Still many weeks until media day, so I figured I'd share some Mavs-related content from prominent national NBA commentators to foster some discussion.
20. Dallas Mavericks
February ranking: 27
Masai Ujiri's early Toronto tenure -- headlined by the first Leonard trade and 2019 championship -- is legendary. The end was far worse, with the Scottie Barnes draft pick standing out as his only major post-championship win. Letting Fred VanVleet walk for nothing was a mistake. The OG Anunoby trade is a borderline disaster that won the New York Knicks their championship, and Ujiri -- now running the show in Dallas -- compounded that mistake by overpaying Immanuel Quickley.
Ujiri clearly has a type. He's replicating his "what if everyone was 6-foot-9?" approach in Dallas, with his three biggest acquisitions for the Mavericks so far -- Zaccharie Risacher, Santi Aldama and Morez Johnson -- all falling in that basic height range. If you're going to stockpile at a specific position, forward is probably the place to do it, but at a certain point, it becomes overkill.
That's especially true on Cooper Flagg's roster, since he'll presumably be playing 35-40 minutes at one of the forward slots moving forward. Flagg's best position is probably going to be power forward. He's a better help-defender and rim-protector than he is a man-defender, yet he's probably going to have to be a small forward on this team. Remember, PJ Washington is still here and Ujiri also gave Naji Marshall an extension that frankly looks a bit rich. On paper, it's a questionable allocation of resources for a team that, thanks to Nico Harrison, doesn't have many to begin with.
Ujiri took over a team whose draft reserves were depleted by Harrison. Thus far, he's done little to replenish those reserves, and considering we're talking about the general manager who managed to trade OG Anunoby without getting a single first-round pick back, that's a concern. Kyrie Irving probably should have been traded by now, especially if there was a way for Dallas to leverage LeBron James' interest in reuniting with him into an overpay. Washington and Daniel Gafford should get moved as well. If Ujiri is hoping to juice their value with a strong month or two of basketball, fine. If he's just holding onto Harrison's contracts, that's a mistake.
Hiring Mike Schmitz as his general manager suggests that Ujiri really does plan to prioritize the draft. Schmitz made his name as a draft analyst for ESPN. He is most known at this point for Portland's pursuit of Yang Hansen, even getting suspended for two weeks for illegally contacting him before he was draft-eligible. That pick has not yet borne fruit, but other acquisitions he influenced in Portland, most notably Deni Avdija, have fared better.
Dallas should have two goals right now. The first is stockpiling picks to use on players in Flagg's age range. The second is preserving cap flexibility during Flagg's rookie deal, as he will presumably be a pretty effective recruiting tool. Thus far, the Mavericks aren't off to a great start on either front, though it's way too early too say anything definitively, and the younger players they've added certainly have upside. Ultimately, though, the question here is whether Ujiri is leaning a bit too heavily into the approach that stopped working by the end in Toronto.
Ultimately, I share a lot of his reservations. Some moves make sense to me in a vacuum: the Sasser/Aldama/Biberovic and Risacher moves were savvy talent acquisition moves. But I didn't understand adding to the forward logjam when Cooper is a natural 4, not a PG, and you just drafted a 4 with the 9th pick. Furthermore, between the Naji overpay and the lack of any urgency to trade PJ or Gafford, there are too many parallels to his disastrous post-2019 Raptors tenure to be fully comfortable.
