How Dirk Nowitzki Has Scored 30,000 Despite the Doubters

Theory 2: Dirk Did it Before Social Media Took Over

Dirk Nowitzki started his career in 1998 when he was drafted by the Dallas Mavericks via a draft-day trade. In the year 1998 cell phones were still bricks, the DVD player was completely unknown to the general public, and the first iPod wouldn’t be around for another 3 years.

The top movies of the year were “The Truman Show” and “Saving Private Ryan” and some of the top musical hits included “Too Close” by Next, “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” by Aerosmith, and “One Week” by The Barenaked Ladies.

Clearly 1998 was a different time. Nowadays, TV’s under 40″ are considered small, everything you need is at the end of your fingertips in what we call smartphones, and movies are accessible in a million different ways, most of which no longer require a hard copy. Then there is that thing we all love known as social media.

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Social media is made up of a handful of sites all designed so that people can network with others without needing to be face to face. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and even Snapchat have made their mark on society and a vast majority of people probably visit at least one of these daily.

This newfound desire to have everything at the end of your fingertips has been great for the sports world, but has also changed sports in a way. Now, instead of watching the games live or attending games in person, people are able to see all the highlights from each game at any given time.

The popularity of players like LeBron James, Blake Griffin, and Stephen Curry have come through the workings of social media and the opportunity people have to see their greatness very easily. Although Dirk has been around through the social media times, the best years of his career were before the social media push and after the reign of King James had already begun.

Dirk has set many milestones in his career while social media has been a presence, but the fact is, when Dirk was playing at his highest level of individual play (2002-2009), social media was not the big deal that it is now. Dirk never wanted to be the center of attention, which is good because it never happened that way.

Next: Dirk's Style of Play