"Avery Johnson doesn't want Maverick fans to hold it against him just because he'll be coaching Deron Williams this season and Rick Carlisle won't. "Deron was the key,'' Johnson said this morning at Fort Worth's Dunbar High School. Then, he added with a laugh, "I didn't take anybody. He was with us first. We just re-signed our own guy.'' While Williams said during the free-agency process that it was a very tough decision for him, Johnson said his Brooklyn Nets were never overly concerned that the Dallas-area product would return to his north Texas neighborhood. "We were never over-confident,'' said Johnson, who coached the Mavericks to their first appearance in the NBA Finals in 2006. "(GM) Billy King and I, we felt we were going to be able to re-sign Deron. We felt it was 80 or 90 percent." Read more: http://mavsblog.dallasnews.com/2012/09/avery-johnson-mavericks-makeover-had-to-happen.html/
