MFFL

For those of you that don't know what MFFL means it is "Mavs Fan For Life."

I will admit to being rather bandwagon fan of the Mavericks. Considering I am a Sports Nut, the NBA is way down on my list. That being said I probably go to 5-6 games a year, probably watch all or part of 20 games a year on TV, and heck I was even a ball boy for the Mavericks for several years growing up. So I may not bleed Mavericks but I am more than qualified to give a rational opinion.

Rational, which is the subject of this blog in regards to the Mavs and the firing of Avery Johnson.

If you know me you know that I am not defending Avery as the "Black" coach. If you look back to one of my earliest blogs on Ron Washington you will see an illustration of that fact. That was before he even coached a game, I am SO utterly displeased now I can't even write a blog on the Rangers and hold to my commitment to keep the blog PG!


I have 2 issues, the first is very simple:

1) Teams don't usually find success after firing coaches that win 75% of their games. The hopes that you just need the right guy to come in and give you the nudge over the the top is very much an exception. It just creates a bad vibe to fire successful coaches, particularly one that is young and on the rise. Avery's winning percentage was trending towards Red Aurebach...

2) Cuban keeps making bad decisions that are considered as "reasonable" at the time.

a) We refuse to pay Nash and he goes to PHX and becomes a 2-time MVP. As much as everyone thought it made sense to move Nash the Jason Terry-Devin Harris-Jason Kidd experiment at PG have been huge failures and we are still in search of a PG.

b)We refuse to pay Finley and he moves 5 hours away and wins a Championship. As much as everyone thought it made sense to move Finley the Doug Christie-Eddie Jones-Jerry Stackhouse experiment at SG have been huge failures and we are still in search of a SG. I mean really Doug Chrisitie is your plan? That pretty much makes my whole argument by itself!!!

Now we fire Avery.... Just to name a few, and the irony of it all is we are much farther above the salary cap than had we re-signed Nash and Finley.

All of these were considered reasonable at the time.... the problem is he (Mark Cuban) keeps making these decisions without a plan!

The latest seems to follow the same questionable pattern. The plan is to bring in a coach (in Rick Carlisle) that is also defensive minded and has been fired from his previous 2 jobs??

In regards to the state of the franchise Avery is probably fortunate. Things are looking bleak as this team is well over the salary cap, with minimal tradeable assets, and no draft picks for the next couple of years.... We may have seen the end of an era and it is likely that Carlisle will be gone and Cuban will have to remove himself from Basketball Operations before it bounces back!