Latest news with #Mavs
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Lakers Can Reunite Luka Doncic With Ex-Teammate If Mavericks Fail To Agree On Deal With 6'10 Big Man
The Los Angeles Lakers, following a disappointing early exit from the 2025 NBA Playoffs, are actively seeking solutions to bolster their roster, particularly in the frontcourt. One potential target was presented as Dallas Mavericks center Daniel Gafford. Although initial reports made it seem like Gafford wouldn't be available for acquisition, recent updates suggest that the Lakers may still have a chance at landing the center. Advertisement Gafford's future with the Mavericks is uncertain due to ongoing contract extension negotiations. The Mavs' big man is entering the final year of his contract and wants a pay raise. However, Dallas has to consider all their options as their starting center, Dereck Lively, is also a year away from being available for a contract extension. In light of this, Gafford finds himself at a bit of an impasse with the organization. At 26 years old, he has proven to be one of the most hardworking and effective centers coming off the bench. With an average of 12.3 points and 6.8 rebounds per game, the Mavs' big man made solid contributions to the team's efforts, even during his few games as a starter. Gafford's contract is currently valued at $14.3 million. Although there is no scope to give him more money in the immediate context, the Mavs could offer him an extension. But, if this deal is not reached, it would be sensible for the team to look at trading him to get some value out of him rather than losing him in free agency. The Mavericks' position in this case is very interesting. With the No. 1 pick in the draft, Dallas is likely to select Cooper Flagg. While this has major connotations for the team's future development, it doesn't answer some pressing concerns that they will have in the immediate context. Advertisement With Kyrie Irving out, tentatively till January 2026, the Mavs are reportedly going to be on the lookout for a point guard. With the Gafford extension also looming overhead, there is a likelihood that the franchise could look to ship Gafford in an attempt to secure a playmaker and maybe another role player. Although the Purple and Gold made some moves to sign Mark Williams from the Charlotte Hornets before the trade deadline, they rescinded the trade as they felt they were giving up too much. However, this decision subsequently hurt them as the lack of a solid center in their rotation saw them make a quiet exit after a five-game series loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Lakers need a big man. The Mavericks need a playmaker. The situation itself sets the tone for a potential trade. Advertisement Proposed Trade Details Los Angeles Lakers Receive: Daniel Gafford Dallas Mavericks Receive: Gabe Vincent, Dalton Knecht The Lakers Could Swing For A Trade With The Mavs For Gafford A potential trade between the Lakers and the Mavericks for Daniel Gafford could work on paper. However, there are a lot of things that need to be considered first. The immediate challenge is identifying who benefits from this trade. On the Mavericks' end, acquiring Gabe Vincent and Dalton Knecht doesn't seem like a horrible idea. Vincent provides stubborn-defensive work and perimeter shooting. Meanwhile, Knecht has displayed talent for being a flat-out three-point threat as well as a gifted scorer. Advertisement However, this doesn't address the Mavericks' immediate need, which is playmaking. Although Vincent can take over the role, he has displayed very little aptitude for initiating and cultivating plays for his teammates. Although a system involving Davis and Flagg may not require a creative playmaker, the Lakers guard may not be the right fit in this context. On the Lakers' side, the addition of Gafford solves a majority of the team's issues in the frontcourt. With the 26-year-old joining the team, the Purple and Gold would feature a solid pick-and-roll center who can act as a lob threat at the drop of a hat. His prior experience of playing alongside Doncic is a bonus that rounds up the overall benefits of his arrival. A trade with the Mavericks also seems a bit optimistic for the Lakers. After the Davis-Doncic trade, fans were asking for Mavs GM Nico Harrison's head on a plate. The backlash of making such a trade has undoubtedly made the franchise resistant to dealing with the Purple and Gold. If it hasn't, Dallas will at least be more mindful of what kind of deal they make when discussing possible packages with Lakers GM Rob Pelinka. Regardless, the Lakers' need for a big man has been made quite obvious. With this in mind, several potential candidates have emerged as targets. The Mavs' big man happens to be preferred because of his experience playing alongside Doncic. Advertisement While the task of bringing Gafford over could be nigh impossible, the Lakers would benefit from swinging for the fences on this one. With the possibility of LeBron James returning next season, Gafford's addition would make the Lakers an instant contender again. However, with more concerns to address, the Purple and Gold would also need to look at other major tried opportunities while simultaneously focusing on ways to improve their wing depth to bolster their perimeter defense. Related: Lakers Might Land 'Shot-Blocker And Lob-Threat' Center In New Trade Idea
Indianapolis Star
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Indianapolis Star
'I'm not taking this for granted.' How Tyrese Haliburton is preparing for first NBA Finals
