Rick Carlisle’s announcement that Dirk Nowitzki would start at center instead of Nerlens Noel was easily the biggest revelation from Mavs Media Day. That statement may be spun in several different directions which all led to new questions. How does it affect Nerlens Noel’s future? Who will start instead of him? Will the Mavs be able to rebound? What about the defense?
Those are all important questions to consider, but one element lost in all of that thinking is a potential solution that decision brings to the table: By starting Nowitzki at center the Mavericks are going to play 5-out basketball to begin games, which should increase the pace of the game and lead to significantly better offensive starts for Dallas.
Looking back over the last couple seasons, how many times can you remember the Mavs falling behind 12-4 or 16-6 to start games? It seems like it happened almost every other night. Many of the supporting characters changed during that time, but one constant when the team was healthy was typically starting Nowitzki at power forward next to a traditional center (like Zaza Pachulia or Andrew Bogut), a bigger-bodied point guard (Deron Williams), and a “big” shooting guard and small forward (Wesley Matthews at 2, and either Chandler Parsons or Harrison Barnes at 3). The Mavs began games with more size than most opponents, but with that usually comes less speed and fewer chances to make explosive plays in transition.
During the 2016-17 season, opponents outscored the Mavs by 1.6 points per game in the first quarter, but not by more than 0.6 points in any other frame. In 2015-16, meanwhile, opposing teams outscored the Mavs by exactly one point in the first and 0.9 points in the third quarter (when starters play together the most), yet Dallas outscored opponents in both the second and fourth quarters.
NBA games are impossibly difficult, but the recipe to a victory is pretty simple: Win the first quarter. Over the last five seasons, the Mavericks are 137-59 in games when they lead after the opening frame, but just 72-125 when they trail. Carlisle often calls the NBA a first quarter league, and he’s absolutely right.
Where does Nowitzki at center factor into this? Last season, per nbawowy, the Mavericks scored 1.098 points per possession with Nowitzki at center. The Mavs’ two most-used lineups with Nowitzki at 5 both scored at least 108.9 points per 100 possessions, according to NBA.com, a mark which would’ve ranked top-10 in the league last season. For the season, the Mavs scored just 103.3 points per 100 possessions in the first quarter, per NBA Stats. Meanwhile, the only big-big combination including Dirk to consistently score at an above-average rate was the German playing alongside Dwight Powell, which didn’t happen very often.
Nowitzki basically broke the sport when he entered his prime around the turn of the millennium because he was able to stretch the floor and bend defenses in ways no other power forward before him had ever been able. His combination of shooting and athleticism made him a walking mismatch that nuked traditional defensive gameplans.
Moving him to the center spot is the modern version of the same idea. Assume he starts alongside Dennis Smith Jr., Seth Curry (or potentially Yogi Ferrell), Wesley Matthews, and Harrison Barnes. Those are five players who can all shoot 3s, featuring two ball-handlers and a 4 and 5 who can both bully switches in the post. When Smith runs high pick-and-roll with Nowitzki, the opponent faces an impossible decision: Do they switch a center onto the explosive Smith and a point guard on the 7-foot Nowitzki, or do they hope to fight through it while not leaving easy options for either player? And what happens if the Mavs run multiple pick-and-rolls in the same possession? And what about the shooters dotting the perimeter? That’s going to cause problems early in the shot clock.
“Coming off a screen with Dirk, I’ve never seen lanes like that before,” Smith said.
Putting Smith into all that space ought to work wonders for him individually as well. Whether teams switch against him or go under the screen, he’ll almost always have a way to find at least a decent look for himself or for another player. Because the Mavs are going to dial up the tempo a bit, they’ll be able to get into those sets faster and catch dozing opponents off-balance, which should free up even more room for Smith to get to the rim.
“It’s the perfect play style for this team, for the modern-day NBA,” Noel said. “I feel like this is the perfect position with the pieces we have, especially with Dennis leading the pack.”
This is a pretty significant shift in philosophy, although we don’t know yet to what degree they’re going to increase the pace, which is an estimation of possessions per 48 minutes. Last season the Mavs ranked 29th. Throughout most of Carlisle’s tenure as head coach, though, the Mavs have usually ranked somewhere in the middle-third in pace and in the top-10 in offensive rating. Last season was an exception in both cases.
