“I Wear My Sunglasses at Night…”
When next July’s free-agent wooing period kicks off, emojis of planes, trains, yachts, motorbikes, drones, Segways and hoverboards will, once again, fly across social media. Only this time around, it could finally be Zaza Pachulia that finds the doors to his estate Krazy-glued to the jambs and the knobs ripped off.
America’s Fallback Big Man gets a visit from the team where he discovered his greatest NBA prominence. The Atlanta Hawks arrive at the Metroplex following a four-day break to face Pachulia’s Dallas Mavericks (9:30 PM, ESPN, Fox Sports Southeast, Fox Sports Southwest).
This past summer, Mavs owner Mark Cuban leapt with both feet into the Shark Tank to snag a big free agent fish: namely, the Clippers’ DeAndre Jordan. He managed to earn a big bite, but came out of the ensuing ordeal looking all wet. Jordan had boxed Cuban out while his Clipper teammates boxed Jordan in. L.A. pulled out all the stops to encourage DeAndre to renege on Dallas’ handsome offer, and to disallow Cuban a second chance to make a first impression.
Along the way, the Mavs’ incumbent center Tyson Chandler was so peeved by Dallas’ sudden negligence that he ran off on a free agent deal with Phoenix. By then, there were slim pickings among the remaining free agent options, and by slim, I mean Javale McGee Slim. Dallas went from perceived title contention, with Jordan manning the middle and a recuperating Wesley Matthews at the wing, to a team with a Texas-sized sinkhole at the 5-spot that will struggle to make the playoffs out West.
Along Came Zaza. Sounds like a good mid-season replacement sitcom, no?
Out of nowhere, did your starting center from the prior season kick the bucket just two weeks before Opening Night? Did your All-Star center get shelved for the season after popping a pec? Did your emergent young franchise center, hardly a year removed from signing a lucrative contract-extension deal, flame out of the very idea of playing pro hoops altogether? After losing out on both Chandler and Jordan, are you on the verge of starting your venerable good-soldier Dirk Nowitzki at the five? In case of emergency, break glass, and reach for Zaza Pachulia.
Mavs GM Donnie Nelson did just that. After getting bridesmaided in the DeAndre Sweepstakes, Dallas traded a second-round pick to Milwaukee in exchange for the 31-year-old (Republic of) Georgian, who has always seen himself as much more than a stopgap plugging up personnel dam breaks.
These days, Chandler is back to looking brittle in Phoenix, and Jordan’s free-throw clanking and wishy-washy play is but one of many issues on a middling Clipper squad. Sometimes, as Cuban would happily advise, it’s the move you didn’t make that makes the difference. Under the old format for All-Star balloting, it would no longer be surprising to find Pachulia near the top of the Center votes. His play has underscored Dallas’ position firmly in the Western Conference standings, sitting at 13-9 ahead of tonight’s contest.
Zaza has been all that anyone could ask for; as usual, all that anyone ever seems to ask for, and more. A pivot that averages a double-double (10.7 PPG; 10.0 RPG, 9th in NBA; 12 double-doubles, 3rd in NBA), hits more than half his free throws (77.8 FT%), racks up steals (0.9 SPG) and can pass out of the post (2.0 APG)? Where does one sign up for that?
As a free agent in 2016, a 32-year-old Pachulia won’t just be chasing options as a third-stringer, like he did when he rejoined Atlanta’s displaced coach Larry Drew in Milwaukee back in 2013. There will be starting spots to fill around the league, and this time the Mavs might be the ones holing themselves up in a house to keep their guy.
Primarily an offensive rebounder (3.1 O-Rebs per game, 9th in NBA) for much of his career, Z-Pac has been getting it done at both ends, his 6.9 defensive boards per game besting his career-high 5.2 as an emergency starter with the 2011-12 Hawks. It’s become obvious that Zaza has been working on back-to-the-basket post moves. While long-revered in Atlanta, he was humorously notorious for missing chipshots around the rim. His career-best 61.0 FG% around the rim, and 55.1% within ten feet, has been no laughing matter this season.
Zaza’s presence has taken a ton of pressure off of Nowitzki, Dallas’ 37-year-old leading scorer (17.9 PPG) whose 60.7 TS% is the second-highest mark in his storied, Hall of Fame-bound career; his 5.8 turnover percentage is a career-low. With his longtime coach Rick Carlisle having been granted a five-year extension, newcomer guards Deron Williams (15.2 PPG, career-low 13.7 TO%) and Matthews (35.9 FG%) getting up to speed, and backup big Dwight Powell (team-high 25.7 D-Reb%, 17th in NBA) blossoming off the bench, Dirk cannot be more satisfied with the way things are shaking out.
Carlisle is perfecting Mike Budenholzer’s method to madness on defense: by design, the Mavericks rank dead last in offensive rebounding percentage (19.5 O-Reb%; tomorrow’s opponent, OKC, ranks 1st). By leaving all but the most available extra-chances (by Zaza) alone in order to get back in sound defensive position (9.5 second-chance PPG, tied with Spurs for fewest in NBA), Dallas has its best defensive efficiency (100.5 D-Rating, 4th best in the West) in its past four seasons.
The steals and blocks are bottom-ten in the league, but the Mavs are generally forcing foes into tough, deep, well-contested shots (27.0 opponent 3FG attempts per game, 3rd-most in NBA; 32.3 opponent 3FG%, 5th-lowest in NBA) and securing the boards (77.4 D-Reb%, 8th in NBA) to set the stage for their offense.
