For two seasons, the Mavericks tried to fit a square peg into a round hole by attempting to turn Harrison Barnes into something he’s not — a wing playmaker that can create offense for others.
The attempt to transform Barnes from a spot-up, isolation scoring machine was mostly due to how barren the Mavericks roster was in those two lottery seasons. Dallas didn’t really have much else of a choice outside of J.J. Barea and then later on Dennis Smith Jr. Barnes needed to pass, because there wasn’t much else going on for the Mavericks anyway.