In November 1994, roughly 30 years ago, the Mavericks debuted the famous “Three Js” lineup consisting of smooth scoring shooting guard Jimmy Jackson, shot happy small forward Jamal Mashburn, and exciting rookie point guard Jason Kidd. The trio with the flashy nickname and flashy games captured the imagination of fans before quickly flaming out due to a variety of factors, most notably personality clashes between the three stars that may or may not have involved a love triangle with singer Toni Braxton.
Enough time has passed that I thought now would be interesting to revisit the rise-and-fall of The Three Js and what more we can learn with a little distance from the controversy. Let’s run through the Three Js, FAQ style….
A Little Context: Dallas before The Three Js
The Mavericks were the model of how an expansion franchise builds intelligently. After a rough 15-67 debut in 1980-81, Dallas steadily improved by hitting on most of its draft picks, culminating in 55 wins in 1986-87 and 53 wins in 1987-88 before the team began to decline due to an aging core and the addiction issues of franchise superstar Roy Tarpley.
The tipping point came in 1990-91. The talented Tarpley had been suspended twice for failing drug tests and a third failed test would necessitate a three-year ban (which, at the time, was considered to be ostensibly a lifetime suspension). The Mavs started out 4-1 and the 26-year old Tarpley was dominant: 34.2 mpg, 20.4 ppg, .544 FG%. 11.0 rpg, 2.4 apg, 1.8 bpg, 23.6 PER, .165 WS48, 3.6 BPM. Alas, Tarpley injured his knee dunking in that fifth game and was ruled out for the season. The Mavs finished up the 27-53 without Tarpley but were left hoping, with his return in 1991-92, they could plausibly contend. Things went sideways from there.
While rehabbing his knee, Tarpley had other issues. He was arrested for DWI again and suspended for another relapse. Before the 1991-92 season, Tarpley, who had failed two prior tests, refused to take a mandatory drug test. The NBA considered this a third failure and resulted in a ban from the NBA.
Without Tarpley, the Mavs fell to 22-60 in 1991-92 and it was clear a full rebuild was needed. Dallas picked a pretty good year to tank. The 1992 Draft was loaded with huge prospects: Shaq, Alonzo Mourning, Christian Laettner, and Jimmy Jackson. Dallas had the third worst record in the NBA but fell to the fourth pick, when a 31-win Charlotte team had lottery luck and leapfrogged Dallas and Minnesota to get the second pick (the Wolves luck was worse, as they were the NBA’s worst team by far and still missed out on Shaq and Zo). Dallas tabbed Jackson with the fourth pick, getting its first J.
1992-93: Tanking & antagonizing Jackson for no good reason
The 1992-93 Mavs were a tank machine on par with The Process 76ers. Dallas clearly did not intend to compete in 1992. Of the 19 players that played on the team that year, 17 were young fringe players. A few of those players would end up having decent NBA careers (Sean Rooks, Terry Davis, and Tim Legler) but they were role players and the rest of the roster would be out of the NBA shortly after the season. That left two bona fide NBA players: Jackson and veteran point guard Derek Harper.
To make matters worse, JJ had a serious contract dispute that led him to hold out for much of the season. According to The Seattle Times, the crux of the dispute was that Jackson wanted a six-year deal and the team was only offering a four-year deal. By mid-December an angry Jackson released a statement saying that he’d never play for the Mavs: “I do not feel that the Dallas Mavericks have dealt with me in the same way other top NBA picks were dealt with. I now feel it is necessary to publicly stop all speculation that I might at some time be willing to sign with Dallas. I will not under any circumstances, or at any time, play basketball with the Dallas Mavericks.”
Perhaps because he was perfectly happy to tank the year away, Dallas GM Norm Sonju was not particularly intimidated: “If we were able to get them talking on a six-year model, no matter what words have been said, things could change. Maybe I’m naive, but I’m hoping good things can still happen. We’re not holding it against him. He was sincere and polite in the way he said it. He meant every word of it and I don’t blame him for being frustrated.”
