The Dallas Mavericks now have the 4th best defense and the 30th best offense, will defense win them the championship?

[41Dirk41]

So is the narrative changed from "win now mode" to "tank now mode"?

[mkot]

And they are now tied for the worst record in the West.

Injured or not, they are bad. The Pels are on a second night of a back to back, no Zion, at home, and they scored only 99 points and lost. They are a Nesmith 3 pointer away from being the worst team in the West.

[peZt]

No point in keeping AD and Kyrie and KLay. The trades were made to be in a win now made. They **** up, they are bad and will not win. Time to salvage the vets for picks as long as they still have some value and tank.
Its the best draft in a decade. They need to embrace the tank now.

As much as I would wish that for the Mavs, I would HATE to see Nico be rewarded with 2 star players in Flagg and AJ/Dybantsa in 2 drafts. He and the owners dont deserve it.

[pepe1991]

To answer question from title. No.
- Magic fan

Mavericks are delusional. They are not contender and all 3 of their stars ( not including Flagg ) are older.

AD is way better trade bait than he is building block, given his age & value.
Kyrie should be also recovered and traded.
I have no clue what's Klay value, probably to be bench player on contender. Can he do that?

As one guy from Balkan told in his podcast when he was asked what's missing peace for Dallas to win a title, his answer was: "well, it's a great supporting cast team , now they just need Luka Dončić"


Bottom line, trade that 99,99999% people thought was disaster, ended up being disaster. Interesting.

I like Flagg, but Flagg isn't Dončić, and i highly doubt he will ever be as good. Flagg is type of prospect who would be like 5th pick if his name is Kuper Flegović and his born country is Slovenia. Majority of Flagg hype was based on fact he is white guy from USA, type of guy USA didn't have since... Bird?

[Andri]

So is the narrative changed from "win now mode" to "tank now mode"?

You know, it has always been about how to try to rationalize a decision made out of ego and feelings.

So the narrative can change because it really doesn't matter.

[41Dirk41]

So is the narrative changed from "win now mode" to "tank now mode"?

You know, it has always been about how to try to rationalize a decision made out of ego and feelings.

So the narrative can change because it really doesn't matter.

We fixed 90% of NBA problems with 1 trade so mission complete.

I just hope Karma will hit hard some guys

[maverick_41]

The trade changed the timeline of the Mavs fans. We had one less contending team in our lifetime.

All expectations we put into a team that was under construction since the second part of 2010s are flushed down the drain.

I don't think it's fair.

[maverick_41]

Injured or not, they are bad.

The Mavs can't complain about injuries. It's the risk they took by acquiring their core players.

[Ssj16]

Dallas + Kyrie = Championship contender.
And they won't finish high in the seedings I assume, so could cause some real damage in the 1st Round to OKC or Houston/Minnesota.

You know what a championship contender on Dallas was? Dallas plus Luka.

Kyrie as the lead has failed. Before Lebron came to Cleveland, that team was horrible. When Kyrie left Boston, they got the job done without him.

Kyrie was amazing as the number 2 to Luka. Hitching your hopes and goals to Kyrie to lead you to the promise land when there is no evidence of it, good luck.

Kyrie won't ever be the lead in Dallas, because Anthony Davis is the lead.
Literally the only thing lacking in Dallas, is a player who can create his own shot out of nowhere, and Kyrie is one of the greatest of all-time at that.

If you're a team that is debating whether AD or Kyrie is the leader of your team, that team has already lost before it even started my friend.

As mentioned, there is no evidence of either having success as a lead for a multitude of reasons.

There is evidence that Luka can be your lead. This was such a horrible trade and it's showing right now.

You can put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig.

[Archx]

Well, Wemby said it best, this is basically what Mavs lost with a perfect roster for this type of player. We'll see how the season goes but it's hard to level a ship if you miss this.

Read on Twitter

[Ssj16]

Also Dallas beat OKC THREE times last season without Doncic in the line-up...
November 17 = Mavs 121, Thunder 119
January 17 = Mavs 106, Thunder 98
January 23 = Mavs 121, Thunder 115
And all of them were before they acquired AD.

