With J.J. Barea — the team’s best and perhaps only playmaker — now out for at least six weeks, Rick Carlisle and the Dallas Mavericks will have to make do with an utterly depleted position group at point guard.
How well Barea recovers from this injury is not entirely certain, either, given that he’s 32 and has needed every drop of athletic ability to carve out the kind of career he’s had as one of the shortest players in the league. Barea won’t be able to adjust to losing a step the way a bigger point guard like Deron Williams did.