INDIANAPOLIS – The first NBA Finals Tyrese Haliburton "truthfully" remembers watching — the first one he didn't just notice but sat down and consumed — was in 2011. He was a LeBron James fan, so at that particular moment, that made him a Miami Heat fan. James had made "The Decision" one year prior to leave Cleveland to join the Heat with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh and they ripped through the Eastern Conference playoffs to the NBA Finals in their first year together, so Haliburton was expecting to see James crowned a champion for the first time. But the Heat met a Dallas Mavericks team with less acclaim but plenty of talent and a coach named Rick Carlisle and they lost that series to the Mavs in six games. "I hated Rick for that," Haliburton said. "... I definitely couldn't stand the Mavs and Rick for that at that time." Flash forward 14 years, however, and Haliburton has an Olympic gold medal in large part because of James' heroics and he now is in the NBA Finals for the first time with Carlisle, who will coach for his first championship since that 2011 team. Obviously, Haliburton has moved past the grudge he held as an 11-year-old. For the past three-plus seasons, Haliburton has asked Carlisle and other members of his staff who were around in 2011 about what made that team work and why it was able to take down a Miami team with so much star power. "The biggest thing is they went into that situation similar to how we've went into a lot of our playoff runs," Haliburton said. "Just being the underdog and knowing that a lot of people weren't picking them and just kinda going into with a — I don't know a better way to put it. Kind of with an F-it, (expletive)-it mentality. Sorry, I didn't want to cuss, but I had to right there, I didn't know how to get it across. But just going into it that way and as long as the guys in our locker room and the people in this building believe, then anything is possible." For Haliburton this season has truly proven anything is possible. His grandest dreams are coming true at the end of a season that started with some of his lowest moments as a player in his basketball life. Toward the end of November he was experiencing something beyond frustration as he went through one of the most miserable shooting slumps in his life while the Pacers struggled with injuries en route to a 10-15 start. But thanks to support from teammates and friends he managed to get his mind right and worked his way back to All-Star caliber play. He actually missed the All-Star game but played some of the best basketball of his life after the All-Star break to earn third-team All-NBA honors. "The beginning of the year this year, no one will ever know how difficult that was for him," Carlisle said. "Through it all he may have missed one game in the first 30. He kept playing. He kept believing in himself, engaging with his teammates, kept a great attitude. There's nothing more you can ask for." By the playoffs he had his confidence all the way back and in the postseason he's authored three shots that will earn a measure of immortality in Pacers history — the driving layup to beat the Bucks in Game 5 of the first round, the step-back 3 to beat the Cavs in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference semis and the high-off-the-rim jumper that sent Game 1 against the Knicks into overtime. He's averaging 18.8 points and 9.8 assists per game in these playoffs and even the numbers don't quite capture his total impact. The struggles of the early part of the season have led to him viewing these playoffs differently than last year's. In retrospect, he believes he may have spent too much of last year's playoffs thinking of that run as the first of many or as an early step in a gradual rise. When the Pacers struggled early, he realized they weren't guaranteed to get another chance. "This is a really exciting time for me personally to have this opportunity," Haliburton said. "This is something I've wanted to do my whole life. Last year, having playoff success in my first playoff run and being unsuccessful to start the season, for me I thought a lot about, wow, maybe I took last year for granted. I didn't know what the playoffs were going to look like as the year was going on. I didn't know if we'd be a play-in team or where we'd stack up in the end with how we were playing early in the year. I'm definitely not taking this for granted. Learning to appreciate every day and remember all these days as best as I can." Haliburton said, as usual, he's tried to pick Pascal Siakam's brain to get a sense of what's coming as Siakam won a title with the Raptors in 2019. He knows the situation isn't going to be exactly the same, but any amount of foresight is helpful. "We talked about it yesterday in film as far as all the distractions, all the things that come with playing in the Finals," Haliburton said. "We've had many conversations with it. I've had many conversations with Pascal leading up to this just in passing, randomly just sitting on the plane. 'Yo, tell me about this game in that playoff run.' That's part of it. I'm really excited about it. We just continue to make more memories and do more stuff together. ... I'm sure some stuff has changed, but the main thing remains the main thing. The emotions, the energy in the building is going to be a lot of fun. That's something I'm looking forward to a lot." He also knows what's coming is a major challenge. The Thunder team the Pacers are about to face don't come to the Finals with nearly the fanfare that Heat team did, but it won 10 more games in the regular season than the 2010-11 Miami squad, posting the fifth most wins in NBA history at 68-14. The Pacers are close to doing something the franchise hasn't done since it moved to the NBA from the ABA, but they have every reason not to get ahead of themselves. And that allows Haliburton to continue to stay in the moment. "It's easy for human nature to set in and be like, 'Yo, we're four wins away from a championship,'" Haliburton said. "'All we gotta do is this, this and that and we're gonna be a champion and this is what the parade is gonna look like.' It's easy to do that. But just trying to be grounded and be where my feet are and take it one day at a time. Because if we're able to do what we set out to do it's going to be really special."
