More on Kelly Dwyer

Just because I have nothing better to write at the moment, I'm going to do one of my e-famous point by point deconstructions of young Mr. Dwyer's comments on my MVP entry. It's been a fan favorite in other circles, so I hope you all enjoy it, as well. Should be fun.

KD: Dirk played better than any player in basketball, consistently, from the first week of November until the end of the season.

J: It's funny that this was the first thing you said. It was followed later by...

KD: The type of swoon Nash had following his Feb. return from injury was exactly the funk I was talking about. Dirk didn't come through with that until the season's final two weeks.

J: So which is it? He either went through a lull or he didn't. Make up your mind. More on that first part later.

KD: If you want to hand the MVP to someone because of the first round of the playoffs, then I'll be right there, covering the ceremony with Luol Deng.

J: I don't know if I ever suggested anything of the sort, but if I did, I'll see you in Oakland.

KD: Unless you're pissed at the All-D votes, which coaches vote on. Not writers.

J: See...now this is where reading plays a key role in understanding. My memory may be failing, but I'm thinking that my exact words on that subject were along the lines of, "The hype around these other players is so bad that even the >>coaches in the league<< have been sucked into the void of intellectual atrophy provided by the sports media. " Something like that. Correct me if I'm wrong.

KD: By the way, the whole "makes his teammates better" BS shows nothing but disrespect toward the players on your favorite team

J: Is that so? Is that why they always laud him for making their jobs easier? Maybe you just misunderstand the phrase "makes his teammates better". My understanding of that phrase is that it means that they are more effective with him on the court, which they are.

For example... Shawn Marion and Amare Stoudemire are shooting over 52% since Nash joined the team. Raja Bell is shooting a career best 42.7% three pointers since joining Nash. Leandro Barbosa is also shooting career high percentages with a better assist rate and lower turnovers under Nash's tutelage. (Yes, he is a young player, but he does attribute a lot of his growth to Steve Nash, as well as Dan D'Antoni.)

Of course Steve didn't teach them how to shoot. But they sure do get better looks because of his presence and pinpoint passing. That makes them TA DA!!! BETTER! Does that improve their individual skill sets? No. But it certainly makes them even less guardable than before. (Conversely, Nash credits his teammates for making him better by being so good.) Maybe you're disrespecting the Mavs by attributing their success to his great season.

KD: So the March 14th game invalidates the other two contests where Dirk was brilliant in leading his team to victory?

J: Yes. That is exactly what I said, verbatim. Thank you for clarifying for everyone what I meant by this... "One game should never determine who the MVP should be. It's not fair to the guys who play the other 81 games of the year (or most of them). What that game did, though, was highlight exactly why Dirk should never be voted for the award."

KD: Did you watch basketball before the Kobe vs. Shaq game?

J: Nope. Didn't have time because I was wallowing in self pity regarding my lack of employment as a paid hack. I'll try to remember to keep up next season, though. Thanks for reminding me.

KD: The type of swoon Nash had following his Feb. return from injury was exactly the funk I was talking about.

J: So let me get this straight. Steve Nash should be punished for being injured for two weeks, then working himself back into game shape simply because Dirk missed all of two games? That's interesting, as it was Nash's absence in the 04-05 season that sealed his first MVP. It isn't as if his performance suffered from boredom or lack of focus. He couldn't shoot straight due to a bum shoulder. HAND THE MVP TO DIRK, FOLKS!

KD: Dirk didn't come through with that until the season's final two weeks. Duncan had his in January. Kobe had his in November.

J: Kobe was coming back from knee surgery. Duncan played his best when it mattered...going into the playoffs. Steve played his best all year, and was sidetracked by an injury. Dirk bombed, as you said, the last two weeks of the season. Isn't that the time that MVPs start gathering momentum for the playoffs? If its a full regular season award, why are you giving him a pass on the last two weeks when it has so obviously affected him in the first round? Sounds rather specious to me.

KD: How is Steve making his teammates "better" if they're already able to do the things he allows them to do?

J: Couldn't think of anything new to say, eh? Couldn't, oh, I don't know, addressed the valid points I made?

KD: He may allow them to do those things nine times a game, whereas Howard Eisley allowed them to pull it off once a game a few years back

J: Howard Eisley is also not an MVP candidate, nor has he ever been. That is a good reason why. Seriously...you've reduced yourself to comparing a two time MVP to a career back up point guard who only became a starter after the Suns shipped Marbury off to New York? Here comes that word again...specious.

KD: Michael Jordan didn't teach Steve Kerr how to hit a jump shot.

J: He sure didn't. But he allowed Steve Kerr to play a HUGE roll in three straight championships, didn't he? Double teams will do that. And who gets double teamed so much that a simple jump shooter can win a championship for you? An MVP. That's who.

KD: If somebody thought you could bring readers to their forum, they'd have found you, and paid you.

J: I hadn't realized that major news networks and professional sports teams were scouring the web for random bloggers to hijack. Thanks for the heads up. I'll be keeping a lookout posted 24/7.

KD: And before you type the "that's not the type of person I want to be, having to hack it up for cash" twaddle, consider that you already think yourself worthy for a job -- that's why you brought the pay bit up in the first place.