In retrospect, it’s a bit funny that contract length was the sticking point. As we soon learned, young players who hit the free agent market earlier would command huge extensions. Still, it did seem that, with the benefit of hindsight, Dallas was in the wrong in the negotiations. Years later, in 2014, Jackson clarified that the value of the deal offered was more of an issue than length:
“I’m the fourth pick, and at the time, it was a market set. So you got Shaquille O’Neal goes No. 1, Alonzo Mourning as No 2, and Christian Laettner as No. 3. So the market is already set. So here’s my window—at six years, I signed a $21 million deal, so Christian was at like 25 or 24 [million], so my market was between 21 and 25 [million]. That’s where it was at. So when I got drafted, and they tried to offer me a deal that was about what the eighth pick got. So Donald Carter came to Columbus in the big plane, and picked me up, and we were flying over Columbus, and he says, ‘Well Jimmy, I don’t think we should pay a guard this much money, because Randy White and Doug Smith didn’t really work out.’
“And I said, ‘Mr. Carter, no disrespect,’ I said, ‘But that’s not my fault that they didn’t work out.’ I said, ‘Now, I’m the fourth pick. I’m not going to ask for anything more, but I’m not going to take less than what my market value is,’ and I said, ‘So if you don’t want to pay me what the fourth pick is, I understand. Trade the pick, but if not, I’m not coming in for anything less than that….”
Jackson brought an antitrust lawsuit against the Mavs and the NBA alleging collusion (there were no pre-determined salary slots for rookies at that time but it was understood that the top pick set the market and each successive pick would descend correspondingly and Dallas was bucking that paradigm for unknown reasons). The lawsuit prompted the Mavs to give in and sign Jackson in March 1993 to the six-year deal for about $21 million, exactly what he asked for initially. While Jackson was gone, the Mavs had gone an execrable 4-50. The Mavs ended up ticking off Jackson for no reason other than to try to upset the well-established salary slots for draftees. (I realize there is an argument that Dallas benefitted by losing while JJ was out but: (a) the would’ve still been horrible with Jackson and (b) the costs of antagonizing your only good young player clearly outweigh any benefit of “super tanking”).
Jackson played the final 28 games and was quite raw (33.5 mpg, .451 TS%, 16 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 4.7 apg, 11.0 PER, -.081 WS48, -4.5 BPM). While those numbers sound bad, he had ability to score that made a defense worry (the shooting guard position had been manned mostly by CBAers Walter Bond and the NBA Jam legend Mike Iuzzolino). Even though he was raw and totally inefficient, Jackson seemed to help and the Mavs closed a relatively hot 7-21 after he joined the team.
1993-94: Enter Mashburn & everyone hates Quinn
The Mavs’ lottery luck in 1993 literally couldn’t have been worse. The 1992-93 were decisively bad. They finished with the worst record in the NBA by eight games and had the league’s worst offense AND the worst defense. Despite having the best odds to land somewhere in the top three picks, the Mavs didn’t get any such pick. Instead, a 41-41 Orlando team with the worst odds (1 in 66) got the top pick. In fact, Orlando GM Pat Williams had said before the lottery that the Magic winning “would be tantamount to World War III breaking out, with Switzerland winning.” To add to the insult from Dallas’ perspective, a 34-48 Golden State also passed them by and got the third pick. So, Dallas was set to pick fourth, their worst possible (and least probable) outcome.
Dallas missed out on consensus number one pick Chris Webber but drafted Jamal Mashburn, who was widely considered the second-best prospect (Philadelphia took project Shawn Bradley second, and Penny Hardaway went third). Mashburn fit well as a small forward because the backcourt was the only place where Dallas had any talent.
The other big move of that off-season was the hiring of Quinn Buckner as coach. Buckner was a no-nonsense disciple of Bobby Knight, his old hard ass college coach. He got a five-year contract, which imparted Buckner with two goals: (a) impart iron-fisted control of the organization and (b) run the Triangle Offense. At his introductory press conference, Buckner said he was “not somebody who’s going to be patient. There’s a task at hand and we’ve got to approach it with a sense of urgency. We can’t afford to be complacent.”
