Dallas Mavs' Defense Fails to Respond After Being Called 'Soft' By Jason Kidd

The Mavs continue to experience worsening defensive execution, placing them among the NBA's worst on the season. What will it take to improve?

DALLAS — A worsening trend for the Dallas Mavericks has been their lack of defensive execution as the strength of the schedule has become more challenging. After giving up an average of 130.5 points in their losses to the Milwaukee Bucks and Sacramento Kings during a back-to-back, the Mavs' defense is at the forefront of focus.

“I think we’ve just got to get better at our defense,” Mavs superstar Luka Doncic said.

The Mavs are coming off a four-game road trip that featured two back-to-backs, with the final of those games occurring at American Airlines Center on Sunday against the Kings, amounting to five games in eight days. Dallas showed an inability to overcome those challenges against tough opponents.

“We can complain about the schedule, about the time, about the floor, whatever we want to complain about,” Mavs coach Jason Kidd said. “But we’ve got to play the game, and we’ve got to be pros about it. It’s about energy and effort and attitude.”

On the season, the Mavs have faltered to producing a 118.2 defensive rating (26th), placing them in the bottom five of the NBA entering Monday's action. The team has seen worsening results in recent games, even ranking in the bottom three in this area over their past 10 games and being the second-worst defense in their last five outings. 

The Mavs face a very thin margin for error offensively as a result, prompting Kidd to call out the defense and say the team's offense is their best form of defense right now. Between giving up many points in the paint and open 3s in recent games, the situation has worsened to requiring masterful outings offensively to win.

"We can't give up both points in the paint and open 3s, and that's what we're doing right now," Kidd said. "Even in our wins, our defense isn't very good, so our offense is our defense. I said that earlier, until we can understand and be connected on the defensive end and make strides, our best defense is our offense, and when we aren't scoring 130 points, it's hard to win."

At this stage, the Mavs have already been called out by Kidd for their "soft" defense, as Kyrie Irving mentioned when speaking to reporters after a home loss against the Toronto Raptors that featured giving up 72 points in the paint. 

"We were soft in the interior, in the paint. When you have your head coach calling you soft, you have to take that personally and take that as a challenge," Irving after the team's loss against the Raptors. "Once we watch film, it will make more sense. I'm looking forward to it tomorrow so we can just move forward, and I would say it's just part of our season of growth."

There were known limitations the Mavs faced defensively entering the season, beginning with relying on rookie Dereck Lively II to fill a significant role after failing to acquire a veteran center in the offseason. While Lively has exceeded expectations, naturally, there is only so much he can do while adjusting to the NBA. 

"He's just young. He's got to go through it," Kidd said of Lively. "This is the NBA. It's not college. He just has to go through it. The more minutes that he's on the floor, he'll get better. 

"Not today, but in a couple of months, he'll understand what he has to do," Kidd explained. "He's giving everything he has. We've got to continue to stay positive, and he's going to get better."

The Mavs lack the ideal physical profile for wing talent except Olivier-Maxence Prosper. Still, his inexperience as a rookie has kept him from being relied on in a meaningful role this season. Between Derrick Jones Jr.'s thin frame, Grant Williams only being 6-foot-6 without ideal lateral quickness, and a reliance on small lineups with Tim Hardaway Jr. and Josh Green on the wing, the Mavs are showing ill-equipped to handle defending even at a league-average level. There is also an apparent lack of an interior presence when Lively subs out.

Dallas Mavericks superstar Luka Doncic.  / Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports

A lot is going wrong for the Mavs on defense. Between an inability to contain the opposition's top offensive options despite loading up on them, they are getting punished by spot-up shooting and cuts and failing to close possessions in critical moments on the boards by giving up second-chance opportunities. Through and through, they have the makings of a bottom-tier unit on defense.

As a defensive leader, Williams called out the team's lack of effort and physicality defensively but acknowledged that the players are taught their principles daily. What Williams shared has become a trend when the roster discusses their defense — it's on the players, not the coaching staff. 

“Yeah, I think it’s mainly just our effort," Williams said. "Understanding we can trust one another. We’re taught our principles every single day, so being mindful of those. Our physicality has to improve.”

While light on words, Doncic shared a sentiment similar to Williams, stating the Mavs must be more physically defensively going forward without sharing specifics. The only problem? That marks two nights in a row when Doncic highlights the team's need to tighten up defensively while the results worsen. 

“Yeah, that’s part of the defense and the physicality," Doncic said on Sunday. "I think those two things we need to get way better [at].”

Sound familiar? That's because Doncic said essentially the same thing on Saturday after Giannis Antetokounmpo picked apart the Mavs, finishing with 40 points, 15 rebounds, and seven assists, while his team scored 132 points. 

 "Just got to play better defense. That's it," Doncic said on Saturday. "I don't think offense is a problem. I think we just have to play better defense."

