Power Ranking the Mavs: Little movement at the top in Week 8

1) Tyson Chandler

Last week: 1 (no change)

Tyson continues to be the Mavs’ most consistent and most valuable player.

2) Dirk Nowitzki

Last week: 3 (up 1 spot)

Dirk has rebounded somewhat from a tough skid. Neither he nor Monta showed up against the Grizzlies, but Dirk at least had some rebounds and assists to balance out his lack of scoring in that game. He followed that up with 20 & 6 against the Pellies and 23 & 8 against the Warriors.

3) Monta Ellis

Last week: 2 (down 1 spot)

Monta put up 2 points against the Grizzlies. I know he had a sore elbow or whatever, but still… that was frustrating. Fortunately he was back to being Monta for the rest of the week, dropping 26 against the Pellies and 24 against the Warriors, with 5 assists in the both those games. Monta basically won the game against New Orleans, scoring 13 points in the last 5 minutes.

4) Chandler Parsons

Last week: 4 (no change)

Chandler Parsons continues to challenge the haters. He was the Mavs’ best player against the Grizzlies, in a game the Mavs might’ve won had Dirk or Monta showed up. As bad as the Warriors game was in the first half, I wonder if things might have turned out differently had Parsons been able to play.

5) Devin Harris

Last week: 6 (up 1 spot)

After the top 4, 5-11 on this ranking is basically a heap. No one is particularly good, but no one is absolutely terrible either. It’s just been a really meh week for the Mavs’ bench. Devin epitomizes this. He moves up a spot largely because he didn’t do anything wrong, not because he did anything particularly good.

6) J.J. Barea

Last week: 7 (up 1 spots)

Barea can be really frustrating sometimes, but that has more to do with his physical limitations than his effort or play. If JJ was 6-3, he would be the Mavs’ best point guard, and it might not be close.

7) Brandan Wright

Last week: 5 (down 2 spots)

Brandan has had probably the roughest week of the season. I hate having him this low, but he set such a high bar for himself to start the season that it has been really frustrating to see him have such little impact the past couple of week.

8) Jae Crowder

Last week: 11 (up 3 spots)

Jae has actually looked like an NBA player lately. I am fully supportive of him getting more minutes, but it absolutely should not be at Aminu’s expense.

9) Jameer Nelson

Last week: 10 (up 1 spot)

Jameer scored 18 against the Grizzlies. He is still terrible at defense and should be playing fewer minutes (and not starting), but his turnovers are slightly down.

10) Richard Jefferson

Last week: 12 (up 2 spots)

Richard Jefferson wasn’t absolutely terrible starting in place of Parsons. I mean, he was at first, but he then acquitted himself fairly well.

11) Al-Farouq Aminu

Last week: 11 (no change)

Aminu deserves to be ranked higher, but Carlisle is holding him back right now. Aminu should be playing more, even if Crowder deserves more minutes. Just play Jameer fewer minutes and use Crowder at the 2 some.

12) Charlie Villenueva

Last week: 12 (no change)

Charlie was DNP-CD’ed against the Pellies & Warriors. But it feels like (right now), he is more capable of contributing something than Greg Smith. Plus people seem to like his blog posts.

13) Greg Smith

Last week: 13 (no change)

It would have been nice to see whether Smith could have contributed something against the Grizzlies. Alas, Carlisle didn’t trust him enough to give it a shot. If Smith wants playing time, he is going to have to really make an impression on his coach during practice.

14) Raymond Felton

Last week: 14 (no change)

I’m beginning to wonder if Raymond Felton is a real thing.