If you are trying to somehow state that these regular season games equate to Dallas being better without Luka by swapping in AD, this is crazy talk.

[mkot]

Injured or not, they are bad.

The Mavs can't complain about injuries. It's the risk they took by acquiring their core players.

The fans don't deserve this but I think the management and owner got what they deserve.

[41Dirk41]

But they only need Kyrie in a playoff series, they don't need to build around him.
Already have great defense and AD, its enough to make the playoffs (especially with Kyrie playing the 2nd half of the season), so just need Kyrie for the OKC series.

They need someone to create for others, because nobody can't create anything, that's not Kyrie. You can't transform the worst offense in the league in good one with addition of Iso player alone.

And when talking about Kyrie, he will be out for a year, when he returns. You people honestly believe he will immediately be his best version? And then you have time restrictions, load management...

No i never believed Kyrie would return to his best, just that he'd give them a player who can score off the the dribble and create his own shot.
I've seen teams winning without a facilitator, so they don't really need Kyrie to play the traditional Point Guard role.
Look at Houston, the 3rd highest scoring team in the NBA despite no facilitator.
Any team with AD and Kyrie and great defense, will go far.

Stop with basketball my friend, it's not for you.

[bonita_the_frog]

They need someone to create for others, because nobody can't create anything, that's not Kyrie. You can't transform the worst offense in the league in good one with addition of Iso player alone.

And when talking about Kyrie, he will be out for a year, when he returns. You people honestly believe he will immediately be his best version? And then you have time restrictions, load management...

No i never believed Kyrie would return to his best, just that he'd give them a player who can score off the the dribble and create his own shot.
I've seen teams winning without a facilitator, so they don't really need Kyrie to play the traditional Point Guard role.
Look at Houston, the 3rd highest scoring team in the NBA despite no facilitator.
Any team with AD and Kyrie and great defense, will go far.

Stop with basketball my friend, it's not for you.

I'm more qualified than nearly everyone, because i literally live with a basketball coach.

[41Dirk41]

No i never believed Kyrie would return to his best, just that he'd give them a player who can score off the the dribble and create his own shot.
I've seen teams winning without a facilitator, so they don't really need Kyrie to play the traditional Point Guard role.
Look at Houston, the 3rd highest scoring team in the NBA despite no facilitator.
Any team with AD and Kyrie and great defense, will go far.

Stop with basketball my friend, it's not for you.

I'm more qualified than nearly everyone, because i literally live with a basketball coach.

Not so good for your teams. Ouch.

This team is dysfunctional as hell. Even with everybody healthy (and you can see that's an impossible situation).

90% of the Mavs roster fit perfect with Doncic.

[bonita_the_frog]

If you are trying to somehow state that these regular season games equate to Dallas being better without Luka by swapping in AD, this is crazy talk.

You made up that crazy talk.
All I did was prove the Mavs roster (with Kyrie, and without AD, and without Doncic) is good enough to beat OKC three times in a regular season.
That means they are not "bad" at "creating for themselves or others".
Those THREE wins over OKC prove when you add Kyrie to these Mavs, you don't have a "bad" offensive roster at all...

I don't believe you understand how bad Mavs roster is in creating for themselves or others. They have the worst offensive rtg for the reason. This team was built for Luka, who was the whole system. Now you have just bunch of role players, who can't create anything.

Rockets have Sengun, who can shoot and playmake. Mavs have Lively and Gafford who can't do either.

[Bob8]

If you are trying to somehow state that these regular season games equate to Dallas being better without Luka by swapping in AD, this is crazy talk.

You made up that crazy talk.
All I did was prove the Mavs roster (with Kyrie, and without AD, and without Doncic) is good enough to beat OKC three times in a regular season.
That means they are not "bad" at "creating for themselves or others".
Those THREE wins over OKC prove when you add Kyrie to these Mavs, you don't have a "bad" offensive roster at all...