As embodied by Dirk’s style of play, what the Mavs do well offensively is drawing lots of contact (23.2 opponent personals per game, 2nd-most in NBA) without turning the ball over (13.8 per game, 4th-fewest in NBA). D-Will (92.9 FT%, 2nd in NBA) and Dirk (89.0 FT%) are both top-ten free throw shooters. If they can’t get shots on drives to the hoop, they’ll settle for plenty of patented step-back mid-range J’s. On shots from the 10-to-14 foot range, Dallas shoots at a league-high 47.8 FG%.
The Mavericks haven’t been proficient from the perimeter (32.6 team 3FG%, 24th in NBA) save for Dirk and D-Will, and aside from Matthews’ 10-for-17 3FG display (season-high 36 points) in a win at Washington on Sunday, both he and Chandler Parsons have been rusty in their returns to action. Former Hawk first-rounder and Mavs preseason star John Jenkins has been lightly used off the bench and has shot just 21.4% from deep. But he is getting more playing time in Carlisle’s recent rotations, especially with J.J Barea (ankle) and Devin Harris (ribs) missing time with injuries.
Until Parsons can get back in the flow, Raymond Felton has taken his place in the Mavs’ starting lineup, shifting Matthews to the 3-spot. Williams and Felton shot a combined 13-for-24 while dishing 12 assists in their triumphant return to New York City proper on Monday.
Parity prevails in the East! While Dallas’ 13-9 record has them currently in a pleasant 4th place out West, Atlanta’s 13-9 record had them sliding down to the 7th slot in the Eastern Conference without really doing anything. Nobody in the conference has more than a two-game winning streak, and none have currently lost more than three in a row. The Hawks (1.5 games back of first in the East) watched every team that was above them drop a game or two during their sorely-needed four-day break. But with fewer games under their belts, none of those teams managed to drop below Atlanta in the standings.
Fortunately, playoff positioning for the defending Eastern Conference regular season champs is irrelevant in December. What is crucial for the Hawks is getting back healthier, and returning to their early-season execution on road trips (1-5 after a 4-0 start) and back-to-back nights (3-3 after a 6-0 start). They’ll head to Oklahoma City for a rematch with the Thunder tomorrow.
Zaza isn’t the only over-30 Euro-hooper who’s been ballin’ outta control lately. Born in the town that invented milk chocolate, Atlanta’s Thabo Sefolosha has been Vevey, Vevey good. It’s arguable that he is enjoying the best season of his near-decade-long career thus far. His per-game scoring (7.6 PPG), steals (1.7 SPG), blocks (0.7 BPG) and rebounding (5.1 RPG) are all career-highs, despite averaging just the fifth-most minutes per game in his ten NBA seasons. His 52.3 FG% blows away his high-water mark of 48.1 FG% from 2012-13. Not too shabby, for a man with a fractured tibia and damaged ligaments just eight months ago.
On the subject of Euro-ballers, it’s hard to forget the game Dennis Schröder had the last time the Hawks visited American Airlines Center. Filling in for an injured Jeff Teague last December, the brisk Braunschweiger broke out for his then-career-high 22 points by making 9-of-15 from the field (6-for-8 at the rim), tacking on six assists and one highlight-reel steal of his mentor Nowitzki.
While it will be tempting for Budenholzer to match Dallas’ small-guard lineup with Teague and Schröder, Kyle Korver will find ample open perimeter looks against Felton, while Schröder can have a greater impact versus the Mavs’ depleted backcourt reserves. While most teams have caught on to Schröder’s Schtick, Dallas lacks the defensive playmakers to both impede Dennis’ relentless forays into the paint and keep his teammates covered.
The Hawks have mastered the art of creating open perimeter shots. They simply haven’t been converting them into points. Based on NBA Player Tracking data, Atlanta has averaged a league-high 15.6 “wide open” three-point attempts (with closest defender six or more feet away) per game, 3.2 more than the Juggernaut State Warriors. But while the Splash Brothers and Company have connected on half of those shots, Atlanta’s 36.4 3FG% ranks just 18th in the league. Leading scorer Paul Millsap (30.8 3FG% down from 35.6% last season; 11.8% in last eight games; 29.0% on “wide open” threes) could be averaging 20+ per game if he would make opponents pay for leaving him so open.
With a hopefully reinvigorated commitment to defensive rebounding and drawing shooting fouls, Al Horford (16.3 PPG, 10.3 RPG, 1.7 BPG, 40.0 3FG%, 81.8 FT% last week) earned himself an Eastern Conference Player of the Week nomination. Depth at the frontcourt positions will be restored with the return of Tiago Splitter (hip) to game action. The sooner Splitter can return to being the pick-and-roll defensive savant of days past, the sooner Atlanta (100.6 D-Rating, 9th in East) can move back among the top defensive teams in its conference.
If Horford’s recent outings come consistently closer to the norm, he’ll help the Hawks surge back toward the top of the Eastern Conference logjam in the standings. If Al regresses to the production of the low-impact player from prior weeks, this summer, he may find himself waiting for his former longtime backup to come out of free agent lockdown, first, before the big-money suitors come for him.
Let’s Go Hawks!
~lw3