Noel’s comments are particularly important because, if Nowitzki starts at center, it means Noel isn’t starting at all. It should be noted that even if Nowitzki starts, it will almost be in name only. Dirk played just 26.4 minutes per game last season, and he spent nearly half those minutes per game playing with J.J. Barea and the second unit, per NBA.com. The German is often the first player on either team to check out of the game, heading to the bench around the 7-minute mark. He spent only 16 minutes per game playing next to Harrison Barnes in 2016-17; if you do the math, that’s five minutes at the beginning of either half and a few minutes at the end of the second and fourth quarters.
Much of the rest of that time will ostensibly belong to Noel, and both he and Nowitzki could share the floor together against some second units and put Barea in pick-and-roll paradise. That should be an effective trio, as Barea and Nowitzki are both dangerous offensive players, especially in partnership with a rim-running big man. Noel can fill that role while also picking up the athleticism slack to clean up the defensive end.
“We make things happen,” Noel said. “Dirk is such a special player with his mentality of the game. He’s just able to make things happen regardless of whether he can move quick or not.”
Pledging to start Curry or another shooting guard means the Mavs will open games with three players 6-foot-5 or shorter, but that doesn’t worry Carlisle. While bigger players like Barnes and Nowitzki are adept at using size to their advantage against switches, many other stretch big men in the NBA don’t have that same ability in the post, and there are only a handful of bigger guards who could potentially use size to their advantage on the block. That gives the Mavs the freedom to embrace their quickness edge and play some full-court defense if they so choose.
“(Post plays) are arduous, they take time, and generally they don’t produce that much,” Carlisle said. “But if you’re quick and you have the ability to cover ground, then get up and make this a 94-foot problem for the offensive guards.”
To Carlisle’s point, only four teams in the league used post possessions more than 9 percent of the time last season, per Synergy Sports, and even the best post team in the league scored below one point per possession in those situations. Post offense is generally inefficient because most players don’t have the skill to score more than half the time down low, and if you’re posting up, it means you’re not shooting 3s. One thing that makes Barnes and Nowitzki stand out as above-average post players is they’ll typically only back down guys who are six inches (or more) shorter than them. It’s much easier to post up when there’s a mouse in the house than when you’re picking on someone your own size. Dallas would much rather have to defend post-ups than roll out a bigger, slower lineup and have difficulty covering all the real estate around the perimeter.
Defensively, they don’t even need to press in order to bother opponents; the Mavericks can disrupt opposing offenses with those small guards simply by slowing down the beginning of a play. There’s an undeniable correlation between good offense and the time it takes to advance the ball past midcourt. Per Mavs analytics, Dallas scored at least 1.09 points per possession each of the last two seasons when advancing the ball beyond the halfway point in three seconds or less, but not more than 1.05 points per trip when it took four seconds or longer. The same holds true for every team in the NBA: The sooner you can get into your offense, the better.
Think about it: If the point guard can cruise up the floor and begin running a play before the poor big men can even get themselves down the floor and into position, the defense is already beginning at a disadvantage. Any precious seconds the guards can keep their opponent in the backcourt not only helps the big men, but it also shaves some time off the shot clock, shortening the possession the way an NFL running game shortens a game. It also leads to forcing more turnovers, which the Mavs have done better and more consistently than almost every other team the last five seasons.
This is a lot of information to think about, and it’s not even a guarantee that Noel won’t be a starter at some point this season, depending on the matchup. He’s going to get his minutes no matter what, of course. Again, Nowitzki starting at center is really something that’s only going to influence about 10-15 minutes each game, all in an effort to maximize the Mavs’ chances of scoring points during that time and not digging themselves into a hole. It’s a smart way to get the ball moving and find good shots to begin the game and hopefully get everyone into a comfortable groove, all the while putting Smith into a better position to make an impact on games by capitalizing on extra space and an increased tempo. And, hey, if nothing else it’ll at least make things more exciting to watch.
“It’s gonna be a lot different than how we played last year,” Smith said. “Obviously we were one of the slowest teams. We’re looking to up the tempo, and (Carlisle’s) showing me different ways I can contribute to that.”
Step one is to move Dirk to center. We’ll see what step two is when the rest of the starters are announced on Monday night.
Share and comment