Larry Brown Sports

Dirk Nowitzki finally got to shave his beard after over two months of waiting.

Dirk was one of several Mavericks who vowed in February not to shave until the team got back to .500 for the season. They came close a few times recently, but they weren’t able to get back to even until Sunday.

Dallas beat New Orleans 107-89 to improve to 40-40, and coach Rick Carlisle says Dirk was already shaving less than two minutes after entering the locker room. Team owner Mark Cuban was proud to beam out the notice using his Bat Signal:

Shave em if you got em Go Mavs #MFFL

— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) April 15, 2013

Dirk had 19 points in the win. Getting to shave is a bittersweet reward; this will be the first time Dallas misses the playoffs since the 1999-2000 season.

Here’s a before look at Dirk in his thick beard:

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Dirk Nowitzki hit the winning shot to help the Dallas Mavericks beat the Chicago Bulls Saturday 100-98, and he celebrated like a madman. One thing you’ll notice about Nowitzki is that he looked just like a caveman as he celebrated. Refusing to shave for nearly two months will do that to someone.

As we told you last month, several Mavericks players vowed not to shave until the team got back to .500 for the season. They were 21-28 at the time they made the commitment, and they’re 36-37 after beating the Bulls.

Dallas was 35-36 after beating the Clippers on Tuesday. They actually had a barber prepared to trim their hair after Thursday’s game against the Pacers, but they lost that game to fall two games below .500. Now they’re back to where they were. Their next chance to get back to .500 will be Tuesday when they play at the Lakers.

Below is a video of Dirk’s awesome shot plus some Dirk caveman memes:

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Dirk Nowitzki had a great moment with a Sacramento Kings security guard last week. The officials for the Mavericks-Kings game were doing a video review of a play with 36.1 seconds remaining in the game. Dirk was trying to work his way over towards the monitors to see how things were going with the review, only there was one problem: a bold security guard stood in his way.

The old man shadowed Dirk wherever he went and boxed out the Dallas all-star. His

“That’s the best defense Sacramento has played!” the announcers agreed.

“This is textbook defense!” the amused announcers said.

Dirk even had sly grin on his face as he tried to outmaneuver the guard by reversing course, but it didn’t work. He should have tried some sort of crossover.

Dirk eventually gave up and playfully pretended to punch the guard in the stomach, and the man reacted with all the emotion of a Buckingham Palace guard.

The whole thing was awesome. The review went Dallas’ way, and the Mavs went on to win 117-112 in overtime.

Video via Dallas Mavericks H/T Marcel Mutoni

The Dallas Mavericks are off to a rough 15-23 start to the season, and at the moment they look like a team that could be destined for the playoff bubble. Two years removed from an NBA championship, Dallas has lost some key players like Jason Kidd and Jason Terry and is dealing with an aging and oft-injured Dirk Nowitzki.

Some feel that the logical thing for Mark Cuban to do would be to start rebuilding, and Dirk would be a valuable trade piece should he decide to go that route. While Cuban acknowledged that there’s close to a “one hundred percent chance” he will make a move before the trade deadline, he said there is no way he’s trading Nowitzki.

“No one’s panicking,” Cuban told the Dallas Morning News. “We’re going to be opportunistic through the trade deadline. We’re not going to trade Dirk. I told Dirk we’re not going to trade Dirk. I told Dirk if I’m going through this [expletive], you’re going through it with me. He actually appreciated it.”

Generally speaking, comments like the ones Cuban made about Dirk would mean nothing. Owners say stuff like that all the time to squash trade rumors and wind up dealing their stars anyway, but I doubt that will be the case in Dallas. Cuban and Nowitzki have always had a genuinely close relationship, and I’d be shocked if Cuban wasn’t open and honest about Dirk’s future with the team. Not to mention, he still thinks his team can contend with him.

“I’m as confident as I can be,” Cuban said. “We didn’t go into this just to be middling. If you look at every team that’s any good now, pick a team. Other than the Spurs, every single one of them had to take a huge step backward.”

With 44 games remaining, there’s no reason to believe the Mavericks can’t turn things around and charge into the postseason. And once the playoffs begin, anything can happen.

Dirk Nowitzki is 34 years old and nearing the end of his NBA career. He has made 11 straight All-Star Games and finally won the elusive NBA title two seasons ago. But the Dallas Mavericks decided to break up their title team because of changes to the league’s collective bargaining agreement and take a gamble that they would land some big-time free agents the next summer.