Many coaches go with the tough guy approach but it only works if people, on some level, like and/or respect you. The players hated Buckner and hated the Triangle Offense. As early as November 26, 1993, articles were dropping that reported that Buckner had worn out his welcome. Jackson and Mashburn were scoring pretty well but the team looked worse than ever, starting out a miserable 2-39.
On December 20, 1993, Sports Illustrated wrote a derisive piece about the Dallas situation: “Before the season was even a month old, the Mavs were rebelling against what one player called Buckner’s ‘reign of terror.’ The three most important Mavericks—rookie forward Jamal Mashburn and guards Jimmy Jackson, who is in his second season, and 11-year veteran Derek Harper—were the most demonstrative in their criticism, lashing out publicly at Buckner for everything from his erratic substitution patterns and his structured half-court offense to what they considered his harsh treatment of the players.”
Buckner’s two young stars were particularly irked: “After a game against the Utah Jazz on Nov. 13, Jackson angrily yelled at Buckner about substitution patterns, and when Mashburn was yanked early in the first quarter from a game against the Trail Blazers on Nov. 21, he fumed. ‘I asked him why [I was coming out],’ Mashburn says, ‘and he didn’t say much. If he’s trying to send me a message, he’s got to tell me. Let me in on it too.’”
Buckner also antagonized his only vet in Harper by benching him in the pre-season for Fat Lever, who had played 35 games in the last three seasons due to knee issues. Things got worse during the season: “Harper started the season opener, but hostilities resumed when Buckner yanked him against the New York Knicks on Nov. 16 only 3:47 into the contest. During a timeout moments later, a steaming Harper sat in open defiance of Buckner at the end of the bench while the rest of the team huddled around the coach. When Buckner reinserted him three minutes later, Harper cursed audibly as he passed the scorer’s table and kicked a resin bottle onto the floor. ‘There’s too many games being played with me, man,’ Harper said later.”
The Mavs were horrible and the environment was totally toxic. The Mavs would sort of rally to finish 13-69. The Mavs were, once again, the worst offensive team in the NBA, though the defense improved marginally to 24th (out of 27 teams). Putting aside Buckner’s interpersonal skills, his offensive scheme failings were notable. A team with two good young scorers in Jackson and Mashburn shouldn’t be the worst team in the NBA. This was enough to get Dallas to fire Buckner after the season and eat the remaining four years of his deal. The Mavs rehired Dick Motta, their original coach from the 1980s, who had been working as a consultant for the team.
In the larger scheme of things, the bad season had two bright spots: Jackson and Mashburn got a lot of playing time to develop and the Mavs were in line for a high pick in a pretty good draft. In terms of development, here’s what the first 2 Js did in 1993-94:
Jackson: age 23, 37.4 mpg, 19.2 ppg, .445 FG%, .283 3FG%, 4.7 rpg, 4.6 apg, 14.4 PER, .009 WS48, -1.7 BPM
Mashburn: age 21, 36.7 mpg, 19.2 ppg, .406 FG%, .284 3FG%, 4.5 rpg, 3.4 apg, 13.2 PER, .014 WS48, -2.4 BPM
Both players showed an ability to create shots but, like with most very young players, efficiency was not there. At the time, Mash’s rookie usage rating of 26.6% was the eighth highest of any rookie since the three-point shot was instituted in 1979-80. His adjusted shooting numbers were ghastly (.480 TS% which was boosted only by the fact that he drew 5.5 free throw attempts per game).
Despite the efficiency issues, the consensus was that both players had bright futures. For example, The 1995 Complete Handbook of Pro Basketball was bullish on both players. Jackson had shown clear improvement and was called a “big-time player in the making…[his] strength gives a lot of guards trouble inside on defense.” As for Mash, Joe Dumars stated “he’s the most well-rounded rookie I’ve seen this year…at the time of the draft, I thought Jamal had the most potential.”
