Near the end of last night’s Spurs/Mavs game, Robert Horry tried to eat Jerry Stackhouse. Stack was going for a rebound, and Horry shoved him. Stackhouse went back at him, the two got tangled up, and Horry then attempted to bite Stackhouse’s arm.

Dick Bavetta got in between the two, Horry started screaming at him, and Bavetta started getting back in his grill. And Horry grabs his shoulder and starts shaking it back and forth, kinda playfully, but he’s shaking him like he was, say, Nazr Mohammed, instead of a 82-pound man who celebrated his 100th birthday sometime in the 1980s. Poor Dick Bavetta was thrashed about like he was a blow-up doll in Horry’s hand. It was bizarre. Also, I think Tim Duncan tried to kick Horry somewhere in there. Robert Horry’s a weird guy.

Anyway… pretty good game last night. Both teams really wanted it, which made it interesting to watch… games like that are somewhat rare among the regular season 82. But the Mavs learned that they’re still the Colts… they’re not quite there yet, and their best player is soft and pasty. They’re a good team; a complete team… the best Mavs team that has existed, in fact. The Spurs are just better. Bruce Bowen pretty much locked up Dirk Nowitzki all night long, and the Spurs threw some double-teams at him when he tried to go inside. The Spurs made Dirk pretty much useless… Gregg Popovich is the man.

My only other major complaint with Dallas is the defense of their bigs. Overall, they’re a solid defensive team (though there were some lapses last night). You have to work for shots against them… their help rotatins are as good as just about any team in the league, which is a major credit to Avery Johnson. But if you can spread the floor on them, you can take advantage of Nowitzki and Dampier. Dampier can block some shots if he’s just hanging out under the basket, but if you get him in some pick-and-roll situations, he’s in trouble. And Dirk is still not very good.