The Dallas Mavericks are on fire. Luka Dončić, now a Los Angeles Laker, is never coming back, that much is certain. Not after the organization, led by team governor Patrick Dumont and general manager Nico Harrison, has spent the last 10 days post-trade disparaging his ability, weight, and work ethic. And the front office’s disconnect is starkly illustrated by their apparent failure to grasp the profound civic and cultural significance of Dončić in Dallas.
Dončić’s trade to the Lakers has been described as the most shocking, and perhaps worst, in NBA history. Harrison, a mostly unknown name in hoops circles before the trade (even in Dallas), is now public enemy No 1 for Mavs fans.
Even the most dysfunctional franchises know not to trade a 25-year-old megastar, fresh off a finals run, who speaks to fans in multiple languages and bought a house in the city where he had played his entire career. Just two years ago, Harrison decided to lose Kristaps Porziņģis for a bag of chips and, even worse, Jalen Brunson for nothing. Harrison was seen as an upgrade over former general manager Donnie Nelson, who the base felt failed to build properly around Dončić. Mavs fans were at first fairly apologetic for Harrison’s missteps, blaming then owner Mark Cuban. But this month, when Harrison took full responsibility for sending Dončić to the Lakers, it was apparent the former Nike executive was a shoe salesman out of his element. The trade destroyed Mavericks culture, the team’s relationship with their fans, any chance of a return to the NBA finals. Most significantly, it ended the Dončić-era in Dallas. The Mavs were praised for their seamless handoff from a hall of famer, Dirk Nowitzki, to a future one in Dončić. That link between the past and a bright future is gone.
It would be silly to suggest things were perfect when Dončić was still a Maverick. Cuban had well-chronicled issues when he ran the team. He was often too involved and trusted the wrong people (for example, Haralabos Voulgaris, Chandler Parsons and Jason Lutin). And he deserves some blame for the current mess: he was the one who hired Harrison in 2021. He also chose to sell 72.3% of the team to Miriam Adelson, the fifth-richest woman in America, and her family for $3.5bn in 2023. Adelson, one of the country’s most controversial figures, is an ardent lobbyist for Israel, an enemy of Palestine and a top financial donor to Donald Trump. Adelson, the mother-in-law of Dumont, is wildly unpopular among large sections of the Mavericks fanbase because of the Dončić trade but also due to rumors she intends to tank the team as leverage to move the franchise to Las Vegas, where Adelson has ties, to build a casino complex and stadium.
So, yes, Cuban does not get a free pass. But one thing is for sure: he would have never traded Dončić, once saying: “If I had to choose between my wife and keeping Luka on the Mavs, catch me at my lawyer’s office prepping for a divorce.”
That’s because for all his faults, he understood what the team, Nowitzki and Dončic meant to Dallas. At his heart, he’s a fan, a part of #MFFL, the hashtag that denotes loyalty to the team for ever. The same sentiment etched in stone at the Nowitzki statue outside.
But instead of Cuban, we have Adelson, Dumont and Harrison, who have set the Dallas sports world ablaze with a single trade. The PR efforts and explanations aren’t working either. Every press conference, interview and Tim MacMahon ESPN monologue only stirs up fans, who have shown their fury in chants, tweets, video montages and protests outside the American Airlines Center.
If you wanted to give the Mavericks ownership and front office a backhanded compliment, they have achieved something impressive. In an NFL city, they’ve managed to steal attention away from the Cowboys, America’s Team and the most valuable sports franchise in the world. But for all the wrong reasons.
But while Dallas is a football city, Dončic helped turn the tide somewhat with his on-the-court joie de vivre. It’s why Dallas made excuses and didn’t riot when the team lost Brunson for nothing, only to watch him become a megastar in New York. At least they had the Slovenian wunderkind who, as long as he was on the floor, gave them a chance to win any game, against any opponent, on any night. Now he is gone in a trade that saw Harrison only deal with one other team, rather than seeing what he could get from the wider market. No wonder all they got back was a first-round draft pick, Max Christie, a player with good two-way potential but nowhere near Dončic’s talent, and Anthony Davis. Davis is a fine player – like Dončić a future hall of famer – but he is 31 and even more injury prone than the Slovenian. In his first gam for the Mavs, Davis was great – recording a 26 points and 16 rebounds – but he picked up an injury and will most likely be out for a month. So much for trading Dončić because of fitness issues.
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That’s the dismal present. The ramifications of the trade will also haunt Mavs fans for the foreseeable future, as trauma usually does. Considering the future, Harrison gave up draft capital control between 2027 and 2030 for players brought in to fit around Dončic. The real poverty era will start in 2027, when Davis, Kyrie Irving and Klay Thompson are all over 34, past their prime, and the team can’t depend on the draft to replenish top talent. The organization’s attempt at censorship has only widened the wounds. During Monday night’s game, the Mavs showed fans on the jumbotron for the first time since the trade. Until then, they feared what fans would do when the cameras were on. During a karaoke montage, a fan mouthed “Fire Nico.” He was kicked out minutes later. Two other fans were kicked out after calling for Harrison’s firing and Cuban told them to “sit the fuck down”. The second incident was caught on camera and widely shared on social media. For many fans it was the perfect visual metaphor for the team’s descent into a draconian state, one where the minority owner feels comfortable enough to cuss out fans for voicing dissent (for his part, Cuban said he did not swear until the fans shouted and pointed at him, and he did not ask for them to be removed). Dumont was not spared either. When he returned to his seat after half-time, he was booed mercilessly. Harrison has been absent from his regular seats at the Mavericks but obviously though he could find some peace watching local college team SMU play Pitt. He was duly booed by SMU fans.
Harrison was fortunate enough to inherit Dončić, Brunson and Porziņģis when he took over. None of them remain. He fumbled all three, letting them go for a pittance in return. Nelson’s 2018 draft masterpiece – landing both Dončić (in a deal with Atlanta) and Brunson (with the 33rd pick!) – should be a contender for the best NBA draft ever. Instead, it has become a tragic tale of squandered potential thanks to Harrison’s mismanagement. Once a mecca for Mavs fans to express their jubilation, the AAC has become an empty, oppressive shell. Fans who have expressed discontent have been thrown out. Arena employees aren’t allowing shirts, signs or imagery criticizing the team through the entrance. The one metric Mavs fans always pointed to in their defense against being a poorly run franchise – Dončić – is gone.
Dallas fans’ anger will continue to burn until the franchise acknowledges their pain, a move unlikely ever to come. After all, if ownership hasn’t cared about pushback over funding Trump or supporting the Israeli government during a genocide, why would it give two damns about Mavericks fans?
