Don’t let Amar’e Stoudemire’s outfit take away from his message. OK? Now try harder.
The Mavericks forward had some harsh words for his teammates following a 127-94 home thrashing doled out by LeBron James and the Cavaliers.
“I came here to win, and we’re [4½] games out of being out of the playoffs, which is unacceptable,” Stoudemire said, according to ESPN.com.
“This is something we can’t accept. We’ve got to find a way to refocus. We’ve got to key into the details of the game of basketball. We can’t cheat the game. We can’t screw around in games and practices and joke around all the time and figure we’re going to win games. This is the pros. It’s the highest level of basketball. We’ve got to act that way.”
Stoudemire was bought out by the Knicks last month over All-Star weekend and chose to sign with the Mavericks, who were in need of frontcourt depth alongside Tyson Chandler and Dirk Nowitzki. Stoudemire has been a helpful addition, averaging over 11 points and three rebounds in eight games. But the Mavericks’ recent 2-5 slide, which includes double-digit beatdowns by the Blazers, Warriors and Cavaliers, has dropped them to seventh in the Western Conference.
“We didn’t come out with the aggressiveness or determination or focus that we needed,” said Stoudemire, not mincing words despite being a recent arrival. “We didn’t compete. We’re not playing like champions, and they took advantage of that.
“We’ve got to pay more attention to detail. We can’t be making minor mistakes. We made mistakes that second-year players or rookie players make in this league. We’re a veteran team. Guys are 13, 14, 16 years in this league. We should know better than that.
“We should be a much better team than what we showed out there. This is a team that’s competing for a championship that we played against. We should have stepped up to the challenge of competing with these guys and we backed down.”
Stoudemire’s powerful condemnation was somewhat offset by his cartoonish outfit, which led to this bit of Internet awesomeness.
But if anyone can spot a team in trouble, it may be Stoudemire, who spent four-and-a-half years on a Knicks team that covered some peaks and every valley imaginable.