Even better news was the shift in draft luck. Dallas landed the second pick in a three-player draft of Glenn Robinson, Jason Kidd, and Grant Hill. Robinson was the biggest star and Grant Hill was the most polished but Dallas had Mashburn and didn’t need a scoring small forward. They drafted Kidd to fill the point guard hole (Harper had been dealt to the Knicks at mid-season in 1993-94).
Kidd had some off-the-court baggage but he was an even bigger prospect than both Jackson and Mashburn and his college stats jumped off the page:
1993-94: Age 20, 35.1 mpg, 16.7 ppg, .472 FG%, .362 3FG%, 6.9 rpg, 9.1 apg, 3.1 spg
In short, Kidd’s college stats made him look like a mini-Magic Johnson. Adding this kind of all-around player to Jackson and Mashburn was truly an exciting prospect and The Three Js were truly born.
1994-95: The Three Js [briefly] play together
For the first time since early 1990-91, there was optimism in Dallas. In addition to the coaching change and drafting Kidd, Tarpley was reinstated and was still only 30-years old. If he could stay clean, the Mavs finally had the depth of a normal NBA roster. Vegas had pegged Dallas for 26 wins, which sounds bad but would’ve been a big improvement over the two prior dumpster fire seasons. Having three young potential stars, unshackled from Buckner’s version of the Triangle, figured to be explosive.
On November 5, 1994, the new Mavs won their opener against the Nets and the component parts did great. Jackon had 37 (and went to the line 17 times), Mash had 30, and Kidd had a near triple-double (10 points, 9 rebounds, 11 assists, and 3 steals to boot). This marked the first time since November 20, 1990 that the Mavs were over the .500 mark.
Dallas continued playing competitively and reached a high mark of 12-8. From there, the Mavs struggled a bit, going 4-17, and were 16-25 overall. On February 23, 1995, the Mavs were 20-30 and were set to play (coincidentally) the Nets again. At the time, here were the stats of the Three Js:
Kidd: 34.9 mpg, 9.4 ppg, .370 FG%, .207 3FG%, 5.6 rpg, 7.4 apg, 2.1 spg
Jackson: 38.9 mpg, 25.7 ppg, .472 FG%, .318 3FG%, 5.1 rpg, 3.7 apg
Mashburn: 38.1 mpg, 23.9 ppg, .436 FG%, .341 3FG%, 4.1 rpg, 3.4 apg
The Mavs were not great but were respectable and both JJ and Mashburn were getting more efficient in their scoring. Kidd couldn’t shoot at all but was still a positive value player because he did literally everything else on the floor. In that second Nets game, Jackson severely sprained his ankle and went down for the rest of the season. We didn’t know it at the time, but this was essentially the last time the Three Js would play together regularly.
Without Jackson, Dallas played pretty well. The Mavs finished up 16-16, shattering the Vegas odds with a 36-46 record (a 23-game improvement from prior year). Here are the stats for Kidd and Mash after Jackson’s injury:
Kidd: 32.2 mpg, 15.0 ppg, .400 FG%, .331 3FG%, 5.2 rpg, 8.1 apg, 1.6 spg
Mashburn: 35.9 mpg, 24.4 ppg, .436 FG%, .308 3FG%, 4.2 rpg, 4.3 apg
Mashburn scored a little more but Kidd’s improvement was marked. He picked up scoring and efficiency at the same time.
Digging deeper into the stats, for the season, Dallas jumped to 15th on offense and improved to 21st on defense. The offense was driven by the offensive boards. Though they were 26th in FG%, Dallas led the NBA in shot attempts, offensive rebounds, and total rebounds (they were 7th in defensive rebounds). So, the big scorers had to give some credit to the unheralded front court that got them so many extra shots.
