Commentary: Nelson, Cuban cut from same cloth / LJWorld.com

Archive for Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Golden State Warriors coach having a great time getting under his former team’s skin

By David Moore - The Dallas Morning News

April 24, 2007

Dallas — If you want to broach this subject with Mark Cuban, please do.

If you want to wait until I take cover under a desk on the opposite side of American Airlines Center, even better.

But if you did catch Cuban in a moment of weakness, I bet he'd grudgingly admit these last few days have reminded him of why he and Don Nelson got along so well in the first place.

Hey, there's nothing like poking the big dog with a stick to get his attention. Nelson has gotten under the Mavericks' skin and in their psyche to turn this series upside-down. And he's done it all with a gleam in his eye and a smirk on his face.

Can you think of a billionaire owner who conducts his business in the same manner?

A disdain for authority and the status quo is part of what bonded Cuban and Nelson in the first place. The problem for Cuban in the current scenario is that the Mavericks are the NBA establishment. Golden State is the upstart trying to make a name for itself after a 13-year playoff absence.

The split between Cuban and Nelson was so bitter, the accusations lobbed back and forth so spiteful, it's easy to lose sight of how much Nelson meant to the Mavericks franchise. Too much focus is placed on what Nelson failed to do at the end of his tenure - get the team to The Finals - and not enough on what he did accomplish.

Nelson sold hope and excitement to a Mavericks franchise that had forgotten how that felt. He's done the same thing in Golden State.

Chris Mullin played for Nelson during the coach's first tour of duty in Golden State. Now the team's executive vice president of basketball operations, he's responsible for bringing Nelson back.

Mullin rejected the image, fostered in Nelson's final days in Dallas, that the coach lacked the attention to detail or the defensive commitment for a team to win big.

"I never really focused on it," Mullin said. "The longer you're around . . .

"I remember coach Lou Carnesecca (St. John's) told us the day after Miss America is crowned, all of a sudden she has a run in her stocking. Knowing Nellie like I do, I didn't have to listen to other people to figure out who he is and what he does."

A quick aside: For someone who doesn't care about defense, Nelson's team sure did a good job of playing it in Game 1. The reason the Mavericks never got their pick-and-roll untracked is because the Warriors did a wonderful job of switching to stay on the man with the ball and the player cutting to the basket.

Dirk Nowitzki reflected on his team's loss Monday, saying he thought the Mavericks might have been too intense, too focused.

"It looked like we were uptight a little bit," Nowitzki said.

The Warriors were anything but uptight. The players joked and played shooting games at the end of practice. Nelson spoke of the shuffleboard games he'd played and the old haunts he'd visited.

"The scotch was good," Nelson said. "It seems to be the same brand."