Mavs Donuts: This'll Rank in Top 10 Strangest Seasons in Team History
DALLAS - Call it "August Anarchy'' ... and let's try to place it in "The Top 10 Strangest Seasons in Dallas Mavericks’ History'' ...
DONUT 12: The Strangest Season Ever The Dallas Mavericks haven’t lost a game since March 10, yet are a 40/1 longshot to win this year’s NBA championship.
At a time normally reserved for compelling playoffs, their owner Mark Cuban is making headlines by being named to a Presidential committee combating a pandemic virus and by marching in a protest for racial equality/against police brutality.
And, hijacking an early Fall sports drama usually starring baseball, the NBA will play regular-season games in August, The Finals into October, determine a champion inside an Orlando bubble, and present a crown adorned with asterisks and mouse ears.
Welcome to COVID-19/NBA-2020, the strangest season in the history of professional basketball. ... Which is why it's fitting that we're counting these Donuts in reverse.
DONUT 11: 'Everybody is Frothing' As America continues to reawaken from its coronavirus slumber, the NBA has a tentative plan to commence – make that, conclude – its season. A second training camp is set to start June 30. Teams in playoff contention – 13 from the West, nine from the East – will convene at the Walt Disney World Resort in central Florida in July. After eight regular-season games, the “traditional” playoff format will begin.
The new schedule will start July 31 and end, at the latest, Oct. 12.
The caveat, of course, is that it could all get scrapped with a couple of positive tests for COVID-19 (think LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard or Giannis Antetokounmpo). All games will be played inside Disney’s “bubble”, limited to players, league personnel and certain media. No fans. Even with strict protocols, daily testing and social distancing, re-boot of the regular season will remain tenuous the next seven weeks and into the playoffs.
“Everybody is just frothing,” Cuban said last week on SiriusXM radio. “You know, these guys are athletes. They’re professional basketball players. This is what they love to do, and they want to play. Everyone is really, really looking forward to figuring this out.”
Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis and company? We're frothing, too. It may not be the winningest season in Mavs’ history, but it will no doubt be the weirdest.
That’s a mouthful, considering the 40-year-old franchise has endured a lost 2-0 lead in The Finals, an upset first-round loss as a 67-win No. 1 seed, “Moody Madness”, an unlikely championship run and ensuing breakup of its roster, an 11-win season, 50- and 66-game regular seasons due to labor lockouts and the abrupt resignation after a 55-win season of its first head coach.
So here goes ... if Fish doesn't mind, again, we'll count Donuts backwards ... The Top 10 Strangest Mavericks’ Seasons:
DONUT 10. 1984 -Moody Madness! Even George Orwell couldn’t predict a first-ever playoff appearance, punctuated by the memorable “Moody Madness” series-clinching win over Sonics. (Read all about it here.)
DONUT 9. 1999 - Is Dirk Good? In a regular season shortened to 50 games because of a lockout, 20-year-old rookie Dirk Nowitzki looks mostly overmatched in averaging 8.2 points per game on 40-percent shooting.
DONUT 8. 1993 - Big Uglies Ugliest season in franchise history features losing streaks of 12, 15 and 19, costing head coach Richie Adubato his job. Despite a backcourt of veteran Derek Harper and rookie No. 4 overall pick Jim Jackson they are 4-45 at the All-Star break and finish 11-71, an unfathomable 44 games behind the Rockets in the Midwest Division.
DONUT 7. 2006 - Wade Is Jordan! 2-0 lead in The Finals painfully evaporates, thanks for Mayor Laura Miller’s premature parade plans and Dwyane Wade’s perpetual trips to the free-throw line.
DONUT 6. 2012 - Fizzled After a regular season shortened to 66 games because of a lockout, the defending champs’ title defense fizzles without Tyson Chandler, J.J. Barea and DeShawn Stevenson and with a shocking 4-0 first-round loss to Thunder.
DONUT 5. 1987 - Sorry for What? In the wake of a 55-27 season ended by a first-round loss to Seattle, Dick Motta – the only head coach in franchise history – abruptly resigns by simply reading a cryptic statement: “Friendship means never having to say you’re sorry.”
DONUT 4. 1997 - Bye, Bye Bye Just two seasons removed from a “Three Js” rebuilding project founded on Jason Kidd, Jamal Mashburn and Jim Jackson, all three stars are traded in the span of seven weeks during a 24-win disaster.
DONUT 3. 2011 - Finally, a Title! Widely considered a playoff afterthought, they blow a 23-point lead in a first-round, Game 4 loss to Portland before Dirk Nowitzki leads unlikely triumphs over LaMarcus Aldridge (Blazers), Kobe Bryant (Lakers), Kevin Durant-Russell Westbrook-James Harden (Thunder) and LeBron James-Dwyane Wade-Chris Bosh (Heat). And a title.
DONUT 2. 2007 - Oh, Nellie An 0-4 start is transformed into a 67-15 regular-season record and the West’s No. 1 seed, but is erased as league MVP Dirk Nowitzki flops in humiliating first-round upset loss to Warriors and former coach Don Nelson.
DONUT 1. 2020 - The Final Word Stay tuned …