Tarpley had been the best scorer in the frontcourt and was still a pretty good player (12.6 ppg, 8.2 rpg in only 24.6 mpg). The starting power forward was 24-year old Popeye Jones, who was developing into a nice solid player and a boarding machine (10.3 ppg, 10.6 rpg but only shot .443 FG% and led the team in offensive rebounding with a 14.1% rate). Center was manned by undersized hustler Lorenzo Williams, who played 29 mpg and rebounded on offense nearly as well as Popeye. On offense, though, Williams made Ben Simmons look like Nikola Jokic. Williams put up only 3.7 shots per game and scored 4 ppg with a comically low 7.9 usage rate. Williams’ usage rate that year was the fifth lowest of the Three-Point Era for players who logged over 2,300 minutes.
As always, Tarpley was an issue. He had played well off-the-bench but the threat of relapse loomed. In addition, he wasn’t a peach to deal with. According to the 1995-96 Sports Illustrated preview, Tarpley “squabbled with Motta because he didn’t start. Though Dallas tried to deal him, Tarpley is back, and his unhappiness could be the biggest threat to what Motta calls ‘a sort of magic developing here.’”
So, the Mavs had to hedge against another Tarpley implosion. Moreover, replacing Williams with a starter with a modicum of offensive skills seemed to be a way to improve quickly. There was every reason to believe that the Mavs, with the right off-season moves, could take the next step to the playoffs with the Three Js in 1995-96.
1995-96: Unbreak my heart
The only avenue for improvement for the Mavs in the summer of 1995 was the NBA Draft, where they had the 12th pick and the 24th pick (from the Knicks for giving them Rolando Blackman in 1992). Dallas was set to draft two big men to replace Williams and, possibly, Tarpley. At the 12th pick, the Mavs took Duke C Cherokee Parks and, at the 24th pick, they took Iowa State C Loren Meyer. On paper, both had more skill than Williams but Motta still stuck with Williams as the starter. This was a bad sign for the new draftees. Parks and Meyer ended up being bench fodder and were both traded within the next year. With perfect hindsight, we can see that Dallas missed on a few helpful players at those spots. While the best player available was Michael Finley, Dallas had no need at that spot with Jackson ensconced at the position. Limiting the options to other frontcourt players, Theo Ratliff (drafted 18th by Detroit) would’ve fit in well as a supercharged version of Williams. The other bad decision was taking Meyer over fellow Big 8 center Greg Ostertag (who fell to Utah at 28). It’s hard to knock Dallas for not drafting the perfect pick in these slots but they got almost no value from either pick (Parks would go on to have a decent career as a backup big and Meyer was out of the NBA shortly).
To make matters worse, Tarpley failed a drug screening when he tested positive for alcohol early in the 1995-96 season. Tarpley claimed that the positive test resulted from taking NyQuil. He was suspended and never played another game in the NBA after the 1994-95 season. (He did end up suing the NBA years later, you can read about that in detail here if you are interested).
Despite the frontcourt issues, things started nicely. Dallas opened with an impressive win at San Antonio, where Kidd and Mashburn each scored 27 points and the undersized bigs held David Robinson to 6-18 shooting. The Mavs won their next three games at home to go to 4-0. Then the bottom fell out. Mashburn began shooting horribly (.478 TS%, which was worse than his rookie season) and injured his knee on December 9, 1995, ending his season. Dallas began losing a lot. They went 2-12 after the 4-0 start until Mashburn’s injury. The losing continued after Mash’s injury and the Mavs bottomed out at 8-22 (or 4-22 after the hot start).
It was at this point, that rumors of a rift between The Three Js surfaced. Sports Illustrated summarized the situation in November 1996: “Kidd and Jackson, previously close, were
quarreling, with Kidd upset with what he saw as Jackson’s selfishness on the court. Jackson had been the Mavericks’ brilliant new star before Mashburn arrived–but then Kidd eclipsed them both…. That team went ‘in the tank’–Kidd’s words–by the end of December. Kidd’s disenchantment snowballed as his grievances against Jackson, which he aired publicly, piled up. And during a
Feb. 15 game in Utah, Kidd says, he hit his breaking point: ‘We were winning by something like 20 points at halftime [actually, 12], but there was almost a fight in the locker room. Jimmy and
[backup point guard] Scotty Brooks were going to fight because Scotty didn’t throw him the ball. Then we went out and lost. I was fed up.’”
