Worth every pennyIt was essentially a swap of Devin Harris for the aging Kidd. I hated such desperate, panic move. I thought it was too steep of a price, although Kidd was rather expensive. The Mavs sent Harris, Trenton Hassell, Mo Ager, DeSagana Diop, Keith Van Horn, cash and first round picks to the Nets for Kidd and Malik Allen.
It doesn't sound like much. In reality, only Harris and Van Horn had any value, and Van Horn had a very sweet expiring deal at the time, not unlike the Erick Dampier trade chip they had last summer. The Van Horn chip was supposed to be a huge player in getting an impact guy. Instead, he was just another name in a trade for a point guard past his prime.
Despite all my bitching, I wrote this on Feb. 20, 2008:
"No more bitching, but also no more excuses about lack of toughness or leadership. This is it. The Mavs have to start winning and they must start winning playoff games by the handfuls. A NBA Championship within the next two years is the only thing that will make this entire rigmarole worth it. The Mavs win and all doubters are silenced."
It took more than three years, but it happened. Jason Kidd was the starting point guard -- an integral ingredient -- on a championship team.
All of the attention goes to Dirk Nowitzki and how this title will boost his image and legacy.
No one really talks about Jason Kidd. He'd been to the Finals twice before against a clearly outmatched, but scrappy, New Jersey Nets team. Kidd was the Nets (finished five times in the top 10 in MVP voting ... in 2001-02 he finished second behind Tim Duncan). He'd never won big before, but now he has.
I don't think it matters that he is clearly past his prime. He says he has years left. His brain is probably making decisions his legs can't handle. Despite what everyone says, he's not near the defender we think he is. Yes, he's highly intelligent on the court and that makes up for a lot of physical deficiencies. Still, he was important more so in working hard, staying the course and never, ever getting frazzled. The latter, I think, was Kidd's most vital contribution to the 2010-11 Dallas Mavericks.
My end game with Kidd's arrival was that only a title matters. You never trade a young commodity like Devin Harris for someone like Kidd unless it ended with a title. I stand by that. Now that the Mavericks have won, the trade is validated in my eyes. That was a good trade, zero doubt ... now.
I hate to judge Harris on this point. Yes, the injuries he's had since are scary. Still, we sent him to New Jersey. It's like sending someone to Siberia and not being able to believe that person can't stay warm. Everyone's going to look worse in New Jersey. Playing next to Dirk Nowitzki, Tyson Chandler, Shawn Marion and others is far and away a totally different set of circumstances that make comparisons unfair.
My most frustrating thoughts about Kidd regard how everyone treats him in the media and public. Like most things concerning the Mavericks, we ignore the bad and over-celebrate the good. No one talks about Kidd's 1-6 shooting nights. Everyone talks when he goes 4-6.
The shooting irks me too. Kidd's played in 17 season in the NBA. For 16 of those seasons, including the 14 previous to re-joining the Mavericks, he was an awful shooter. Then, suddenly, in 2009-10, he's shooting and shooting well. With time, his ability to beat defenders off the dribble has disappeared and he never gets to the free-throw line. Apparently, all it took was some tutoring from Nowitzki and he can suddenly shoot.
Kidd was a Hall-of-Fame point guard before he came back to Dallas. But him "learning" how to shoot this far into his career is like learning Shaquille O'Neal could really shooting 90 percent from the free-throw line. If Kidd could always learn to shoot, why didn't he do it earlier? Would it not have helped his team? No one's really explained this.
Note: I always like to bring up in the "Jason Kidd is a good shooter" discussion that he was 36 percent from the field this season and 34 percent from the three-point line. Kidd still can't shoot. But he can hit big shots. There's a marked difference.
Kidd has his limitations. He knows them even if the rest of us would like to think he's a 38-year-old, defying-all-odds superstar that no one really appreciates. I think he could give a shit. That dude, maybe more than anyone, including Nowitzki, wanted a ring. He cared nothing for legacy (or else he would've learned to shoot in 1994) or for how he looked (or else he wouldn't have beat his wife).
He was about the ring. It validates everything. It, in turn, solidifies his legacy.
