--The Mavs traded C DeSagana Diop to Charlotte for G Matt Carroll to help put a scoring-challenged bench -- outside of Jason Terry -- put up points. But in four games, Mavs coach Rick Carlisle has barely played Carroll, a 40 percent career shooter from behind the 3-point arc.
Carroll didn't get off the bench in Sunday's blowout at Boston until the final 6:18 of the game. He never got in at any point when the Mavs desperately needed any kind of scoring or defensive spark. For the second consecutive game he did not take a shot, and he is just 1-of-4 in four games with the Mavs.
--In their last two losses to Milwaukee and Boston, the Mavs have given up quarters of 38, 36, 42, 37 and 32 points. Those are not "winning numbers" as Mavs coach Rick Carlisle is fond of saying.
QUOTE TO NOTE: "I really want to make this work here, and that's really all there is to it." -- Dirk Nowitzki, on the prospect of possibly being traded if the Mavs decided to retool a la what Minnesota did with Kevin Garnett.
