Rick Carlisle calls out Blake Griffin for flopping in J.J. Barea incident

Dallas Mavericks head coach Rick Carlisle calls out Blake Griffin for flopping on the play that got J.J. Barea ejected Thursday.

J.J. Barea’s David vs. Goliath-like takedown of Blake Griffin has gone viral since the slight skirmish occurred in the contest between the Dallas Mavericks and the L.A. Clippers Thursday night.

Dallas head coach Rick Carlisle has voiced out his take on the matter and has insinuated that Griffin made a meal out of the incident by flopping.

“Watching Griffin's cat-ate-the-canary smile tells you the story of that play,” Carlisle said to Tim MacMahon of ESPN. “That's all you have to look at.”

In real time Barea did appear to have bearlike strength when he tackled the 6-foot-10, 251-pound Griffin. However watching it on replay makes it seem like Carlisle does have a point.

Surely the burly Puerto Rican is strong in his own right — and not to mention absolutely fearless — but at 6 feet and 185 pounds it would not have been that easy for him to take down such a big guy without a bit of overacting from Griffin.

Barea further exhibited his no nonsense attitude by staring down on Blake as he was lying on the floor.

The 19-year veteran, Dirk Nowitzki, affirmed his support for his teammate and took a shot at what he perceived to be a terrible call made by the officials.

“Just weak,” Nowitzki told MacMahon, when asked about his thoughts on his teammate’s flagrant 2 ejection. “It's tough to tell these days in this league what's a flagrant 1, what's a tech. I'm lost, and I think so are the refs.”

Flopping has become an endemic problem in the NBA today and this is yet another incident that adds to the growing concern.