J: One of my biggest pet peeves is people trying to speak for me. Knocking down a man of straw you built with your own hands does not constitute a valid argument. I bought up the "paid" thing in the first place because (if you had bothered to read other entries) it is something I say when I find that professional journalists aren't living up to standards of excellence that I and other readers set for them. I'm a good writer, and I don't even get paid. What's your excuse?

KD: Don't try to have it either way.

J: Who made YOU God? Who are you to say that I can't have either of two choices set before me? (What you meant to say was, "Don't try to have it BOTH ways.") Still, it's your own fault for trying to back me into a corner with the imaginary argument you came here with. If I ever get paid for writing, it will be a small miracle. But if it meant having to compromise my own standards of artistic integrity, I'll be more than happy to continue doing it for free.

KD: The great lot of NBA blogdom offers analysis and insight that somehow manages to rise above subjectivity and teach people new things.

J: And yours accomplishes neither.

KD: The worst is when the fans willingly ignore things they know will hurt their argument (November 9th, 2006; December 28th, 2006)

J: I didn't ignore anything. I used a specific example to demonstrate a lack of quality by a player compared to another in the same game at the same time. Fourth quarter of the March 14 game illustrated beautifully the differences between the two players. But since we're on that subject...I find it amusingly ironic that you would accuse me of ignoring the two games earlier in the year, while you simultaneously try to brush the last two games under the rug. So why are you ignoring more critical games? Is it because those two games just happen to destroy your argument that Dirk is the MVP...that he was outplayed in every way by Steve Nash?

KD: when objective scribes who have been around all year are also around and know better.

J: Number one: I never claimed to be completely objective. I even state in my profile that I come off as a homer, yet I do my best to remain as objective as possible. The whole point of being a "fan" is to support the home team.

Number two: I sure as hell hope that you're not counting yourself as someone who knows better. For your information, I said for a long time that even I cannot choose between Nash or Nowitzki as MVP. They were both having great years, and I said on azcentral for all my fellow Suns fans to see that I wouldn't be bothered in the least if Dirk won it. Then March 14 happened. Then April 1 happened. Then I noticed Tim Duncan. Nash and Duncan are my top two because of their big game performances and all around great play, but I still choose Nash because Duncan is a San Antonio Spur.

KD: Pick on the idiots who want to give Dirk an MVP because of the "best player on the best team" tripe.

J: I'd rather pick on the idiots who think that Dirk has been the most consistent player all year, the ones who can't admit that he has said and done things on and off the court that point to his ultimate ineptness as the best player and leader of a team.

KD: Pick on Dirk's pathetic first round in a vacuum, especially when you know it's a regular
season award.

J: You mean...especially when I STATED CLEARLY that it's a regular season award.

KD: Celebrate the play of what could be the NBA's finest player to ever play the position

J: I am. That's why I say that Steve Nash should be the MVP, and not a seven foot off guard who plays at the four even though he has the size and lateral movement of a center.

KD: don't instead choose to waste your time denigrating others with specious reasoning.

J: Waste my time? On the Internet? On an amateur sports blog? Are you joking? How would you have me waste my time...by working? I'll denigrate whoever the hell I want, especially when that person uses specious reasoning to counteract his own dissonance to the fact that he backed the wrong horse. Speaking of specious...aren't you the genius who stated as part of his reasoning for choosing Dirk that he is "the NBA's probable leader in passes that lead to the assist"?

The Gretzky pass isn't even a measurable statistic, and you're trying to use it as reasoning for choosing Dirk? Moreover, a quality that Nash excels at better than anyone in the league? Are you shittin' me? Dallas was 24th in the league in assists, and you're saying that Dirk Nowitzki is probably the league leader in a statistical category that doesn't exist that, if it did exist, is directly proportional to the amount of assists a team has. And you say that I use specious reasoning?

KD: It just makes you look, at any age, desperate.

J: I'm sorry...you were saying? My age (33 for those who haven't looked) has what to do with anything? But since you decided to open that door...who in their right minds is going to listen to a 26 year old kid talk about the nuances of basketball when he isn't even old enough to remember Kareem's sky hook? Only a kid would lack the foresight it takes to make that statement. Now can we get back to the meat of the debate?

KD: Hard to do that with someone who's entire argument consists of hyperbole.

J: You want hyperbole? Try this on for size... "Nowitzki is a consistently devastating scorer, one of the league's best (and most underrated) help defenders, the NBA's probable leader in passes that lead to the assist and a spacing creator nonpareil. "

Don't make accusations about things of which you are guilty. It makes you look like you didn't think this whole thing through. Then again, so do all of your half-ass replies to my entry.

KD: You could have said "Kelly Dwyer, who disagrees with me as to Steve Nash's relative merits as an all-around basketball player when in comparison to Dirk Nowitzki;"

J: Conversely, I also could have said, "Kelly Dwyer's a fucking illiterate retard without the base sense back away from a loose cliff edge. Can you believe this jackass won't concede that Nowitzki has given voters reason to doubt their decision to make him this year's MVP? What an asshole!"

But I didn't.

KB: Virtue and skill should be their own reward.

J: That must be why you're getting paid.