The Mavericks defeated the defending-champion Warriors on national television, and Luka Doncic looked every bit the part of an MVP candidate.
Doncic finished Tuesday’s victory with 41 points, 12 rebounds, 12 assists, 4 steals, and 1 block. It was an utterly masterful performance in which Doncic narrowly outperformed the reigning NBA Finals MVP, Stephen Curry.
After the game, TNT analyst and eleven-time NBA All-Star Charles Barkley interviewed Doncic. He asked the Slovenian-born superstar if he feels that the Mavericks need to play at a much faster pace than they have thus far.
Doncic was candid and with a knowing smile, he reminded Barkley that he is slow. This was one example of criticism doubters had about Doncic before he fell to No. 3 overall in the 2018 NBA Draft. Some scouts felt that Doncic had a slow first step and that he lacked explosiveness.
Chuck: "Do you guys think y'all need to play at a much faster pace?"
Luka: "Yeah we have but you know, I'm slow"
Luka keeps it honest with Chuck 😂 pic.twitter.com/cTsyYXWBOI
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) November 30, 2022
Now that we’ve seen what Doncic can do in the NBA, Barkley’s observation about the Mavericks is technically correct. His team plays at an average speed of 3.99 miles per hour, which is indeed the slowest mark in the league.
For the second season in a row, Dallas ranks last in pace overall, currently averaging just 96.0 possessions per game. In fact, the last time a non-Doncic-led team finished the season with a slower pace was in 2017-18.
It is especially noticeable for Dallas when it is in the open court. It takes the Mavs an average of 8.6 seconds to shoot the ball after forcing turnovers, via InPredictable, which ranks as the slowest in the NBA for the second year in a row.
That obviously hurts them when they are attempting to score in a transition offense. The Mavericks are currently shooting 46.7% (which is the worst in the league) while averaging 15.6 points per game (second-worst in the NBA) on these opportunities.
When it is all said and done, however, how damning is this for the Mavericks? Tim Cato put everything in context (via The Athletic):
“They have the league’s third-best half-court offense, per Cleaning the Glass, which has made up for the lack of easy fast break points or offensive rebounding … But Dončić has a tempo at which he plays that won’t change, and the Mavericks have a roster that isn’t suited for anything other than the heliocentric style that they play.”
Doncic absolutely plays at one of the most unique tempos in basketball.
He is averaging 6.48 seconds per touch, which is the most in the NBA.
But listen to how Kevin Durant, a basketball genius, describes the way Doncic moves on the court. Right away, it becomes clear that Doncic’s change-of-pace, stop-and-start speed is definitely a feature and not a bug (via EuroHoops):
“He plays at a nice pace that’s why I think he can make them shots that way. Like those crazy shots that he be making, the passes that he throws it feels like he is just walking on the track. … He got a nice pace.
He gets you up in the air because everybody is pressing him, he might get a foul on one play, boom now you loosened up, now he gets into the paint and pump fakes you, you jump, and he pump fakes you again because he moves so slow, one leg fade you know his pace is so incredible to me.
He’s deceptively quick too. He’ll get around you fast, slip around you fast for a layup and then slow down, that’s how he’ll get a lot of fouls too. Because he’ll act like he doesn’t have any athleticism. And he can get around you and he got a big body so he be trying to trick people into thinking he can’t get around you. And he slows down, you chase him down and he’ll slow down, and get a layup and one so you got to be on point with that dude.”
Durant describes Doncic as a “deceptively quick” player and notes that the Dallas superstar will sometimes slow down and “act like he doesn’t have any athleticism” before scoring on his defender.
There is a method to the madness for Doncic, but it tends to take a long time to come to fruition. The average offensive possession for the Mavericks lasts 15.55 seconds, per PBP Stats. That is an eternity by NBA standards and (by this point, to no surprise) is the slowest of any team in the league.
But the average offensive possession for Dallas is actually slower when Doncic is off the court (15.75 seconds) compared to when he is playing.
This might be the root of a much bigger problem for the Mavericks, who currently project as a fringe non-play-in team in the Western Conference playoff picture.
Dallas can absolutely play slow if its offense is high-powered by Doncic. They average a stellar rate of 117.6 points per 100 possessions when Doncic is on the court. When he rests, however, their offensive rating (105.5) drops significantly.
In the 199 minutes that Luka Doncic and Josh Green have shared the floor, the Mavericks have a 119.0 offensive rating and 98.1 defensive rating, resulting in a 20.9 net rating.
Among 720 NBA 2-man combos that have played 150+ minutes, Doncic-Green ranks 10th in net rating.
— Grant Afseth (@GrantAfseth) November 30, 2022
Perhaps one solution is more minutes for Josh Green, who is a legitimate sleeper candidate for the NBA’s Most Improved Player. As noted by Cato, Green’s mere presence on the floor “pushes this team’s tempo past its usual crawling status” and the numbers back this up.
The Mavericks play at a faster pace when Green is on the court (96.2) relative to when he is not (94.0) this season, per PBPStats. Their offense moves much quicker when Green plays (15.0 seconds) compared to when he does not (15.9 seconds) as well.
Remember how Dallas is the slowest team to shoot after forcing a turnover? Green is the exception, showing excellent flashes both during leak outs as a scorer and as a promising playmaker as well.
⚡️ @JoshBGreen….Mr. Electricity! @dallasmavs | #MFFL
📲 Live on NBA League Pass: https://t.co/PM2triRm0n pic.twitter.com/ofBHh6u6Mv
— NBA Australia (@NBA_AU) November 5, 2022
Green is averaging 1.31 points per possession when finishing in transition, per Synergy, which ranks 81st percentile in the NBA and is by far the best among anyone on his team.
Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd noted that after spending the offseason working with Miami Heat guard Kyle Lowry, he can tell that Green looks comfortable bringing the ball up the floor.
He is only averaging 19.5 minutes per game, but he currently leads the Mavs in raw plus-minus. The positive point differential when he is on the court suggests that whatever it is he is doing is translating to winning basketball.
It is clear that playing him alongside Doncic is a good idea, but Kidd might want to give him a go as more of a primary option in the second unit to see if they have anything there. If he can tire opposing defenses with a high-tempo offense while Doncic rests, that could go a long way in the postseason.
Even if he proves to make the most sense as a tertiary option in Doncic’s ball-dominant offense, though, that will give them a spark of the energy and speed that they desperately need.
