criterion, and I hate always mentioning his name in these scenarios since Dallas likes him plenty. We know transactions can transform from unlikely hypotheticals to Shams Charania tweets within days, sometimes hours, in this league, but I do not have high hopes for Beal on this team, however.
The $19 million that Hardaway could opt into next season would be a great contract, numerically, to match other teams and make deals happen. But Hardaway was crucial this season. For Beal, yes, you would deal him. How many other available young players are better for this team than Hardaway, though? You could argue about Aaron Gordon. The whole league has its eye on the Philadelphia situation and their non-complementary star duo. Remember that Hardaway has averaged 17 points this season as a starter while hitting 43 percent of his 3s. He’s still only 28. If he picks up his option, I feel confident that production isn’t flukish.
These aren’t clear paths to adding third stars; they’re more like vague ideas of various paths that could exist somewhere out there, untraveled upon yet. This league mocks those who try predicting it. But there are some ways and outcomes, however slight, where Dallas could sign another star in the next year.
Does Dallas need a third star?
Let’s return to Kemba Walker, an undisputed star who could have been better than any free agent Dallas had signed in its franchise history and yet a player that three-fourths of the fanbase, at least by our survey, was ultimately glad to not sign. Walker is 30, for starters. He and Doncic finished last season with the first- and fourth-most touches after the All-Star break. There were timeline, usage and defensive concerns involved with Walker’s questionable fit. But some of those same concerns could have materialized if Dallas had managed to sign Bradley Beal next summer. Even Antetokounmpo would be a curious fit next to a ball-dominant Doncic, who possesses the ball for nearly nine minutes every game this season, second-most in the league. Antetokounmpo is so obviously talented that the duo would figure it out, and some of this question is about Doncic, who could very well be asked to slightly reduce his touches in the coming years. (That’s another topic we’ll dive into later in this series.)
Ultimately, I have posed a question that has no real answer. No, Dallas doesn’t need a third star. And yes, if they were to sign one, it would need to be the right type of star player. Yes, Dallas can win a championship with Doncic and Porzingis as its best two players – an unproven theory but a rational one. But no, having Doncic and Porzingis as your two best players likely doesn’t make Dallas this decade’s new dynasty. I guess that’s the goal, right? Undisturbed dominance? In that context, then, of course the Dallas front office wants to pursue Antetokounmpo.
Teams can aim big without compromising more conservative plans; they can also be overambitious and double down on uncertain gambles. For example, not using this summer’s mid-level exception on a quality veteran who can improve the roster because they want to preserve cap space for Antetokounmpo. That would be foolish. It’s a repeat of how the team missed out on drafting Antetokounmpo in the first place. But keeping up with Alex Saratsis, Antetokounmpo’s agent, throughout the year after establishing an initial relationship when Kostas Antetokounmpo was on the team? That’s good, smart business. There’s nothing wrong with that.
If you made me the omnipotent god of basketball transactions, I would place an established, veteran point guard like Holiday or Conley on the Mavericks today. It’s the team’s largest hole, a starting-caliber creator who’s mature enough to settle into the background when Doncic’s dominating. It’s a skill set that Dallas needs more than a specific archetype; if you could find that secondary creator with off-ball skills in a wing, sure, go for it. I prefer smartly crafted teams over dynasties floating one tier above the rest of the league, but the front office’s job isn’t appeasing local basketball writer Tim Cato. I enjoyed the 2011 championship for delayed gratification that felt entirely earned, but I have still criticized the front office for choices made prior to and following the title. Understanding that their job is to pursue the most super third superstar in existence is crucial to writing about this team.
So, if you forced me to answer once and for all? No. I believe the team’s smartest path forwards is building a smartly constructed team of role players and starters around two stars which, if done correctly, would cause the team to arrive at contention status within one season and three. And I believe they have accomplished some of that already with the roster they have. But I also believe that the front office isn’t content with plans that humble. They would prefer to seek immortality. Which is fine, I suppose, as long as it’s not the only acceptable path forwards.
https://theathletic.com/1877210/2020/06/18/state-of-the-mavericks-does-dallas-need-to-add-a-third-superstar/
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