No team in the NBA had it worse when their 2022-23 NBA season came to an end than the Dallas Mavericks.
After reaching the Western Conference Finals last year, the Mavericks failed even to make the NBA playoffs this time around, and to make matters worse, the league fined the team for their efforts to tank for a better draft position in their final two regular-season games.
With the league assessing the Mavericks with a $750,000 fine for blatantly tanking, team owner Mark Cuban will match the amount fined and donate it to charity.
Mark Cuban tells me he will match the NBA’s $750k fine with a charity donation as he usually does. via
— Dalton Trigg (@dalton_trigg) April 15, 2023
The 2022-23 campaign seemed doomed from the start for the Mavericks, with the team failing to re-sign star guard Jalen Brunson in the offseason, as he decided to take his talents to the New York Knicks.
Although it now seems like a brilliant move by Brunson, who has flourished in New York alongside Julius Randle and has helped the team reach the playoffs, the same can’t be said for the Mavericks, as they’d do anything to turn back the clock and get him to stay in Dallas.
To counter Brunson’s departure, the Mavericks made a bold move in the regular season to help put another talented guard alongside superstar Luka Doncic.
The blockbuster trade to acquire superstar guard Kyrie Irving ahead of the NBA trade deadline appeared to be a step in the right direction, but it didn’t impact the season’s outcome much.
The question is whether Dallas can keep Irving, who will hit free agency this summer, and continue to put talent around Doncic moving forward.
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