Eight Takes from the Mavs’ Friday afternoon practice as they prepare for a weekend visit from the Raptors … and nurse some wounds, of both the physical and mental variety.

    It’s the Mavs Afternoon Drive:

    Mike Fisher, the long-time DFW radio talk-show host and sportswriter in charge of DallasBasketball.com, has been chosen by 103.3 ESPN Radio to host “Mavs Magazine,’’ the weekend show that focuses on the NBA team.

   The show, a decade-long staple on the Mavs\' flagship station, begins airing on Saturday and will run from 10-to-11 a.m. every Saturday through the NBA season.

    Appearing on Fish’s inaugural show: Mavs GM Donnie Nelson, a moment between Randy Galloway and coach Rick Carlisle, game reports from ESPN’s Mike Peasley and an “offbeat’’ visit with Erick Dampier.

    Turns out, Mavs TV play-by-play voice Mark Followill has been lying to you and to me about his assertion that “I’ve never seen the movie ‘Grease.’’

     He issued the outrageous claim during the Mavs-at-Hornets game on Wednesday, and then dared repeat the fib to my face on Thursday night.

     It didn’t ring true. … as I’ve noted, Followill is 38, is a pop-culture person, owns a TV and certainly appreciates The Arts.

     And now DallasBasketball.com has uncovered the truth.

    Not only has Mark Followill seen the iconic musical about the “summer nights’’ involving John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John and the T-Birds and the Pink Ladies, it turns out he was actually in the film!

     Click in for a long lost artifact of when Mark Followill was Hopelessly Devoted To a movie he now pretends to have never seen.

   Once the Thursday press conference was over, once the DJ stopped playing, once the hands were pumped and the babies were kissed, once the mayor’s proclamation was proclaimed, once the open bar was about to close, once I shot the bull with Del Harris (at left), I cornered the person who’d just been hired to become the first woman to coach men in an NBA-affiliated league and asked her … the question.

   “So,’’ I said to Hall-of-Famer Nancy Lieberman of her new job as the Mavericks\' affiliate in the NBA Development League, “a woman coaching men. … you know … um, how’s that going to work?’’

   Fortunately, Nancy’s answer – and the rest of the historic event in Frisco  – was smoother than my question.