The Mavericks have signed Olivier-Maxence Prosper to his rookie-scale deal, the team announced in a press release early Monday morning. His signing means all the first-round picks in last month’s draft are now under contract.
As the 24th selection, Prosper is eligible to receive $2,733,720 in his first season and can earn $13,870,583 over the four-year contract, as our breakdown of rookie scale salaries shows.
The 21-year-old forward was one of the top beneficiaries of this year’s pre-draft process. A strong showing at the NBA Combine in Chicago, followed by impressive individual workouts, moved him into the first round.
Prosper was officially selected by the Kings, but Dallas acquired his rights in a draft-night trade that didn’t become official until the moratorium was lifted on July 6.
“O-Max was considered one of the best wing defenders in college basketball last year and plays with tremendous energy,” said Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison. “We are excited to put pen to paper and officially sign him.”
Prosper played his first collegiate season at Clemson before transferring to Marquette in 2021. He averaged 12.5 points and 4.7 rebounds per game last season.
How did he do in summer league?
5 games, 25.4 MPG / 12.6 PPG / 3.6 FGM / 8.2 FGA /43.9%FG / 0.8 3PM / 3.4 3PA / 23.5 3P% / 4.6 FTM / 5.6 FTA / 82.1 FT% / 1.2 OREB / 4.2 DREB / 5.4 TRB / 1.2 AST / 1.2 TOV / 0.8 STL / 0.2 BLK / 2.4 PF / +6 +/-
Needs some work, but the pure athleticism and defense is there. He doesn’t have much feel for shot creation and sometimes looks a bit lost on offense, but that’ll come with reps. He’s looked locked-in and unintimidated when it comes to playing, and he’s been solid off-ball.
I think that with some time, he could become a DFS or RoCo type who can play and defend multiple positions thanks to his big wingspan. He just needs to improve his shot but it’s mechanically solid. I think he’ll be a decent player, and his work ethic and mindset got a lot of praise from scouts.
Thank you!
About what you would expect for his expierence level at summerleauge. Tight range on the offensive side not much out of 8 feet with lots of weak side swoop ins.
It will take time for him to get his footwork together on defense. Typical of what you see from young bigs during summer leauge.
I see 9 teams in no particular order that are better than the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference right now. How much better is this team supposed to be than the version that we saw that was awful last year???
Denver
Phoenix
L.A. Clippers
Sacramento
Memphis
Golden State
L.A. Lakers
New Orleans
Oklahoma City
A full training camp to get familiar can change a lot, but I agree we have to actually see them play before there’s any hope of improvement. They’ve made some decent additions in the draft and trades, but they’re not a contender in my eyes even with Luka. If their additions step up and Kyrie and Luka show actual synergy instead of taking turns and messing it up, they could be pretty formidable on offense. Defense is still a work in progress, but Williams and having an actual Center should help.
Thought to be fair, the Clippers and Pels on that list depend almost entirely on health. If they aren’t healthy, they’re not as good as Dallas.
Dallas has a couple of huge additional questions as well.
1) Is Luka spending the summer eating Chicken Wings and drinking beer, or is he working out, and coming to training camp in shape as opposed to getting in shape in November and December?
2) Is Kyrie gonna completely check out on Dallas. He did it at his last two stops, and caused pure chaos along the way. You do realize that Kyrie ain’t concerned about winning games anymore. He is just here to score points, and collect checks.
As for the first one, judging from his workouts and the buzz on the vine, no. Also, even fat Luka is still better than 95% of the league xD
As for the second, no duh. But from a pure talent perspective, he’s still excellent. The Mavs made this gamble when they traded for him, and they don’t really have a choice but to play it out. Even if all he does is score 27 ppg like he has the last couple seasons, that still has value to them. Him showing up is the biggest concern. If they get that, they’ll live with it.
They weren’t awful all season, it was only bad down the stretch, and a lot of that seems self induced.
They were a far better team with Dinwiddie and Finney Smith, and you have to think they can probably get back to at least that with a Kyrie who has gone thru camp with this team and Grant Williams. It seems like a foregone conclusion that they will trade for a center still, I just think they’re taking their time with it, but I think they have a few backup plans out there if their top choices don’t materialize.
You could sit here and go team by team on your list and pick many of those teams apart in various ways. Mavs are at least showing up to the table with a better hand than they had with the disastrous finish to the season. I’m not getting crazy and saying they’ll be a contender, but I think anyone taking that list of 9 teams and saying there is no way they land somewhere in the middle of that mix is either extremely pessimistic or a straight up hater.