With the Mavs falling just three wins short of lifting a championship last season, it looked like they were only a piece away from accomplishing that goal. In that pursuit, they recently added former Warriors’ superstar Klay Thompson to the roster on a three-year $50 million deal. While Thompson’s addition does solve their shooting problem to some extent, it might have further exposed a major weakness in Dallas’ starting lineup, which was even exploited by the Celtics during the recent finals.

Addressing the Splash Brother signing on The Lowe Post pod, veteran analyst Zach Lowe believes that the Mavs might have gotten worse on the defensive end after adding the aging superstar. During the finals against Boston, most Mavs players struggled to stop Jayson Tatum and Co.’s offense. And Luka Doncic even faced a ton of criticism for his lack of fitness and inability to stay productive on both ends.

So, the Mavs definitely needed to get better defensively this summer for a chance to correct that mistake. But Klay, who was once known as an elite two-way player, has seen a massive decline in his defensive abilities since missing those two seasons because of horrific ACL and Achilles injuries. And Lowe didn’t have much faith in the Mavs’ new starting lineup with Klay in it. He said, “The Kyrie, Luka, Klay, Washington quartet in the starting five, if that’s what it ends up being… there is a downgrade in on-ball defense.”

They’ve also parted ways with arguably the only player who was great at one-on-one defense- Derrick Jones Jr. He moved to the Clippers in free agency and Lowe had serious reservations with the current roster sheet, as he stated, “That was Derrick Jones’ job, use your speed and your length to chase around the quickest ball handlers… Klay [Thompson] can’t do that anymore”.

“Luka sure as hell ain’t doing that. Kyrie can do it. I just don’t think that’s something you want to ask him to do for 25 minutes every game. 82 games a year,” Zach asserted, posing the flaming question. So, there might be a way for the Mavs to solve this issue.

How can the Mavs overcome their defensive weaknesses?

With the departure of Derrick Jones, the Mavs’ expected starting 5 are certainly not the best defensive setup. However, they have also made some moves in the past few days which could help them. Apart from the Klay move, the Mavs added Naji Marshall on a three-year $27 million deal alongside Quentin Grimes in a trade sending Tim Hardaway Jr. to the Pistons.

Both these players have the potential to replace Derrick Jones in the lineup and make up for the lack of defense. Standing at 6’5, Jones averaged a block in this year’s amazing playoff run and was a menace on defense all season.

Both Grimes (6’5) and Marshall (6’7) are taller with bigger wingspan and also much better 3-point shooters than Jones. With identical steal averages and decent block averages in comparison to Jones, the newly acquired duo will be a major part of Kidd’s rotation next season. They will make the Mavs an overall better shooting team. With that potential, Lowe believes the Klay Thompson signing might not be too bad after all.

“I think they can work around it, and I think the upgrade in shooting with Klay is worth the risk on defense. It’s not as big a home run,” he concluded.

Well, that was his take. Do you agree with it?

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