Porzingis is in a better place
Hostile reception at MSG reminds ex-Knick why he welcomed Mavs move
NEW YORK— By the time Kristaps Porzingis and the rest of the Dallas Mavericks flew back to Texas after Thursday night’s highly anticipated reunion game at Madison Square Garden, he had played his former team twice in a week. He had also endured nearly 10 consecutive days of fielding queries about the circumstances surrounding his departure from the Knicks — and the state of his game nine months later.
The Mavericks, though, didn’t seem terribly concerned about this stretch of drama overload for their marquee newcomer. They preferred to focus on all the Knicks-free pavement in front of them for the rest of the season. It is an easier position to take, mind you, if you believe — as Mavericks officials do — that Porzingis is ahead of schedule in his comeback.
“He is so much further on than I expected after 20 months off,” Mark Cuban, Dallas’ team owner, said this past week. “I expected him to be rustier. And add that to a new system, new teammates, new city.”
Garden-goers — with some in the lower bowl chanting “traitor” — saw a different sort of Porzingis, 24, when he made his first appearance at the Garden since the fateful night he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee against the Milwaukee Bucks on Feb. 6, 2018. The Mavericks are generally using him in six-minute bursts as he continues to rebuild his stamina after such an extended period of rehabilitation. Porzingis is also still in the process of restoring the requisite confidence in his legs to throw himself into crowds.
Despite such limitations, he was averaging a more-than-passable 18.3 points, 7.9 rebounds and 2.4 blocks per game heading into Thursday — a 106103 loss to the Knicks (after a 106-102 defeat last Friday) in which he finished with 20 points and 10 boards. In the biggest adjustment, he is spending more time beyond the threepoint line than he ever did as a Knick and averaging 6.2 attempts per game from long distance, up from his highest figure (4.8 per game) in New York.
A whopping 43 per cent of Porzingis’ shots in 2017-18 were what many teams regard as dreaded “long twos” — shots from at least 10 feet but short of the three-point line. The Mavericks are trying to wean Porzingis off the increasingly devalued shot.
As coach Rick Carlisle explained last week, Dallas’ staff is convinced that Porzingis is “one of the best spacers in the history of the game if you look at the analytics on it. When he’s out above the arc, it has an amazing positive effect on the team that he’s playing for, whether it was New York or whether it’s us.”
Porzingis’ presence on the perimeter, and his proficiency on catch-and-shoot opportunities from three-point range, draws the opposition’s size away from the basket. That, in turn, opens driving lanes for the Mavericks’ Luka Doncic (33 points, 10 rebounds, 11 assists against the Knicks), who has taken an immediate leap from rookie of the year to certifiable franchiseplayer production.
Perceptions have changed since the Knicks dealt Porzingis to the Mavericks on Jan. 31. In some corners of the league, Dallas was assailed for potentially surrendering too much — two future first-round picks packaged with the promising young guard Dennis Smith Jr., in addition to taking on the expensive contracts of Tim Hardaway Jr. and Courtney Lee — for a player with Porzingis’ injury history. It was widely presumed that the Knicks made the deal with the knowledge that a significant free-agent score was looming.
The price doesn’t look quite as steep now; not after the Knicks flopped in free agency despite the team owner James Dolan’s hints at major signings in a March radio interview.
The New York police department said this week that there is no update on an investigation it opened in March after a complaint brought by a woman who said Porzingis sexually assaulted her at their Manhattan apartment building in February 2018. Porzingis, who has not been charged, has denied the allegation. Some in Thursday night’s crowd chanted “rapist” when he was on the court.
The Mavericks, when it was their turn, bestowed a five-year, $158-million (U.S.) contract upon Porzingis in the first allowable minutes of free agency and have made the player’s comfort level a priority after watching how quickly his relationship with the Knicks spiralled.
One example: Dallas hired Manolo Valdivieso, Porzingis’ physiotherapist from Spain, after the Knicks refused to do so. It is a concession that the Mavericks have made to a franchise centrepiece before; Nowitzki’s physiotherapist from Germany, Jens Joppich, still drops in for occasional work with various Dallas players even though Nowitzki retired in April.
“It’s a new NBA,” Cuban said, adding that it’s incumbent on teams today, when it comes to their stars, “to try to re-earn their loyalty every day.”
Until they can pinpoint a new face of the franchise to succeed Porzingis, it will be difficult to dispute that the Knicks are struggling mightily to adapt to it.