Texas Notes: Carlisle, Ayres, Fredette

Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle‘s contract status beyond this season is up in the air, but even so, owner Mark Cuban said Friday on 103.3 FM ESPN that he hasn’t lent much thought to the matter, given what he described as mutual interest in a continued partnership, notes Tim MacMahon of ESPN.com (ESPN Now link). Carlisle signed a four-year deal prior to the 2012/13 season, though at least one report at the time indicated an option for a fifth season was involved. “We obviously want to keep Rick and he doesn’t want to go anywhere, so I don’t see it being an issue,” Cuban said.

Here’s more from out of the Lone Star State:

• Power forward Jeff Ayres, who made 51 appearances for the Spurs last season, has been waived by Shanxi of the Chinese Basketball Association, international journalist David Pick reports (via Twitter). Ayres had inked a one-year deal with Shanxi worth a reported $1MM back in early September. The 28-year-old averaged 2.7 points, 2.3 rebounds, and 0.3 assists in 7.5 minutes per game during the 2014/15 season for San Antonio.
• While he may be a long shot to make the regular season roster, Jimmer Fredette was signed by the Spurs to help replace the outside shooting that was lost with Marco Belinelli‘s departure to the Kings via free agency this summer, Ananth Pandian of CBSSports.com writes. “He’s a shooter,” coach Gregg Popovich said about Fredette. “He’s a scorer, and we’re looking for that type of thing to add to the team. People always look at the big guys. But we started last season thinking that not having Patty Mills is going to be a big factor for us. And it was huge. First of all you don’t have him for the first half, and then it took him a long time to get back into the flow. And this year Marco not being here is important. He came off the bench and helped us in a lot of games and I think that’s a big concern.”
• Fredette also noted that he was surprised that the Spurs were interested in him, Pandian adds. “I just hadn’t heard that [the Spurs] were a team that was necessarily on our radar,” Fredette told Pandian. “We always loved the Spurs organization and the team but it was kinda just a call that my agent told me was out of the blue. As soon as we got it, I was obviously extremely excited. I feel like this is a great opportunity for me to be on a good team and also it fits my style of play well. They move the ball well, they share they ball, lots of movement, play uptempo, so I’m excited to be part of this organization. Hopefully it will work out well.“

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.