It should have gone without saying back then that Nowitzki wasn’t the only Hall of Famer on that team, but it recently became official. Jason Kidd’s fingerprints were all over the club’s success. (So was everyone else’s. The debate among Mavs fans often centers on the question “Who was the second-best player on the team?” There is no right answer; it’s impossible to choose. You take any one player off that team and the Mavs don’t win. That’s the beauty of their run.)
Despite the nature of playoff games, when the pace is much slower and generally there is more isolation play, especially in the fourth quarter, Dallas was able to keep the ball moving. One example: Kidd actually assisted Jason Terry slightly more often in the playoffs (28.1 percent of his made buckets) than during the regular season (26.4 percent). The Mavericks led the league in assist percentage in the 2010-11 regular season and finished third in the postseason among the eight teams that won at least one series. Kidd quarterbacked an offense that handed out 20 assists in 10 of its 21 games, including two games of 30+ dimes. He assisted his teammates on one-third of their made baskets while he was on the floor in the postseason. In general, we look back on those Mavericks as an iso-heavy team that revolved around Nowitzki. There was plenty of iso-ing and posting up, as is always the case in the playoffs, but Dallas actually shot spot-up jumpers on a higher percentage of possessions than any other team that postseason. Even when the Mavs iso’d, it was with passing in mind.
The point guard position has changed in recent years. With more teams relying on spread pick-and-roll to generate offense, point guards must now be a scoring threat first, or else the offense is compromised. Kidd was a never a shoot-first player, instead relying on other initiators to create dribble penetration while spotting up on the arc and making the occasional extra pass. That isn’t to say he wasn’t a scoring threat, however; he made more 3s (43) than anyone else in the 2011 playoffs, including his teammate Terry.
Kidd’s reluctance to create for himself, often choosing instead to get the ball out of his hands as soon as possible, was a key to what made Dallas such a good passing team. The earlier in the shot clock Nowitzki or Terry could touch the ball — or, better yet, both of them — the sooner the Mavericks could dismantle their opponent. And by making the opposition cover so much ground, Dallas was simply able to wear the other team out. The Mavs scored 111.4 points per 100 possessions in the fourth quarter during the 2010-11 regular season, second-best in the league, and they flaunted a league-best 53.6 effective field goal percentage in the fourth.
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A typical Dallas possession during that playoff run consisted of at least three or four passes, often more. If nothing was open early, Nowitzki would finish the possession late. That level of ball movement doesn’t happen under a point guard who needs it in his hands to make plays. Dallas could beat people inside-to-outside, high-to-low, and side-to-side, and oftentimes in combinations. The Mavericks scored 0.970 points per possession in the halfcourt during the 2011 playoffs, which led the league and it wasn’t even close. Second place was Boston, at 0.919. In playoff fourth quarters, their offense scored a blistering 115.0 points per 100 possessions, while the defense allowed just 104.7.
Shawn Marion gets a ton of credit for defending go-to players throughout that run (and we’ll get to him later, of course) but Kidd spent an extraordinary amount of time defending those same players. He checked Kobe Bryant for much of their four-game series, taking over for Marion when he defended Lamar Odom or even Pau Gasol. In fact, Kidd defended Bryant for a big chunk of the fourth quarter in Game 3, blocking a shot and holding Bryant to 2-of-6 shooting with a turnover in the frame. Kidd also defended Kevin Durant in the Western Conference Finals while Marion spent time on James Harden and Russell Westbrook, and he had the tall task of guarding Dwyane Wade in the Finals. The Mavericks allowed just 99.8 points per 100 possessions with Kidd on the floor in the 2011 playoffs — the best mark among anyone on the team who played at least 50 minutes — all while he ran point on an offense which scored 109.1 points per 100 and assisted on 61.8 percent of its makes whenever he was on the floor.
Kidd’s biggest contribution of them all was his intelligence. “I don’t think there’s ever been a smarter player in this league than Jason Kidd,” Carlisle once said. His understanding of offense wasn’t the only thing that stood out, though. Kidd just found ways to make plays with or around the ball. The Mavericks came away with more than their fair share of 50/50 balls during the 2011 playoffs, and Kidd could take the credit for many of their successes.
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Despite his advanced age and natural drop-off in athleticism, Kidd knew exactly when to turn on the jets so he could make plays. He famously sat on the bench for every second possible in order to maximize his rest time, and he’d receive massages before virtually every game to help loosen up. And while he was older, his game hadn’t really dropped off; he was an All-Star in 2010.
Kidd had a next-level awareness of the moment, which helped him make some of the biggest, yet occasionally invisible, plays of the postseason. For an example, look no further than Game 3 against the Lakers, when during a seven-second stretch of game time Kidd showed the extent of his hoops genius. With 16.6 seconds left and the Lakers down six points with the ball, Kidd knew that L.A. would need a 3-pointer to give itself a chance to force overtime. After Dallas sniffed out the Lakers’ play and forced a turnover the previous trip down the floor (for that, go to Shawn Marion’s tab), it looked like the Lakers were setting up the same exact play, only this time instead of cutting to the top, Kobe took a screen from Derek Fisher to go to the corner, and it would then be Fisher who used the double-screen to come to the top of the arc. The Mavs, led by Kidd and Chandler, called it out.
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Kidd fought through the screen, not caught off-guard by the similar play design, and was still able to strip Bryant clean. Not only did he appear to anticipate the play, but he was also able to communicate that to his teammates and wipe out Bryant’s shot entirely by himself.
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His best work would come seven seconds later. With L.A. now down five points and just nine seconds left on the clock, it made sense for the Lakers to miss intentionally — though it didn’t seem like that was their plan. Still, as Pau Gasol was lining up his free throw, Kidd communicated with Jason Terry, appearing to tell him exactly what was about to happen.
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It might just be pure luck that Kidd always found himself in the right place at the right time, but this is a guy who once, while down two points with under two minutes left on the road, intentionally ran full-speed into an opposing head coach in order to draw a technical foul. In Game 4 against Oklahoma City, Kidd stripped Kevin Durant with 1:02 left in overtime of a tied game, then 22 seconds later hit a go-ahead 3-pointer. We hear a lot about The Moment during the playoffs. Kidd always had command of it.
You can replace individual qualities like shooting, passing, and defense, But it’s hard to find someone who can do all three, and it’s even more impossible to find someone who’s also got a supreme understanding of the game. Kidd was extremely valuable — so valuable, in fact, that as Pelton points out, Kidd’s Value Over Replacement Player during that run rated even higher than Dirk’s.
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