nbascribe
06-19-2006, 11:07 AM
How poignant. A columnist calling Dirk out...:lmao
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Big German is a big bust
JENNIFER FLOYD ENGEL
In My Opinion
MIAMI -- The Big German was The Big No Show. Again.
For anybody who believes they have never seen Mavs All-Star and superstar Dirk Nowitzki play back-to-back clunkers, welcome to South Beach.
He strung together two complete games of mediocre plus 6:33 of less than impressive in his time in Miami.
Not coincidentally, the Mavs lost Games 3, 4 and 5 -- including an absolute heartbreaking 101-100 overtime defeat Sunday -- to the Heat and now return to Dallas with just as many victories as when they left a week ago.
Two.
Which is how the Mavs find themselves a loss away from elimination in this NBA Finals. All is not lost, of course. Miami has yet to win in Dallas. At all. This year.
Home, Miami or Pluto, if Dirk continues playing like he has for too long of stretches in this series, the Mavs will not win.
"We'll go home and get some home cooking and Dirk will be ready," Mavs guard Jason Terry said. "We're not concerned about anything Dirk does offensively. I thought he was there all night defensively."
What is wrong is a lot more complex than just simply Dirk. There was the big group collapse late in Game 3 followed by a collective Mav no show in Game 4 followed by an officiating malfunction in Game 5 where officials absolutely practiced enough stupidity to lead reasonable people to believe in conspiracies.
And while all of this is blog worthy and makes for good talk radio conversation, good teams find a way.
Great players make sure they do.
Dirk finished 8-for-19 for 20 points. Hardly embarrassing.
However, this was a back-and-forth, forth-and-back game of H-O-R-S-E that spilled into overtime, with big players nailing big shot after big shot after big shot.
Except for one.
Dirk.
He had a big goose egg in overtime until 9.1 seconds remained. It was then he nailed a brutally wicked fadeaway with Shaq's hand in his face that gave his Mavs a slim one-point lead.
All that was needed was a defensive stop.
It did not come. Instead Heat guard and official Mavs killer Dwyane Wade made another big-time play, drawing a foul from Dirk with 1.9 second remaining.
Nowitzki had help in this portion of his late overtime frustration; what referees whistled him for can only be described as a phantom swipe.
Was it a foul?
Replays clearly showed that Dirk took a swipe at Wade but, if there was contact, it was certainly not the blow-the-whistle-with-1.9-seconds-remaining-in-the-game kind.
Are you kidding me?
Dirk obviously disagreed.
"It was a tough call," Nowitzki said. "Dwyane pushed off like three guys to get to the basket...I kind of thought I went out of the way, and they gave him the call. I thought it was a tough call."
This is the kind of stuff that leads Mavs owner Mark Cuban to blog in anger and provokes a usually composed Avery to go ballistic about NBA inconsistency.
Wade, of course, banged home both free throws which were interrupted by an unnecessary and confusing timeout that refs assessed before not after Wade's second free throw.
Mavs lose.
Dirk walked off, kicking air and angrily tossing the ball into the stands.
"Obviously frustration," he explained. "That is a tough loss. You know to lose a game like that when we are up by one...They tied the game, then we go up with a couple of seconds left and they get a call. So more than anything it is frustration."
The reality is the Mavs were trying to do the impossible for most of their time down in South Beach. They were trying to win without their best player playing like it.
At his best, Dirk has been OK. Unfortunately, not a lot of his time in Miami has been spent at what I have come to expect from him -- performances like we saw in Game 5 in Phoenix.
Game 4 in Miami was a case of the not-so-good Dirk with him going an ugly 2-for-14 for 16 points. His numbers were not much better in Game 5.
"He still played a great game," Heat forward Udonis Haslem said. "He still made plays at the end."
Dirk certainly had his moments Sunday. With 10.1 seconds left in regulation, Nowitzki drove, drawing three defenders to him. He then delivered a perfect pass to Erick Dampier underneath for a dunk.
He also had that fadeaway which was ruined by his phantom foul.
If the Mavs are going to have a chance to win both games in Dallas, Dirk has to be better.
He has to be better than, or at least somewhere in the vicinity of, what Wade is doing for Miami. What he has done is nothing less than hoist his Heat teammates upon his back and carry them to within a victory away from a championship.
And trust me, Antoine Walker is heavy.
Meanwhile, with his Mavs teammates doing plenty of heavy lifting alongside of him, Dirk has been simply all right.
Howard had 25, Terry 35, in Game 5.
What was needed was a big game from The Big German. What they got instead was The Big No Show.
It has to change. Or this Finals will officially become The Big Disappointment.
Jennifer Floyd Engel can be heard weekdays 9 a.m.-noon on Dennis and Engel on ESPN/103.3 FM.
