'Tis The Eve Of The Regular Season

And thank God for that.

As usual, the immortals on my shoulders are each making their cases. The angel on my right says we've upgraded and then some, with the addition of Shawn Marion. Drew Gooden showed some good things in the preseason. The keystone pair -- Dirk and Kidd -- took the summer off, meaning they're fresh and rested. Roadrunner Beaubois looks like he could be a contender (and one of the nice things about having Kidd is he speeds up learning curves, particularly for points).

The devil on my right isn't nearly so eloquent. His arguement against the Mavs going anywhere or doing anything this year can be summed up in two words; Josh Howard.

He's our most versitile player, our best defensive guy, and when he's on he's an All-Star, full stop. For a variety of reasons, he hasn't been on nearly enough the past couple of years. Some of it is factors beyond his control -- nobody plans on losing kinfolk or rolling an ankle -- and some of it is self-inflicted.

The situation with J-Ho is simply this; he had arthroscopic repair surgery on his injured ankle about a week after the season ended. That was six months ago. Coach Carlisle is being extremely vague about his recovery timetable, and that's starting to scare me.

The devil doesn't have to say anything else. I know the rest of the list of Things That Can Go Wrong -- (insert player name) is past it, somebody gets hurt, things just don't gel.

Things will unfold the way they will unfold. Do I think this is a championship team? I can't answer that, it's too early. Being frank, in order for that to happen, we're going to need a significant chunk of luck.

But why be glum? It's basketball season! See you tomorrow. If all goes according to plan I'll be there with E. Honda face paint and a song in my heart. Mavericks!
-BJ