Doncic described Antetokounmpo's performance as "torching" the Mavs' defense, often getting into the paint and facing little resistance. The Slovenian superstar was right about the extent to which "The Great Freek" was pouring it on his team's defense, given he scored a staggering 32 points in the paint. 

"Giannis was just torching us in the paint," Doncic said. "I don't know how many paint points he had, but he had a lot. Obviously, it's really tough to stop him, but he was just getting into the paint a lot."

Down the stretch of the Mavs' loss to the Bucks, there were shortcomings in how the defense recovered to off-ball shooters, particularly Pat Connaughton, who had multiple made 3s that proved costly. Kyrie Irving attributed it to the defense being out of position, while also failing to contain Antetokounmpo. 

"We did a good job coming out of halftime with that energy and verve we normally have," Irving said. "We were playing good defensive principals, and they were making timely shots. A few times in that fourth quarter, I was out of position, or other guys were out of position defensively where we're giving up some corner 3s to some of their shooters and Giannis getting downhill, shooting a few free throws tonight."

Much of the Mavs' roster has yet to show the capability to be aggressive in getting into the ball or navigating screens with much impact. Before worrying about any of that, it might help their perimeter players to begin at least handling and maintaining enough focus not to allow off-ball players to beat them on cuts, corner drifts/shakeups, or on the boards by simply paying attention and being assertive. 

After the Mavs can reduce off-ball lapses, a quality next step would be to have a collective commitment to making more than one defensive rotation when needed instead of not communicating and just pointing — or expecting a teammate to be a mind-reader — expecting someone else to do it. It's been common for a half-serious closeout to occur and for that defender to feel as though they did enough on the play when they were needed later on to make an additional effort on another closeout, resulting in a wide-open shot being given up. 

Even when some players are making that necessary extra effort, there has been a consistent inability to either take a proper angle or do so with the needed timing to contain an attack off the catch, resulting in a re-drive against an out-of-position defense. Again, many of these shortcomings begin with focus and commitment to taking ownership of one's role. 

"What I learned from tonight and even in Denver is just that we still have to mature as a team and continue to find that consistency that we talk about daily," Irving said after the loss to the Bucks. "And that's just doing the little things and settling into our roles, and night-to-night, it could be different people finishing the game in different lineups. We just got to be prepared.

"Teams are going to throw their best at us. We saw that tonight against. Milwaukee, you see that against other teams," Irving explained. "But when you play against the top teams in the league, you can really use that measuring stick to propel yourself moving forward and gather all the mistakes and attack them and then move forward."

When factoring in that it's rare for the Mavs to encounter an All-Star caliber talent where they have an ideal physical profile to handle without needing to load up aggressively with help or send double teams, it's a necessity to be all the more disciplined and committed to doing all of these little things to survive. 

Sacramento Kings star Domantas Sabonis against the Dallas Mavericks.  / Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports

Domantas Sabonis finished with 32 points, 13 rebounds, and six assists against the Mavs while shooting 13-15 from the floor, with his only misses being from beyond the perimeter. Dallas had absolutely zero answers to contain him, whether it was Lively, Dwight Powell, or a perimeter player. Williams mentioned the need for more toughness or improvement in making low-man rotations.   

"He was just walking down the lane against us, doing pick-and-roll and shooting layups," Williams said of Sabonis. "That’s something we have to be better at — our low man being present and available and then having the low man’s back — that’s something we have to improve on and be mindful of because either we have to make a play at the rim and not allow these layups and things to happen, or we have to foul somebody and show a little bit of toughness.”

Another limitation the Mavs face beyond the lack of ideal physical traits for many of their defenders is the lack of creativity and sophistication they can deploy in their defensive schemes. Between a rookie rim protector learning the NBA game and a rotation full of perimeter players that take plays off, only so many looks can be deployed throughout a game. 

De'Aaron Fox, who finished with 30 points, four rebounds, and seven assists, often saw drop coverage when he wasn't getting blitzed, enabling him to mentally prepare for pull-up 3s knowing the look would be there and went 6-10 from deep. Between giving up those shots and not getting into the ball aggressively, it was light work for the All-Star guard to pick apart Dallas' defense. 

“His pace is incredible. When he makes shots, especially those pull-ups, it makes him difficult to guard," Williams said of Fox. "Making his life a little bit more difficult, pressuring the ball, will be necessary.”

The Mavs have a prime opportunity to refocus before their two-game road trip in Los Angeles, featuring a matchup against the Lakers on Wednesday, then concluding with facing the Clippers on Saturday. The team will have had two days to rest and prepare for each of their upcoming games with minimal travel required. 

Suppose the Mavs prove unable to recalibrate their defense given much-improved circumstances. In that case, it may be time to strongly re-evaluate personnel choices and begin to evaluate possible in-season roster moves.