The first incident of an uncommanded nosedive in a MAX that later crashed was actually avoided by the crew, who disabled electronic trim before it overwhelmed

The first incident of an uncommanded nosedive in a MAX that later crashed was actually avoided by the crew, who disabled electronic trim before it overwhelmed the ability to correct the issue with the smaller manual trim wheels of the MAX. So there was a near miss before the first crash. The next crew didn't disable electronic trim in time, and the decreased manual trim wheel size meant they couldn't move the horizontal stabilizer back into trim.