Some notes from the Norm Sonju show on WBAP last night and other 
info.

Jamal Mashburn is going to miss tonights game against the Lakers
with a hip pointer.  He'll be reevaluated today and might also 
miss the next two to three games.

Apparently Terry Davis made a comment to the press about the
lack or inconsistent playing time that Popeye Jones has been
getting.  Popeye Jones didn't make any comment.  (Way to go Terry!)

Randy White DNP-CD in 4 out of the last 6 games (including the
Clippers game Tuesday night).  Supposedly, either internally or
publically, Randy has been told by the coaching staff that he
is not part of the Mavs' future.  I don't know the details or
if that is correct, so I'll withhold any comments about the logic
of making such a comment to a player in midseason.

Sean Rooks will not be returning until probably the end of March.

Dallas is only one of four teams that have two players in the top
21 scoring average.  Jackson is number 21 and Mashburn is 17.
Mashburn is also leading the rookies in scoring and minutes per
game.

Former Mav Morlon Wiley was signed by Miami this week to fill in
for Bimbo Coles, who dislocated his finger.  I was surprised how
high Sonju was on Wiley.  He felt that Jackson played better
when Wiley was at point as Wiley was more of a pure point guard.

One of the reasons that the Mavs paid Jackson for the full season
last year, instead of calculating for the number of games he would
play, was for salary cap purposes.  By giving Jackson a full salary
for last season, it kept his base salary lower (ie, the team would
have given him more money this season).  Sonju (whose job is 
signing players and dealing with the salary cap) said that the team 
was planing ahead for signing their 1st round pick (Mashburn).

The Mavs signed Lorenzo Williams to a contract for the rest of 
the season.  Williams had an offer from a team in Turkey but
apparently decided to remain with the Mavs.  He has been getting
significant minutes at center is good at rebounding and shot
blocking (which the team desparately needed help at).  The contract
is two years - guarenteed for the rest of the season and is 
unguaranteed for next season.

The big hub-do in Dallas last week was that Mashburn was not 
selected as Rookie of the Month (Vin Baker of Milwaukee was).
This was despite that fact that Mashburn was averaging over 23 
points per game and shooting about 52% FG for February (numbers 
from memory - don't quote them).  

In case you missed it in my NBA nibbles notes, the Mavs will not
be broadcast on radio WBAP after this season.  WBAP signed a 
three year contract with the Dallas Stars of the NHL.  (Just
one more reason for me to hate the Stars.)  The Mavs are still
deciding on their future home station.  The one good thing about
the Mavs moving is that the Texas Rangers (baseball) have always
been #1 at WBAP (unless, of course, the Mavs move to the Cowboys'
home station).  The problem is that at 50,000 watts, WBAP is
the most powerful station in Dallas and can be heard in 39 states
(although it does depend on the area of some of those states).  
This means that many distant fans are no longer going to be able to 
listen to games (heck, I'm only 3 1/2 hours South and I'm worried 
about being able to listen to games next season).

Historical notes:
Last Friday, March 4th, was the one year anniversary of Quinn 
Buckner being hired and Jim Jackson being signed.
On March 9, 1988 the Mavs cliched their earliest playoff berth.


patricia