Down at the juice bar (have to admit, the first one I’ve ever been to) at our Dallas hotel, Lakers radio voice Spero Dedes and I took some time to chat about a struggling 2-4 Dallas Mavericks team prior to Tuesday evening’s 7:30 p.m. tip against the Lakers.
After dropping a 103-92 road game to the previously winless L.A. Clippers, Dirk Nowitzki - who has had three 30-point games - had this to say:
“If you don’t compete hard, it’s not about X’s and O’s. You can run whatever play you want. You can have all the schemes you want defensively. We’ve just got to push ourselves to play harder. I don’t know what’s going on. We don’t leave it all out there.”
Spero had a good point about the quote, that it’s not something you hear from players until they’re starting to panic. And it’s quite early in the season for that…
Alas, Dedes and I talked about that comment, chatted about Josh Howard (who’s day-to-day with a sprained wrist) and Jason Kidd (who certainly hasn’t turned the Mavs around) and also paused while his spread of berries and granola was delivered by the waiter. Finally, let me apologize if you hear any interference in the audio interview … Just remember, journalists, don’t put your recording device anywhere near an iPhone, or that’s the sound you’ll hear. My bad on that one.
Here’s the audio:
