The Mavericks decided to trade Kristaps Porzingis to the Wizards last week because they determined he couldn’t be an effective second star with Luka Doncic, Tim Cato of The Athletic states in a discussion of the deal. Porzingis was in his third season in Dallas, and all three had been disrupted by injuries, leading to concerns about whether he would ever be reliable to stay on the court. The Mavs are 13-9 in the games he has missed this season, so the front office felt it was safe to move on from his contract.
Cato is skeptical about Dallas’ return in the deal, although he says Spencer Dinwiddie will be a welcome addition for a team that has trouble driving to the basket and the Mavericks believe Davis Bertans is a better defender than his reputation would suggest. They plan to use him in larger lineups where his lack of rebounding will be less important.
There’s more NBA news from Texas:
- The Spurs are focused on making the play-in tournament and reaching the playoffs, even though their 22-36 record indicates that they might be better off maximizing their first-round draft pick, writes Tom Orsborn of The San Antonio Express News. Dejounte Murray and Devin Vassell both talked last weekend about the importance of getting to the postseason, and coach Gregg Popovich repeated that message on Monday. “If you put yourself in the situation, more as a coach than any other position in the organization, besides players, you can’t go to your team and ask them to lose,” Popovich said. “You can’t do that. It’s an impossibility for all of the logical reasons you can think of on your own. So, you go play your best, you keep teaching, you keep doing what you do. And if you lose and wind up with a high draft pick, well, you accept it and you are glad you got a high draft pick. But it can’t be because you didn’t push them or teach them or demand from them.”
- Goran Dragic gave up $819,835 in his buyout agreement with the Spurs, tweets Keith Smith of Spotrac. The amount is equal to a 54-day minimum-salary contract for Dragic, so he’ll make up roughly all that money once he signs with a new team.
- The Rockets used part of their mid-level exception to sign rookie guard Daishen Nix to a four-year contract, according to Smith (Twitter link). Nix will make $612K for the rest of this season and $1,563,518 in 2022/23. The final two years of the deal are non-guaranteed at $1,836,096 and $1,988,598, and the last season is also a team option.
It’s amazing to me how quietly the Mavs were able to make this move. Obviously the Sabonis and Harden deals took the majority of the lime light but heading into the TD I didn’t see anyone talking about good ol’ Tingus Pingus. Not sold on Dinwiddie taking them over the hump and I hate Bertans’ contract but overall I think the Mavs did well by moving on from KP
I don’t mind them moving Porzingis at all, but the return is pretty awful. Those two guys are bench players.
With KPs contract and injury history I doubt they could have pulled off a much better deal. If the Dinwiddie and the Lazer can bounce back from their bad seasons they could provide at least enough pop to let Luka breathe. I honestly thought the Mavs were stuck with Porzingis
There contracts are more tradable than Porzingas.
Bertans should benefit from playing with Luka. He will find his shot again. If Dinwiddie is healthy. Cause there were rumors he wasn’t. He’s a good fit next to Luka. And also helps them let Brunson walk. I’ve read there are teams that will offer 20 mill for Brunson. I hope NYK isn’t one of them , Geeeezz
I was advocating Zinger for Wiggins earlier, so maybe they were too late thinking Zinger should go… Wigs is looking better… (while for GSW, Zinger would have added height to a !ineup with Dray as a 5.)
Still, Dinwiddie in theory has the smarts to support & engage with Doncic, unless he has a problem or block. But from his perspective, better this situation than the Knick’s.
Dallas is 3 games up on play-in teams and nobody improved enough to beat them out; Norman Powell (Clips) is injured and Pels and Kings are a ways back.
I watched a lot of Wizards games over the years and I never looked at Bertrans as an awful defender. He’s not the greatest but nowhere near as bad as some think he is.
Dallas traded away the wrong guy. Luka should of been in NY. Does anyone really see Luka staying long term like Dirk?
Surprise a NY fan saying Luka should have been traded there. Dream on, even if he leaves Dallas it won’t be for NY