Well the NBA Finals, and season, is over. The Dallas Mavericks are NBA Champions for the first time. But all anybody seems to want to talk about are the losers, the Miami Heat. But let's take a closer look at the series.
The Mavs won in 6 games. They played well. They played smart. They were led by a man named Dirk Nowitzki who had a hunger like no other in this series. He has been labeled as coming up short in the playoffs for years. This was his redemption. Even though he was sick for game 4, he came out and willed his team to victory. Even though he could not get a shot to fall in the first half of game 6, he kept the mentality of "shooters keep shooting, eventually they will start to go in" and they did late in the game. The Mavs were filled with guys who just had not quite reached this mountain-top before. Jason Kidd has played 17 seasons, including reaching the finals twice, but just now got his first win. Shawn Marion and Peja Stojakovic and played on numerous good teams in their careers that just didn't get there. Dirk and Jason Terry had reached the finals 5 years earlier before losing to the Heat. Their coach, Rick Carlisle, had coached the Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers to be great teams before they ran into problems that prevented them from true greatness. So I am very happy for the Mavs, they deserve it.
The Heat on the other hand, lost the series when they were the favorites going in. They didn't play particularly bad most of the time, but they didn't have the same results in the 4th quarters mostly that the Mavs did. All anybody wants to talk about is LeBron James not living up to what he should be doing late in the game. True, he could have done a lot better and been more aggressive, but I think it just wasn't his time yet. You have to fall to truly experience the joy that comes with overcoming your past failures. There is no doubt in my mind that the Heat will be back in the Finals again over the next several years. They will have more chances and will be able to learn from their mistakes in this year's Finals.
One thing that must be fixed for the Heat is LeBron's aggressiveness in the 4th quarters. Actually, I don't think it needs much fixing, just a little tweaking. In the previous rounds of this years playoffs, he was unstoppable in the 4th quarters. He was shooting and making 3's at a rate we had never seen from him before. But in the Finals, his shot wasn't falling and so he stopped shooting, choosing to defer to others who were shooting better. Except most of his teammates didn't want to shoot it because this was the time LeBron was supposed to take over so they kept passing it back. It led to some awful sequences on offense. LeBron needs to drive to the basket whenever his jump shot isn't falling. He needs to post people up and work his way closer to the hoop. He has not done that most of his career, relying on his jump shot which is fairly unreliable at times.
The Mavs will be contenders again next year, but I don't think they will get back to this point. Their aging team mixed with the difficulty of winning two years in a row will be too much for them I think. The Heat, on the other hand, need to improve their bench. If I were them, I would look to trade Chris Bosh for some better role players. I know he is good, but he is being under-utilized as the third option on the team. The problem though, is that with James and Dwyane Wade controlling the Heat, there is no room to increase Bosh's usage. Yes, they have the best 3rd option in the league, but I think it would be better for him and the team if they could trade him for maybe a bigger center and a few other role players. Their bench currently is made up of older players who were once pretty good, but now are just barely still playing. Sure they had their moments, but you need to improve over Juwan Howard and Erik Dampier. If they couldn't find a use for Dampier, their biggest body, to play in the finals against a bigger front court that the Mavs had, then it's time to let him go. Fill the bench with young guys who have something to prove. They need to go after guys like Jason Kapono and Jeff Foster in free agency.
So anyways, now it time for the NBA Draft, which is one of my highlights of the year. So stay tuned for more exciting NBA off-season things.
