Dirk Nowitzki followed the entire crunchtime of the season opener of his Dallas Mavericks from the bank – and Rick Carlisle actually wanted to replace him.The German then explained his “refusal”to Dallas Morning News.
About three minutes before the end Carlisle Nowitzki wanted to replace Nowitzki, after he had already been sitting on the bench for a few minutes.Nowitzki, however, withdrew and asked Carlisle to keep Dwight Powell on the field.
“I haven’t played such intense minutes since April as I did today,”Nowitzki said,”I felt really weak in the fourth quarter.Normally I go out a little later, this time I asked for about nine minutes on the clock to come out.Dwight played well.”
Nowitzki himself hadn’t had a good day on the court in his 24 minutes.He only scored four of his 14 throws (10 points), and the Mavs lost to Atlanta by 18 points while standing on the court.Nevertheless, it was an unusual picture, the living legend in its 20th century.NBA season not see at the end of the game.
“It was really weird,”said J. J.Barea.”But we are in change.Wesley Matthews immediately announced further unfamiliar situations:” It’s going to be really funny everywhere.It’ll probably be a kind of year.But we have to go into it.”