I don't believe you understand how bad Mavs roster is in creating for themselves or others. They have the worst offensive rtg for the reason. This team was built for Luka, who was the whole system. Now you have just bunch of role players, who can't create anything.

Rockets have Sengun, who can shoot and playmake. Mavs have Lively and Gafford who can't do either.

OKC was in few of those wins playing without all Cs.

You have to understand that Mavs are far the worse offensive team in the league at the moment. Kyrie in prime couldn't alone make good offensive team from that and old Kyrie coming from long term injury for sure won't make Mavs good offensive team. Something is playing bad offense without a star, something completely else is having offensive rtg around 100. And don't forget they're the only team in Nba with only 1 away game played. So their schedule was very team friendly.

[Homer38]

We can agree to disagree. I don't think it was collusion. Is it so crazy to think that Nico would look at supermax for Luka and wonder if it is the right path? They didn't know at the time that Kyrie would tear his ACL.

So trading a generational talent who is 26 years old and just led your team to the finals the previous season was the right move? Especially trading him for injury prone Davis and Max Christie, that was enough? The trade was a blunder of proportion. There is no way i wouldn’t have paid Luka. Flagg is great but Luka is special.

Luka has never led a team to a championship. He still has a lot of time to do that. The Mavs, who knew him best, traded him because they didn't believe he was capable of doing it.

This comment make no sense since so many legends who was drafted by a awful team won their first title at only 27-28 years old.Jordan won his first title at 28.Same for Shaq.LBJ at 27.Mavs legends Dirk won his title at 32 or 33

If you think Luka could not win a title with Dallas after making in 2024 at 25 is just crazy

[Ssj16]

If you are trying to somehow state that these regular season games equate to Dallas being better without Luka by swapping in AD, this is crazy talk.

You made up that crazy talk.
All I did was prove the Mavs roster (with Kyrie, and without AD, and without Doncic) is good enough to beat OKC three times in a regular season.
That means they are not "bad" at "creating for themselves or others".
Those THREE wins over OKC prove when you add Kyrie to these Mavs, you don't have a "bad" offensive roster at all...

I don't believe you understand how bad Mavs roster is in creating for themselves or others. They have the worst offensive rtg for the reason. This team was built for Luka, who was the whole system. Now you have just bunch of role players, who can't create anything.

Rockets have Sengun, who can shoot and playmake. Mavs have Lively and Gafford who can't do either.

I know you apparently live with a basketball coach but that doesn't automatically make you qualified to talk basketball.

I still don't get the point you are trying to prove with those regular season games and how they correlate to the Mavs somehow being better this year without Luka.

It's a strawmans argument anyways because everyone except Nico knows that AD is Mr glass and the dude is injured once again and the Mavs are currently one of the worst teams.

We have evidence that Luka can lead this team to deep playoff runs and has been way more available in his career than AD has ever been.

I feel like you gotta take the L on this one.

[bonita_the_frog]

I know you apparently live with a basketball coach but that doesn't automatically make you qualified to talk basketball.

I still don't get the point you are trying to prove with those regular season games and how they correlate to the Mavs somehow being better this year without Luka.

It's a strawmans argument anyways because everyone except Nico knows that AD is Mr glass and the dude is injured once again and the Mavs are currently one of the worst teams.

We have evidence that Luka can lead this team to deep playoff runs and has been way more available in his career than AD has ever been.

I feel like you gotta take the L on this one.

You don't get my point or you can't read?
I literally just told you, and I even showed you what I was replying to-

All I did was prove the Mavs roster (with Kyrie, and without AD, and without Doncic) is good enough to beat OKC three times in a regular season.
That means they are not "bad" at "creating for themselves or others".
Those THREE wins over OKC prove when you add Kyrie to these Mavs, you don't have a "bad" offensive roster at all...

I don't believe you understand how bad Mavs roster is in creating for themselves or others. They have the worst offensive rtg for the reason. This team was built for Luka, who was the whole system. Now you have just bunch of role players, who can't create anything.

Rockets have Sengun, who can shoot and playmake. Mavs have Lively and Gafford who can't do either.

Your case is dismissed. We're done!