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Michael Beasley shares why he hates the narrative that Luka Doncic is out of shape: "When I'm scoring 50, tell me then to get in shape"
Luka Doncic may be a transcendent talent, but two significant flaws have overshadowed the Los Angeles Lakers superstar's career. One is his lack of effort on the defensive end, which was abundantly apparent in their first-round exit at the hands of the Minnesota Timberwolves in this year's NBA Playoffs. Another is his lack of conditioning, which fans and analysts have pointed to as the main reason the Dallas Mavericks stunningly traded him to the Purple & Gold before this season's trade deadline. Advertisement However, one former NBA veteran, Michael Beasley, has pushed back against that popular narrative, claiming that if the Slovenian ace doesn't have optimal physical conditioning, he wouldn't be able to put up the numbers he regularly does or even lead the Mavs to the NBA Finals last season. You have to be in shape to put up a lot of shots in the NBA The NBA is a grown man's league, wherein getting a shot off takes a lot of strength and stamina. In his eight-year NBA career, the 6'6" guard has averaged over 20 shots a game, proving his ability to handle the physical demands of the league. It's a point that Beasley, the second-overall pick of the 2008 NBA Draft, champions. "I hate this narrative on Luka, right? It's just something that I'm hearing in the news. I hate this like "out of shape" narrative that I'm hearing, 'cause it's like everybody that's saying he's out of shape is the same ones that's cheering hurrah hurrah when he's scoring 50 points or 60 points," the left-handed forward said. Advertisement Beasley, who last played in the Association for the Lakers in 2019, added that this critique of Doncic's game only comes out of the woodwork whenever his team loses. However, it all fades when the native of Ljubljana, Slovenia, drops 73 points on defenses designed to stop his every move. "In order to score 50, you got to be in shape to shoot 30 shots at least, right? Especially in the NBA. When it works, what shape are we speaking about? It's like you always got to find something bad to say about him. And it's like—why? Like bro, sometimes the other guy was just better and just bust their ass. And just really bust their ass. And it's as simple as that," "Beas" pointed out. Related: Michael Jordan warned the NBA about pushing the "next MJ" narrative: "There's a danger to that, the credibility of the game can take a hit" Don't try to ruin a man's reputation Luka was keen on staying a member of the Mavs organization for his entire career. He had helped build something special in Dallas after the team acquired him in the 2018 NBA Draft. However, the Mavs' decision-makers did not believe in "The Don" as much as the latter believed in his team. And not only did Dallas trade him, but they also tried to assassinate his character on his way out with talks regarding his subpar physical conditioning. It was something that Beasley certainly took offense with. Advertisement "It's like, when I'm scoring 50, tell me then to get in shape," the "Walking Bucket" stressed. "The second I get a turnover, or the second I don't win one of the games that you clearly been paying me — now I'm out of shape?" "That s**t messes up the players' money. And the organizations know what they're doing. That's not fair," he added. With the Lakers' offseason starting earlier than they would have liked, it seems like Doncic has not wasted any time getting to work. He recently attended a basketball game of his former team, Real Madrid, and looked to be in great shape. While there is no doubt that "Luka Magic" has natural talent, his dedication to staying fit and improving his game only bodes well for him and the Lakers moving forward. Related: "Keep putting him in trade rumors for second string centers" - Austin Reaves' agent issues warning amid constant trade rumors
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
"We were like 8 years in the Bataan Death March" - Former Mavs GM on Dirk turning into the franchise's savior
There was a time when the Dallas Mavericks knew how to appreciate and show loyalty to their European star. After drafting Dirk Nowitzki in the 1998 draft, the organization stuck with the then-wunderkind despite enduring two seasons missing the playoffs. Before picking up the German legend, the Mavs also failed to advance to the playoffs for eight consecutive years. The team's former assistant coach-turned-general manager, Donnie Nelson, likened the futile stretch to one of the most infamous events of World War II. Advertisement "We were like eight years in the Bataan Death March, the Maverick walk in the desert, where we hadn't made the playoffs," Nelson said of Dallas' woes. Nelson's hyperbolic comparison Some might have found it distasteful for the former Mavs executive to make such a juxtaposition, as the Bataan Death March was one of the most atrocious war crimes the Imperial Japanese Army had committed. During WWII, the Commonwealth of the Philippines, which was still under US occupation, was invaded by the Empire of Japan. One of the deadliest battles of the conquest happened in Bataan, a province 80 miles away from the capital, Manila. The combined American and Philippine forces, which numbered around 120,000, were defeated by the 75,000-strong Japanese troops after a three-month skirmish. Advertisement Around 72,000 to 80,000 prisoners of war were then forced by the invaders to march for nearly 65 miles