Harrison Barnes Signing Is Good Enough (for Now) for Dallas Mavericks
After striking out on a few top-level free agents (Mike Conley, Hassan Whiteside), the Dallas Mavericks have once again cobbled a team around the ageless Dirk Nowitzki.
Consisting mostly of low-cost veterans that fill a specific role, this is what they've done pretty much every year since winning the NBA championship in 2011. Deron Williams will re-sign for a year and $10 million, according to ESPN.com's Marc Stein. Seth Curry will be brought in on a two-year, $6 million pact, per Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical. And bench big man Dwight Powell will be retained with a four-year, $37 million contract, per The Vertical's Shams Charania.
The exception to that strategy, at least this summer, is Harrison Barnes. In the wake of Kevin Durant's decision to sign with the Golden State Warriors, the Mavericks came to an agreement with the former Warrior on a four-year, $96 million maximum contract, per a July 4 report from Stein.
Barnes became one of the NBA's most polarizing players over the last year or so. He turned down a contract extension from Golden State prior to the 2015-16 season, expecting to hit the open market and receive a significantly higher payday.
That's exactly what ended up happening, but only after Barnes scuffled through the season due to injury and fits of ineffectiveness. Everything came to a head during Golden State's NBA Finals loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers when he shot 5-of-32 over the final three games of the series.
Due to those struggles, Warriors fans and media members alike often ridiculed Barnes. His impending max contract was held up as a symbol of the forthcoming free-agency bonanza and a sign that teams would have to overpay to bring in talent.
In the end, though, Mark Cuban found his high-priced free agent willing to take his money and come to Dallas to play alongside Dirk and Wesley Matthews. He just, as usual, was not the Mavs' top target.
X's and O's
Because of Barnes' contract, it's easy to say that he will now be expected to become the Mavericks' No. 2 scorer—the Robin to Dirk's Batman. In practice, however, that may not be the case.
It's not as though Barnes is joining a team devoid of other options. Wes Matthews is still around, and he's another year removed from his Achilles injury. And even in Rick Carlisle's relatively equal-opportunity flow offense, the point guard still runs the show, which means Williams can be expected to get his fair share of touches, too. He finished fifth in the NBA in touches per game last season, per NBA.com's SportVU player tracking data.
Instead, Barnes will likely be counted on to do what he does best (knock down threes, which he's done at a 37.6 percent clip in his career) while also being tasked with expanding his game to include more post-ups and work as a secondary ball-handler in pick-and-roll situations. The Mavericks like to post their wings (see: Matthews), especially when they draw smaller defenders, and especially when they rest Nowitzki.
Barnes flashed occasional post-up abilities with the Warriors. He scored 0.91 points per possession out of the post last season, per Synergy Sports data on NBA.com, placing him right around the same efficiency level as players like Carmelo Anthony and Karl-Anthony Towns.
However, Barnes was only given opportunities when he had a clear mismatch. It's likely he'll see a decline in efficiency with more opportunities (simply due to the standard usage-efficiency trade-off) and tougher matchups.
How he'll work as a pick-and-roll ball-handler is also unclear. Going back to his time at the University of North Carolina, Barnes' biggest offensive weakness has been a relative inability to create with the ball in his hands. He's not a good dribbler, and he doesn't seek out passing lanes with his head up when coming around screens.
Teams know he's looking for his shot and they play his dribble attacks that way. As a result, he's often struggled when attempting to create his own offense anywhere other than against mismatches in the post.
Things become a bit cleaner for anyone that plays with Nowitzki, but the transition could still be a somewhat messy one for Barnes.
Dallas will have more than a few minus defenders on next year's team, so Barnes will also be counted on to step up his game on that side of the floor.
He proved a very capable defender at times with the Warriors, but that was within the context of their switch-happy system, and with Klay Thompson running the wings alongside him and Draymond Green. Plus, he had Andrew Bogut to cover for him when he slipped.
Needless to say, he will not have those benefits with the Mavericks (with the exception of Bogut, who was traded to Dallas after Durant's decision). He'll simply have to be more consistently locked in on a possession-to-possession basis now.
Fit and Finish
Barnes didn't really have a choice in whether or not he'd be able to stick with Golden State. The Warriors prioritized getting Durant over bringing back every supporting piece from a 73-win team that couldn't quite push itself over the top.
It's likely they would have prioritized Durant even had they won.
They were right to do so. The dude is one of the three best players on the planet, and Harrison Barnes is not. Plus, it worked.
So Barnes was always going to go to the highest bidder that he felt comfortable with. Once the Lakers spent big on Timofey Mozgov and Luol Deng early in free agency, the number of suitors for Barnes' services shrunk. The rumored 76ers offer never materialized (at least not in public reports), and it's not clear if any team other than Dallas offered a max deal (though it's likely more would have if he sat on the market longer).
The Mavericks still have a relatively clean cap sheet going forward, even factoring in both Barnes' deal and Dirk's reported two-year, $40 million contract, per Stein.
If they don't sign any more players to contracts that run beyond this season, they should have upwards of $28 million in cap space to go shopping again during the summer of 2017, per Basketball Insiders. Cuban hasn't been able to reel in top targets the last few years, but that should be enough to get somebody relatively worthwhile.
In the meantime, this move allows them to continue pushing for a playoff spot during the final years of Nowitzki's brilliant career. Cuban has always said he wants to do right by Dirk, and while he hasn't been able to land the big fish, he and general manager Donnie Nelson have always recovered nicely to make sure the Mavericks don't fall completely off the map and waste Dirk's winters playing for a team with no shot at a postseason berth.
Barnes' contract runs twice as long as Nowitzki's, though, and when the big German hangs up his kicks for good, it will be up to Barnes and whoever else Dallas comes away with the next few summers to pick up the slack. How enticing a proposition that is remains to be seen.
.jpg?w=600 "Colts Release Kenny Moore")