Jennifer Floyd Engel, 817-390-7760 [email protected]
© 2006 Star-Telegram and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.dfw.com
=========
Big German is a big bust
JENNIFER FLOYD ENGEL
In My Opinion
MIAMI -- The Big German was The Big No Show. Again.
For anybody who believes they have never seen Mavs All-Star and superstar Dirk Nowitzki play back-to-back clunkers, welcome to South Beach.
He strung together two complete games of mediocre plus 6:33 of less than impressive in his time in Miami.
Not coincidentally, the Mavs lost Games 3, 4 and 5 -- including an absolute heartbreaking 101-100 overtime defeat Sunday -- to the Heat and now return to Dallas with just as many victories as when they left a week ago.
Two.
Which is how the Mavs find themselves a loss away from elimination in this NBA Finals. All is not lost, of course. Miami has yet to win in Dallas. At all. This year.
Home, Miami or Pluto, if Dirk continues playing like he has for too long of stretches in this series, the Mavs will not win.
"We'll go home and get some home cooking and Dirk will be ready," Mavs guard Jason Terry said. "We're not concerned about anything Dirk does offensively. I thought he was there all night defensively."
What is wrong is a lot more complex than just simply Dirk. There was the big group collapse late in Game 3 followed by a collective Mav no show in Game 4 followed by an officiating malfunction in Game 5 where officials absolutely practiced enough stupidity to lead reasonable people to believe in conspiracies.
And while all of this is blog worthy and makes for good talk radio conversation, good teams find a way.
Great players make sure they do.
Dirk finished 8-for-19 for 20 points. Hardly embarrassing.
However, this was a back-and-forth, forth-and-back game of H-O-R-S-E that spilled into overtime, with big players nailing big shot after big shot after big shot.
Except for one.
Dirk.
He had a big goose egg in overtime until 9.1 seconds remained. It was then he nailed a brutally wicked fadeaway with Shaq's hand in his face that gave his Mavs a slim one-point lead.
All that was needed was a defensive stop.
It did not come. Instead Heat guard and official Mavs killer Dwyane Wade made another big-time play, drawing a foul from Dirk with 1.9 second remaining.
Nowitzki had help in this portion of his late overtime frustration; what referees whistled him for can only be described as a phantom swipe.
Was it a foul?
Replays clearly showed that Dirk took a swipe at Wade but, if there was contact, it was certainly not the blow-the-whistle-with-1.9-seconds-remaining-in-the-game kind.
Are you kidding me?
Dirk obviously disagreed.
"It was a tough call," Nowitzki said. "Dwyane pushed off like three guys to get to the basket...I kind of thought I went out of the way, and they gave him the call. I thought it was a tough call."
This is the kind of stuff that leads Mavs owner Mark Cuban to blog in anger and provokes a usually composed Avery to go ballistic about NBA inconsistency.
Wade, of course, banged home both free throws which were interrupted by an unnecessary and confusing timeout that refs assessed before not after Wade's second free throw.
Mavs lose.
Dirk walked off, kicking air and angrily tossing the ball into the stands.
"Obviously frustration," he explained. "That is a tough loss. You know to lose a game like that when we are up by one...They tied the game, then we go up with a couple of seconds left and they get a call. So more than anything it is frustration."
The reality is the Mavs were trying to do the impossible for most of their time down in South Beach. They were trying to win without their best player playing like it.
At his best, Dirk has been OK. Unfortunately, not a lot of his time in Miami has been spent at what I have come to expect from him -- performances like we saw in Game 5 in Phoenix.
Game 4 in Miami was a case of the not-so-good Dirk with him going an ugly 2-for-14 for 16 points. His numbers were not much better in Game 5.
"He still played a great game," Heat forward Udonis Haslem said. "He still made plays at the end."
Dirk certainly had his moments Sunday. With 10.1 seconds left in regulation, Nowitzki drove, drawing three defenders to him. He then delivered a perfect pass to Erick Dampier underneath for a dunk.
He also had that fadeaway which was ruined by his phantom foul.
If the Mavs are going to have a chance to win both games in Dallas, Dirk has to be better.
He has to be better than, or at least somewhere in the vicinity of, what Wade is doing for Miami. What he has done is nothing less than hoist his Heat teammates upon his back and carry them to within a victory away from a championship.
And trust me, Antoine Walker is heavy.
Meanwhile, with his Mavs teammates doing plenty of heavy lifting alongside of him, Dirk has been simply all right.
Howard had 25, Terry 35, in Game 5.
What was needed was a big game from The Big German. What they got instead was The Big No Show.
It has to change. Or this Finals will officially become The Big Disappointment.
Jennifer Floyd Engel can be heard weekdays 9 a.m.-noon on Dennis and Engel on ESPN/103.3 FM.
Jennifer Floyd Engel, 817-390-7760 [email protected]
© 2006 Star-Telegram and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.dfw.com