Sports Illustrated also gave voice to the rumor that Kidd and Jackson, who were not speaking, were fighting over the attention of singer Toni Braxton. I remember the rumor from those heady pre-modern internet days but this article was kind enough to give concrete details:
“Oblique but persistent published reports said the two guards’ squabble was partly over a ‘mystery woman’ later identified as pop singer Toni Braxton. Shaking his head now, Jackson says, ‘People actually come up to me now and ask, ‘What’s she like? What’s Toni like?’ And I say, ‘Brother, I don’t know. I don’t even know the woman.’
Kidd says, ‘I was supposed to meet her last [Dec. 4 and 5] when we were in New York. She was in the studio, recording. But I didn’t go.’ Nevertheless, a Dallas Morning News columnist, citing unnamed team sources, wrote that Braxton called Kidd after they missed each other in New York and said she was sorry he wasn’t feeling well–but it was nice of him to send Jackson in his stead. When Braxton was reached for corroboration, she coyly said, ‘A girl will never kiss and tell, you know that.’ The columnist reported that Jackson was unavailable for comment. Soon the unrefuted story was picked up by publications from Vibe magazine to the National Enquirer.”
Regardless of what was true, it was clear that Kidd and Mashburn detested Jackson at the time. The team finished a miserable 26-56 and Motta was fired. After the season, in late June 1996, Kidd went public with a demand that either he or Jackson be traded and Mashburn also stated that “I told [ownership] some of the same things, that there’s a lot selfishness on the part of Jim.” Management refused to agree to a trade and Kidd retracted the ultimatum a few days later but was still discontented, blowing off a meeting with new coach Jim Cleamons.
Sports Illustrated reported that at the start of the 1996-97 season, “the Mavs’ three young stars
were promising to be ‘professional’; Jackson and Kidd, along with [the recently reacquired] Harper, were elected co-captains by their teammates. Kidd and Jackson talked several times during camp, and each expressed some regrets.”
Turning to the stats, the 1995-96 Mavs fell a little bit on offense from 15th to 19th and regressed even more on defense from 21st to 25th. Dallas still led the NBA in offensive rebounds and shot attempts but after shooting about league average in 1994-95, they shot below league average and stopped getting to the free throw line. It was a lost season for Mashburn’s development. Kidd and Jackson played full seasons, which showed improvement from Kidd and regression from Jackson:
Kidd 1995-96: 37.5 mpg, 16.6 ppg, .381 FG%, .336 3FG%, .468 TS%, 6.8 rpg, 9.7 apg, 2.2 spg, 17.8 PER, .068 WS48, 2.0 BPM
Jackson 1995-96: 34.4 mpg, 19.6 ppg, .435 FG%, .363 3FG%, .538 TS%, 5.0 rpg, 2.9 apg, 16.6 PER, .092 WS48, -0.3 BPM
The Mavs were willing to keep the core together and see where it took them for 1996-97. At this point, it was clear that Kidd was a star. Mashburn was a question mark coming off of injury and Jackson (who noted that he hadn’t fully recovered from the ankle injury in 1994-95) played like a decent starter level player.
The Mavs completely screwed up the draft, trading their pick at six in one of the greatest drafts ever for Eric Montross and the ninth pick. At nine, the Mavs took a decent back up in Samaki Walker while Boston used Dallas’ pick on Antoine Walker. This exchange did not help Dallas add to its core.
1996-97: A swift end of The Three Js
The Mavs gave The Three Js a pretty short leash in 1996-97. Actually, it seemed more like Kidd gave the Mavs a short leash. The infighting among The Three Js calmed (or placed on hold) because the bigger nemesis was the return of the hated the Triangle Offense. Cleamons, who had worked under Phil Jackson in Chicago, ran the same sets as Buckner and Kidd hated it. After an 9-17 start, Kidd was traded to Phoenix on December 26, 1996 primarily for Michael Finley and Sam Casell.
