Time to rebuild?

This was the first Sunday since August without a football game. It does feel weird and you realize how much this country has become a football nation. There was NBA to fill the void, but you did feel a void for sure even if you are a NBA fan. ABC had the Celtics-Mavs followed by Spurs-Lakers and both games turned out to be one-sided. The Mavs got blown out by Boston much like the Suns last week. This was after they got blown out by Milwaukee and they blew out the Detroit Pistons themselves.

It's interesting to see how both the Suns and the Mavs seem to be in the same boat. Both used to be at the top of the Western heap, but now are fighting for a playoff spot. Both teams are very inconsistent and up and down. Both teams routinely get blown out on the road. It's clear both these teams are just due for a make-over. Given that the talent differential is not that high in professional sports and especially with good teams like the Mavs and Suns, there can be only one reason for frequent blowouts - a lack of effort.

It's clear what's happening with both these teams. They are veteran teams bored with mediocrity. They have been close to the mountain top and they don't feel all that excited about their inevitable slide down. Young, up and coming teams get excited about making the playoffs and clinching the 7-Th or 8-Th spot, but the Suns and the Mavs obviously cannot be motivated by just that after headlining the playoffs the last 5 or 6 years and making multiple Western conference finals. Now these vets don't see themselves going that far and are not seeing any light at the end of the tunnel. So when they get down by 10 in a game, they just give up. No energy or enthusiasm to fight back.

All this means is that the GMs of the Suns and the Mavs have to start looking at rebuilding. It's not going to be easy given the age and salary of stars in these teams, but it has to be done sooner or later - better sooner than later. If you are not going anywhere, you can either grab a snickers bar or start wheeling and dealing and re-building on the fly. I think both these teams have to cross that bridge. They may have to go the Miami route where the Heat held on to Wade and are re-building around him. They can't be afraid to take a step back for a year or two for future greatness.

Mavs and Suns can't just tweak this roster here and there and catchup with the Lakers, Celtics, Cavs or even the Hornets of the World. I would say the Mavs hold onto Dirk and Suns hold onto Amare and look at gutting the rest of their roster. I am a Suns fanatic and I love nothing more than watching Steve Nash in a Suns uniform, but even I have to say, the Nash trade rumors make sense. He is one of the guys on the Suns roster with some trade value and the new Suns don't use all of his skills anyways. He is a defensive liability who probably can be hidden well in a defensively superior roster. I wouldn't be surprised if Kerr pulls the trigger.

The straight-up Nowitzki for Amare trade rumors are also out there. I don't see the point in these except that it'll shake-up both the teams I am talking about. It's obvious everybody thinks these two teams need to do something drastic to get back in the game. Lets see what happens. Who knows, Nash might be throwing alley-oops to LeBron in a month or so. Speaking of the King, dude has been amazing. He hit the first buzzer-beating game winner of his career on Friday against the Warriors. Then he had another monster game on the road against the Jazz. This guy is on a clear-cut MVP pace this season. He is dominating on all fronts and is unstoppable.

The other unstoppable team in the NBA are the Lakers. Today, they pummeled the Spurs at home. Bynum has been awesome the last week and this guy can put the Lakers over the top. Bynum is coming into his own after his return from injury and getting used to playing with Pau and the new alignment, Add his defense and offense to Kobe and Pau and that ridiculously loaded bench, the Lakers are a scary team. I sure hope the Celts, Cavs or the Magic stop the Lakers. I don't see anybody in the West touching them.