The most exciting thing about this video, to me, is that it shows definitively that Nerlens Noel is alive and ready to catch lobs. As a card-carrying member of the Nerlens Noel fanclub and certified conductor of the Nerlens Noel hype-train, this season has been a huge disappointment for me. But I’ll wait until Noel gets some highlights on my channel before really going deep into this whole sitch.
For now, we’ve got Dennis Smith Jr., the rookie who is pretty much perfect for leading the Mavs’ tank. He’s got everything you want in a tank commander: raw enough that more minutes will result in more development, good enough that the fans keep showing up, and bad enough that he costs more wins than he gains. All of Dallas’ goals are met when he plays big minutes, so big minutes he will play until the end of the season.
He was good tonight, and even that wasn’t close to enough for a win. Nice! 23 and 8, only 4 turnovers, no lobs to Dirk but we’ve got a lot of season left to get those in, if I’m a Mavericks fan I’m feeling pretty good about things. Minus the whole “rampant institutional harassment” thing they have going on.