to a train station, which would transfer them to Manila, while being subject to physical abuse, merciless killings, and harsh conditions. Perhaps it may have been too much for Nelson to use it as a comparison. However, the statement should give us a glimpse of what the Mavs had to endure for several seasons before finally getting a taste of success. For eight years, they never placed higher than 10th in the Western Conference, even if, at some point, the team had the likes of Jason Kidd, Jim Jackson, Jamal Mashburn, and Michael Finley suiting up for the club. Advertisement Related: "I saw what Nico Harrison was talking about" - Kendrick Perkins proclaims Anthony Edwards will win a championship before Luka Doncic Nowitzki, the hero Dirk's arrival ushered in a new era for the playoff-starved squad. Of course, the former European hoops standout had to endure some struggles during his first two years in the Association. It didn't help that the lockout delayed his rookie campaign, including a full offseason. By his sophomore season, though, Nowitzki found his bearings, showing significant improvement in terms of production and poise on an NBA court. Dirk would have won the 2000 Most Improved Player award if it weren't for Jalen Rose edging him out by seven votes. In the 2000-01 campaign, Dallas was finally able to look past its own version of a death march, advancing to the postseason and securing the No. 5 seed. Nowitzki earned an All-NBA selection (third team), a feat he would continue to achieve every campaign until 2012. More importantly for the franchise, it went to 12 consecutive playoffs, which included two Finals appearances. Advertisement The Mavs failed to reach that stage again until last season when another European phenom, with the help of a resurgent Kyrie Irving and overachieving role players, steered the team to the Finals. Unfortunately for the fans, another death march may be looming for Dallas. A few months ago, its front office inexplicably parted ways with Luka Doncic to bring in an aging and injury-prone superstar in Anthony Davis, a move that frustrated many of the Mavs' supporters, including the retired Nowitzki. Related: "He made the Mavericks what it is" - J.J. Barea argues that Dirk is still the greatest Mav of all time despite Luka's accomplishments
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Kevin Garnett shares why he would trade the Mavs number one pick for Giannis: "We are trying to win now"
Hall of Fame teammates Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce animatedly discussed what they would do with the No.1 pick if they were in charge of the Dallas Mavericks. Garnett started the discussion by calling the Draft Lottery a bogus process because the Draft should be for bad teams that need players from college to bolster their rosters. The Mavs aren't one of those teams because they have a lineup many believe would be a contending team when they are fully healthy. Advertisement However, because Dallas did not make the playoffs, they had a 1.8 percent chance of winning the lottery, and by a stroke of luck, they ended up with the top pick. However, KG says the Mavs don't need a future star right now. "Dallas has the now, the middle, and the later. They're built for the now, the middle, and later…We trying to win now. I got the guns and the beam on me now. I got to win now. So the now is now," said Garnett. Mavs in a win-now mode When the Mavs traded Luka Doncic for Anthony Davis, the goal was to build a win-now team with players aligning with Kyrie's timeline. Cooper Flagg is a great talent but does not fit the bill. Giannis Antetokounmpo does, so that's why KG said if he ran the Mavs, he would use the top pick to trade for the "Greek Freak." Advertisement But Pierce questioned Garnett's move, asking him what if adding Giannis does not work out in Dallas, and Cooper turns out to be the generational talent everyone says he is. "The Big Ticket" then threw the question back to his former Celtics teammate, asking him 'What if it's Flagg who does not pan out?' At least Giannis is a proven commodity. "Bro it's damn if you do, damn if you don't," added KG. "But you got the Flagg, bro. The name of the game is capture the Flagg. Now I think you entertain the best offers. You finna have Kyrie, Anthony Davis, two real bigs with Lively and Gafford. Bro, come on, bro. You got Washington, man. Man, you got a horse of dogs over there. Man sh**, Klay? Sh**. The key is securing the 'Flagg" Make no mistake—the Bucks have not said that they are willing to trade Antetokounmpo, and Giannis has not declared that he wants to leave Milwaukee. But the chatter around is getting louder. And as they say, where there is smoke, there is fire, especially when it's coming from Shams Charania. Advertisement Giannis Antetokounmpo, the two-time NBA MVP, has not made any firm decisions about his future. But sources tell me for the first time in his 12-year NBA career, he is open-minded about whether his best fit is in Milwaukee or playing elsewhere—and exploring what those options outside of Milwaukee look like," Shams announced on "Get Up." But whether the Bucks make Giannis available or not is the least of the Mavs' problems. What's important for them is that, as KG said, they have 'secured the Flagg'. And once the free agency period opens at the end of next month, the Mavs have to be all ears and listen to every offer that comes their way. Related: Kidd breaks down why the Mavs are a perfect landing spot for Cooper Flagg: "This is a great situation for him to grow his game"
