Against the Los Angeles Clippers, Dirk Nowitzki was the sixth player to reach the 50,000 minute mark in the regular season. Clippers coach Doc Rivers then paid him respect.
“It’s really unbelievable – 50,000 minutes – I mean, I have no idea how he gets up in the morning and leaves the bed at all,”said Rivers.”And it was hard minutes. If I’d played 50,000 minutes, half the time you wouldn’t have known I was out there. It made it easier. But 50,000 minutes as the first option is really impressive. And in his size. It’s incredible, really.”
Nowitzki has also completed 5,895 in the playoffs, which are not added to this mark. Before him, only Elvin Hayes, Jason Kidd, Kevin Garnett, Karl Malone and Tim Duncan reached this brand. By the end of the season Nowitzki could even climb to third place.
“There’s a reason why players like him are great,”said Mavs coach Rick Carlisle,”It’s not just because of God-given talent, which of course they have a lot of. It also depends on what they do with it and how they form these talents. Dirk has one of the most important and unique careers in our sport.”
LeBron James, who is already in 22nd place all-time (43,155 minutes), also congratulated Nowitzki on the milestone via Twitter.