Where there is no heart, there is no glory

Within this past decade Dirk Nowitzki has played with two dominant future Hall of Famers and had exceptional talent surrounding him. Nowitzki’s stat sheet has Hall of Fame written all over it. If you would have told me Dirk was un-achieving and unable to win big games, I would have told you that you were insane. Still the reality is you’re not going crazy. So the big question is; Why can’t the Dirk Nowitzki win the games that matter? To refresh your memory, let me give you a break down of the Mavs history in the last nine to ten years.

Mark Cuban owner of the Dallas Mavericks took over the franchise back in 2000. Since the arrival of Cuban the ball club has been a dominant force in the NBA. Cuban as an owner reminds of Jerry Jones the owner of the Dallas Cowboys. They both have a niche for all star caliber talent, but they also have similar way of losing the meaningful games. The Mavericks have had plenty of talent over the past years and Dirk Nowitzki has been the franchise player they’ve built around. Mark Cuban has done a great job of keeping the Maverick’s roster full with talent like; Steve Nash, Jason Kidd, Devin Harris, Michael Finley, Josh Howard, Antawan Jamison and the list continues. Dirk Nowitzki and his Mavericks have had more regular season success than post season success. This franchise has won fifty games or more in the last nine seasons, they’ve made post-season appearances more than five times and seen the Conference Championship once. With so much regular season success and a team capable of winning the NBA championship, why haven’t they won?

Do not blame Mark Cuban and his staff, the blame goes on Dirk Nowitzki himself. Mr. Nowitzki will have all of the stats and number to make him one of the elite Power – Forwards in the history of the NBA. But his career will never possess a gold ring because Dirk Nowitzki plays with no heart. A true champion plays with passion and gives his heart and soul to his team. For example Kevin Garnett played with the Minnesota Timberwolves organization for ten long seasons, but never won anything. Every night whether his team was a playoff team or not he played the game as if it were his last. Finally when Kevin was traded to the Boston Celtics he won his first NBA title, but he won with the same passion and hunger as if he was the only star on the team.

As for Dirk every night he can be a sensational scorer, but what else does he bring to your team? If you’re pondering about the other great stuff Dirk Nowitzki bring to your ball club . . . well let me help you out, he brings nothing! He is not a dominating rebounder for his height and he lack of great defense. You can simply say if you shut down Dirk’s offense, you shut down Dirk’s entire game. As we seen in the past offense doesn’t win anything.

Dirk what will it take for you to obtain the hunger of champion? Its start with heart and passion, these two things will drive you beyond your talent. By having the heart and passion for the game it will create leadership. A great leader must have all of the intangibles to get his team from point A too point B. A great leader must see nothing but victory because if he doesn’t, he will always question his failures.