The Mavericks most notably lost former Defensive Player of the Year Tyson Chandler after the title. They let J.J. Barea, Caron Butler, and DeShawn Stevenson go, too. Former Sixth Man of the Year Jason Terry left over the summer, as did Jason Kidd. The Mavericks missed out on Dwight Howard and Deron Williams — both of whom they hoped to land — and instead ended up with guys like O.J. Mayo, Darren Collison, Elton Brand, and Chris Kaman.

The Mavs are now 13-21, their plan doesn’t seem to be working, and Dirk is questioning the franchise’s long-term plan and direction.

“It’s going to be tough now,” Nowitzki said after the team’s loss to the Hornets Sunday, per ESPN Dallas. “I always liked to think you don’t want to build your franchise on hope.

“We hoped for Deron last year. We hoped for Dwight. Why would he leave the Lakers? To me, it makes no sense. He’s in a great situation. Why would CP3 leave? (The Los Angeles Clippers are) the best team in the league probably right now. They’re probably the deepest team. So are you going to hope that we get something?

“Maybe Cuban has something up his sleeve. Maybe you have to take a chance on a bad contract to get him in here and make something happen. I mean, I don’t know. That’s something we’ll have to see this summer. We’re going to play out this season. I’m going to get better and better, hopefully from game to game, so I can actually close out some of these games. And then we’ll see what happens.”

The veteran forward even wondered aloud if the team should consider trading him.

“Either you break the whole thing up and trade me or you get a bunch of one-year deals and try to be a player next summer. That’s the decision we made, so now we’ve got to fight through it.

“The only reason I would leave — or would have left — is if we wouldn’t have won the championship and I would have been like a Karl Malone and (Gary) Payton going to join Kobe and Shaq in L.A. like they did at the end,” Nowitzki said. “But now I’ve got a ring and obviously want to finish my career here. But I also want to be competitive.”

Dirk is in the third season of a four-year, $80 million contract with the team that includes a no-trade clause. It sounds like he may be willing to waive the clause if things don’t improve in Dallas.

Photo credit: Richard Rowe-US PRESSWIRE

Dirk Nowitzki appeared in his first game of the season for the Dallas Mavericks on Sunday against the San Antonio Spurs, but the result was the same one Dallas has seen for much of the year. Nowitzki’s absence through the first 27 games of the season certainly made life more difficult for the 12-16 Mavs, but the 11-time All-Star said it is the absence of Jason Kidd that has really hurt the team.

“Our basketball IQ obviously went down a little bit with J-Kidd leaving,” Nowitzki said according to ESPNDallas.com. “I think that’s pretty obvious. We don’t make the right play on defense. I don’t think that’s selfishness. Maybe we don’t react quick enough or maybe it’s not natural enough to the guys yet, all the calls, the switching of coverages. You’ve got to pay attention; you’ve got to be smart out there. …

“Offensively, our decision-making has been brutal. We’re averaging 20 (turnovers) a night. It’s impossible to win, especially on the road.”

The Mavericks allowed a season-high 129 points to the Spurs on Sunday, meaning they were pretty much incapable of stopping everything and anything San Antonio threw their way. Dirk should certainly help alleviate some of the team’s struggles when he gets back into the swing of things, but losing a veteran point guard like Kidd is never easy. Dallas was hoping Derek Fisher would help fill the void left by the departure of Kidd, but that didn’t work out.

If the Mavericks are going to contend in the Western Conference this year, they’ll need someone to emerge as their new floor general.

It would be tough to argue that the new flopping rule the NBA has put into place for the upcoming season won’t benefit the game in some way. Any type of fine is going to discourage players from doing something on some level, so it certainly can’t make the situation any worse. Flopping has become a league-wide epidemic, and those who are found guilty of it from now on will be fined up to $30,000.

Dirk Nowtizki does not think this will work.

“I never looked at myself as a big flopper,” Nowitzki said Thursday according to the Dallas Morning News. “If you play me physical then, obviously, I’ve got to sell the call and get to the (free throw) line. That’s just part of the game. We’ll have to see how they enforce that.

“I think it’s a bunch of crap to be honest with you. Are they going to come back after a game and fine you for flopping? That’s tough to do to me.”

Yes, that’s exactly what they’re going to do. They do it with upgrading or downgrading flagrant fouls, so flopping will be no different. While I don’t agree with Dirk that it will be difficult to go back and review the tapes to enforce the rule, I do agree that it may not be effective.

As I mentioned before, what’s $30,000 to some of these players? If $30,000 is what it takes to put your team at the foul line and give them a chance to win with 10 seconds left in the game, I’m sure most players are willing to pay it.

Photo credit: Richard Rowe-US PRESSWIRE