The SF Gate reported at the time that: “Kidd was feuding with Cleamons over offensive philosophy, had not noticeably patched up his differences with Jackson (whom he had derided for selfishness last year), and had refused to back off of a ‘trade him or trade me’ ultimatum he issued in the summer. He was only one of several Mavericks players who had griped from time to time during Cleamons’ brief reign, and was one of many players with whom Cleamons was unhappy with their commitment to winning….The past week or two had been filled with talk that Kidd, who felt shackled by Cleamons’ deliberate offensive schemes, was on the market.”
Jackson commented that the trade: “caught me off guard.” Mashburn was quoted more directly as saying that that trade was “fucking stupid, man.” Kidd took a shot at Cleamons’ lack of patience on the way out: “Look at the Utahs and Seattles, they’ve been together for years. We never had that opportunity, and now we can’t have that opportunity. We were never given a fair shot, but we have to go on.”
On February 7, 1997, the Mavs hired Don Nelson to run the organization. His first order of business was to clean house. He traded Mashburn to Miami for flotsam and jetsam on February 14, 1997. At the time of his trade, Mashburn summed his assessment of The Three Js Era thusly: “Everybody considered The Three Js the problem, and that wasn’t the case. We were just three perimeter guys trying to put it together – and it didn’t work. We all wanted to win, but we had different perceptions of winning. We never really came together. Jason [Kidd] wanted to go this way, Jimmy [Jackson] wanted to go this way to win, and I thought it was another way to win. It was one of those things where we all have to take responsibilities for it.” (H/T to https://nbatrades.tumblr.com/)
Jackson was traded three days later in a massive nine-player deal with the Nets, where Nellie picked up the object of his affection in Shawn Bradley. In the end, the Mavs turned The Three Js into Shawn Bradley and Michael Finley (also nominally Robert Pack, who was traded by the Nets for Cassell).
Summing up The Three Js
We’ve gone a long way on our journey back to the time of Three Js. Let’s summarize with what we’ve learned:
-Because of injuries and bad luck this team never got to gel. Ultimately, all three players played together in only 111 games. This was too short a time to really get a chance to prove themselves. On the other hand, Jackson and Mashburn didn’t end up becoming big stars as anticipated, though Mash was pretty good. If the Mavs could’ve gotten some competent frontcourt players (Antoine Walker was clearly available or could’ve been traded for a good vet), the team would’ve been playoff level but not good enough to challenge the real contenders.
-Objectively, the returns for The Three Js was less than what was traded away. Here’s how the five major players in these trades did after the 1996-97 season:
Kidd: 1,176 games, 36.1 mpg, 12.5 ppg, .402 FG%, .353 3FG%, .513 TS%, 6.4 rpg, 8.7 apg, 1.9 spg, 18.1 PER, .143 WS48, 4.2 BPM, 66.5 VORP
Finley: 938 games, 34.1 mpg, 15.8 ppg, .441 FG%, .378 3FG%, .524 TS%, 4.3 rpg, 2.9 apg, 16.3 PER, .113 WS48, 1.2 BPM, 25.7 VORP
Jackson: 565 games, 30.8 mpg, 11.5 ppg, .416 FG%, .378 3FG%, .504 TS%, 4.5 rpg, 2.8 apg, 12.1 PER, .061 WS48, -1.1 BPM, 4.0 VORP
Bradley: 549 games, 20.3 mpg, 6.5 ppg, .472 FG%, .524 TS%, 5.6 rpg, 0.6 apg, 2.1 bpg, 16.7 PER, .139 WS48, 0.9 BPM, 8.2 VORP
Mashburn: 365 games, 38.5 mpg, 19.1 ppg, .423 FG%, .369 3FG%, .507 TS%, 6.0 rpg, 4.4 apg, 16.4 PER, .112 WS48, 1.1 BPM
Finley was a very good player and Bradley was a decent center. Kidd was so good that the Mavs would’ve come out way ahead if they just kept him. Jackson was a solid player but never played as well as he did in 1994-95 and it’s fair to wonder if that ankle was ever the same again. Mashburn was about as valuable as Finley until a knee injury forced his early retirement in 2004.
