How bad is it? I mean, we know that Dirk is getting older, he’s very tall, and those knees have many miles of basketball on them. Part of it could be the way the season is scheduled. That’s normal. I can see that. You take the time that he has been playing, you add his height to that, you multiply times infinity, and you have how bad his knees hurt. However, is this something to be worried about or just a little precaution because they want to be careful? I mean, the schedule is messed up.
Well, think about it. This is the Mavs. The new Mavs. Not the old ones. The old Mavs…not so smart. The new ones. They’re smart.
They know how to manage their team. So, they look at Dirk and tell him, “You’re sitting for four games so your knee doesn’t get worse.” I don’t think is a Steve McNair (may he rest in peace) situation where he wasn’t practicing because he could only handle playing on Sundays. This is a precautionary move by a very smart team.
So, here’s a better question. How many times are we going to have to do this? I mean, how often will we have to sit Dirk for a couple games to rest his knees? Are we going to have to reduce his overall minutes in the future AND have him sit periodically? Probably. That’s the way the world works. Things stop working when you get older, but by doing things like this now it becomes much easier to justify having him play in the future (more) because he’ll be rested.
You could easily sensationalize this story, but that would only work if this were a bad team like, I don’t know, the Hawks. This is the Mavs. No panic button needed. You’re in good hands, Dallas.
