About

WHAT IS THIS PLACE?

The Two Man Game is the ESPN affiliate blog for the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, and is owned and operated by Rob Mahoney.

WHO ARE YOU?

Rob Mahoney is an obsessive student of professional basketball, dedicated to the minutiae, the overarching themes and everything in between. You can read more of Rob’s thoughts and views on the NBA at The New York Times‘ Off the Dribble blog, NBC Sports’ ProBasketballTalk, Hardwood Paroxysm (a sister site in the ESPN TrueHoop Network), and Voice on the Floor. You can also follow him on Twitter @robmahoney.

Rob is also the author of Mavericks Stampede: Dirk Leads Dallas to the 2011 NBA Championship, a definitive look back at the Mavs’ amazing run through the 2010-2011 season and postseason. You can purchase the book through the publisher, Triumph Books, Barnes and Noble, or Amazon.

Holler: TheTwoManGame[at]gmail[dot]com.

WHY IS THIS BLOG CALLED “THE TWO MAN GAME?”

Good question. Next?

WHAT IS A “D4?” WHY ISN’T (PLAYER X) CONSIDERED TO BE (TRADITIONAL POSITION Y)?

Well, I’m glad you asked. I remain convinced that the basketball positions — point guard, shooting guard, etc. — are almost entirely useless. If you’ll allow me to block quote myself:

To those still clinging to what they know, I’d ask this: what’s a power forward? What characteristics link Dirk Nowitzki, Tim Duncan, Rashard Lewis, Lamar Odom, Reggie Evans, Tyrus Thomas, and J.J. Hickson? Not rebounding. Not scoring. Not skill set. Not height relative to their teammates. Not even the spaces they occupy on the floor. I’m at a total loss as to the criterion that would group that bunch together, which makes the assessment “Player X isn’t a real power forward” pretty much worthless. I think I know what it means, but without the ability to define the contemporary power forward, how could I really know for sure?

Conceptually, this is nothing new. Players like Dirk have been bending positional bounds for years, and the basic tenets of fluid positionality have been preached by a number of NBA scribes. Yet this system makes enough intuitive sense to work, and gives the thought a more practical and literal application.

What is “this system,” you ask? It’s a neo-positional system introduced by Drew Cannon of Basketball Prospectus that helps us to move away from those empty designations and closer to more meaningful ones. As I mentioned in my assessment of Cannon’s system, it’s not perfect. It’s a work in progress. Yet by defining positions by a player’s offensive skills/defensive capabilities, we already have something far more vivid than traditional classifications could ever offer.

For a full explanation of the system, please read this.