Though the Mavs clearly lost the talent exchange on all three trades, they’d be fine because Nellie found Dirk Nowitzki and Steve Nash shortly after he cleaned house. Sometimes, there is something to be said for resetting the board when your team is in a rut.
-Within a short time afterwards, The Three Js had basically gotten over the Dallas experience. In April 2003, David Aldridge did a great feature on them. Here’s how each saw the situation with a little hindsight:
Kidd: “We all got along, [but] different stories started to take a life of their own and they grew into something bigger than what really didn’t have no truth (to them). The three of us didn’t know how to handle it … I think the outside was really a big influence on the three of us and which sent us down the wrong road. And we kind of separated and started to take a stand against one another, which really wasn’t the case. And that really hurt us.”
Jackson: “[Kidd’s] agents were intimidated by me.… because I was all about business. I used to question Jason on a lot of things that were going on business-wise that they probably didn’t agree with, but I didn’t care. Because my loyalty was to him and not to his people.”
Mashburn: “When you’re losing, it brings a lot of inconsistencies in your personality. It was real rough.”
On the Braxton story, Jackson denied it emphatically and at length:
“It’s funny, ’cause no matter how many times I say it or how many times Jason says it or no matter how many times she may say it, people are still going to believe what they’re going to believe, to be honest with you, I never met her. Jason may have met her, but what happened was we were in New York … I had a publicist who was going to set up the whole team to go over there and see her in the studio (in New York). So, I’m sitting in my room, I’m chillin’, it’s about 7:30, 8 o’clock, and I’m waiting for people to call me, and nobody calls me. So, I’m like dang they must have left me, so I went to a sponsorship meeting with Scotty Brooks. Hung out that night with some sponsors from Coke and AT&T.
Jason was supposed to go, but he didn’t go. I came back to the room at 12 o’clock, 12:30 to get ready for the New York game. A few days later I heard that I left the team and went to the studio (to allegedly meet Braxton). And my biggest disappointment was if you want to know where I was at, just ask me. Didn’t nobody ask me about this until late June when we had a meeting with the new coach, Jim Cleamons. And (rumors) were spread because someone said I was on my way, which was true, but I was on my way with the team because I had already set up that there was going to be seven or eight of us going to the studio, but I never got a call that night. So, they all went out and did their separate things without telling me, so I got stuck.
So, now the label is that it happened in Atlanta, and a car was downstairs and I went downstairs and said that Jason was sick, which is a lie because Jason, Jamal, all of us were all together in Atlanta that night because a friend of mine had a party, so it never happened in Atlanta. So, it all goes back to communication. And that’s what I said to Jason was this. I said, ‘Jason, I’m not mad at you, but I’m disappointed because as a man, how close we were — if you ever had a problem you could have sat down and talked with me.’ Whether I agreed with you or not, that’s not the point — it was a matter of respect. I can always respect a man, whether I agree with you or not. And that was my biggest problem.”
In other words, Kidd definitely thought it was true at the time and was pissed off. Mashburn essentially confirmed this in 2015: “She definitely cost me relationships with Jimmy Jackson and Jason Kidd. “I necessarily wouldn’t even put it on here. I think at that time Jimmy and Jason were going through their own particular issues. From my understanding, being in the locker room, there was no truth to the Toni Braxton part. She played a part in it from the standpoint that she had an album out at the time, or was about to release it, called ‘Secrets.’ She went on the Dallas airwaves and said she doesn’t kiss and tell.”
As Mashburn noted, had they been a bit more secure and/or mature, none of the chatter would’ve bothered them but they were too young and immature and the rumor it was just another spark to add to the controversy fire that was already brewing.
-Lastly, a special shoutout to the Triangle Offense, which was part of the vexing Quinn Buckner mess in 1993-94 and then returned to annoy Kidd in 1996-97. It just seemed like the wrong offense to take advantage of Kidd’s skillset and was the last straw in his demanding a trade.