The No. 1 roster-building rule in the NBA is a simple one: you need to have a superstar. Shocking, I know. Every champion since the 2004 Detroit Pistons has had a player earn either First- or Second-Team All-NBA honors. Before the Pistons, the last team to win it all without one was the 1995 Houston Rockets, who had a former MVP in Hakeem Olajuwon. Simply put, you need a top-10 player in the NBA to win it all. The Dallas Mavericks (Luka Doncic) and Boston Celtics (Jayson Tatum) both have one.
Of course, having a top-10 player isn’t exactly a replicable blueprint. It’s not as though the Utah Jazz or Charlotte Hornets can just go out and sign Giannis Antetokounmpo tomorrow. But the Celtics and Mavericks aren’t exactly the early 2010 Heat, either. They are not simply an assemblage of multiple superstars with few resources devoted to the rest of the roster. These are deep and thoughtfully constructed rosters with lessons that can be applied to almost any team.
So before the NBA Finals begin, let’s try to figure out what we can learn from Boston and Dallas’s success this season. These are the lessons other teams should learn from the Mavericks and Celtics.
Trade for players on bad teams
When the Mavericks traded for PJ Washington in February, they knew they weren’t getting a finished product. When Washington arrived, he spoke openly about needing to guard a variety of different kinds of players. “I love the fact that he talked about defense because we’re going to be holding him accountable,” general manager Nico Harrison said at the time. Read between the lines and you get the true message: we need to hold Washington accountable because the Hornets weren’t.
Young players don’t always bring their best defensive effort when they have nothing to play for. The same was true of Daniel Gafford when he played for the Washington Wizards. He had a negative D-EPM last season at -0.3. When he got to Dallas, that figure jumped to +1.5 this season. In Washington and Gafford, the Mavericks identified two young players on bad teams who clearly had…
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