One of the teams that will be closely watched this season is the Mavericks.
While Luka Doncic is signed through the 2026/27 season – he has a player option in the final year of his contract – the Mavericks need to be a major contender on a yearly basis to prevent Doncic from being the next superstar to ask for a trade.
Dallas rolled the dice on Kyrie Irving last season, making a blockbuster trade for the mercurial point guard. In the short run, it blew up in the Mavs’ faces as they didn’t participate in the postseason. Irving was signed to a three-year, $120MM contract this offseason but that won’t end the speculation that he could eventually be dealt to the Lakers – if Los Angeles wants him.
Dallas’ other big move this offseason was to engineer a sign-and-trade with the Celtics for power forward Grant Williams.
The backcourt duo and Williams will comprise three-fifths of the starting lineup. From there, it gets murky.
Josh Green or Tim Hardaway Jr. would seem to be the logical candidates at small forward but coach Jason Kidd won’t rule out the possibility of Olivier-Maxence Prosper – the 24th pick in the draft — grabbing that spot if he has a strong training camp.
Ditto for center Dereck Lively II, their lottery selection at No. 12. Kidd believes Lively will be a factor from the get-go, even though there are veteran options in Dwight Powell and Richaun Holmes at that position.
The Mavs have also been involved in a number of trade rumors, with Deandre Ayton, Clint Capela and Buddy Hield among the players they’ve been linked to in recent months.
Kidd would seemingly be on the hot seat this season, following last season’s flop and owner Mark Cuban desire to have a serious shot at a title while keeping Doncic happy.
That brings us to our topic of the day: How do think the Mavs will fare this season? What player should they trade for to significantly improve their chances?
Please take to the comments section to weigh on this topic. We look forward to your input.
Should of kept Brunson or Smith. Could of traded for Ayton( Same age as Luka). Drafted the hometown kid to trade him away for Lively. Luka should be playing SG. Irving is a bad fit. Clueless owner
Luka should never be playing SG, what? He’s a natural SF or PG, but SG is a weird fit due to being measurably worse off-ball (and bad at defense).
A SF. No way
If superstars will be able to play better together than last year, I think this year will be great for Dallas.
If by “great “you mean 50 wins and out by the second round, I concur.
Still a tremendous improvement over the sh*tshow that was last year. And with a promising young Big/Wing combo to develop. Worth a shot, really. It’s not like they’d be in a better position if they’d let Kyrie walk.
This team wont get out the playin tournament. They dont have a real way to get better because i think they can only trade 1 first round pick. Luka and kyrie are ball dominant guards and this team has zero defense and the center depth is awful unless lively breaks out or richaun holmes has a comeback yr. In a yr or 2 from now lukas gonna want out and the mavs will rebuild
Luckily for the Mavs Kyrie has proven he can play off ball as he’s done in the past with Harden, Durant and LeBron so I don’t think both guards are as ball dominant as one would first assume. Grant Williams is a good defender while Hardaway is a decent on ball defender and Josh Green has good upside on that end.
They do lack in depth at the 5 so I guess if it were baseball you’d be hitting .333 which is pretty good I guess.
Bad
Enough said
I wouldn’t be surprised if Dallas played lineups with Grant at the 3 and Maxi at the 4 just because they need the added length and defensive hustle. Kyrie is a negative defender because of his tendency to gamble for steals among other problems, while Luka is a non-factor on that end because he spends too much time complaining to the refs despite his above-average length and instincts. The hope is that Kyrie will help Luka save energy on offense, but Luka will still whine too much for it to be a help.
I like Lively. He’s got a future.
Kyrie has to be one of worst teammates ever. He plays when he wants. He is all about himself. He should’ve been a tennis player. Or a boxer. This is a team sport. And the only success you have in NBA. Is team success.
Agreed, though I’d say Harden is a worse teammate than Kyrie. Kyrie is at least both willing to and capable of playing off ball.
DAL had a pretty good off season considering what they started with. Still, I don’t consider DAL a contender in the West, and they might even have to fight for the last play-in spots (assuming they want one this year). After the top 3, there are about 8 teams that include DAL that I could see finishing the season in almost any order. IMO, DAL is toward the bottom of the group talent-wise, but they don’t appear as susceptible to injury and related issues as most of the others. Upside to a top 6, but most likely play-in.
I don’t know if I’d say they’re so far down talent-wise, just because of Luka. He’s essentially what 38 yo LeBron, is with slightly better shooting and slightly worse defense, except healthy for most of the season. I would put them clearly above Sacramento and the Pels, given the defensive weakness and lack of a secondary clutch guy from the former and the health issues from the latter (Ingram, Zion, Murphy, and Nance are all basically locks to miss time, either because of present injuries or likely future ones, plus CJ and Alvarado could also miss chunks), as well as how mid they were last year when Zion was out, and worse when Ingram was. They looked outright awful at points last year. The Thunder have more talent, but they’re also young and need to mesh, so they could be slow starters like in ’19-’20. The Wolves could be great, but they could also be terrible if KAT+Gobert can’t mesh, even as talented and hungry as Edwards is. The Clippers are also another health toss-up who could be big droppers (and even then, with their roster aging and no real new additions aside from Russ and Hyland, they can’t improve much), and Phoenix and GSW could do the same to a degree. I think there’s plenty of room to be hopeful for Mavs fans, because they have a higher floor than I think people give them credit for after their offseason additions.
My range, I guess, was 4-11. I think most of the other teams in that range (MEM, LAC, MIN, LAL, NOP, SAC and OKC) have more talent. While most of those teams have pre-existing conditions that signal they might play under their talent level, so does DAL. KI doesn’t play full seasons. Luka is whining about something in his thigh that sounds like “I might miss some games”. There’s no above baseline talent on that roster beyond those two.
after tanking games for a draft pick, I hope they lose every game. I hope they trade everyone of the losers who were on that team. I can’t root for this team until everyone on last year’s team is gone. This includes Luke and Mark Cuban, who should have his team taken away. I’ll instead root for Houston since I lived there for a year 40 years ago.