Dallas Mavericks: Pressure is on Nico Harrison to make roster better
By Reid Hanson
The Dallas Mavericks are enduring their toughest days of the Luka Doncic era. After losing 127-126 to the Washington Wizards, the Mavs stand only one game over .500 and in sixth place in the Western Conference standings.
Losers of seven of their last nine games, the Dallas Mavericks are at their lowest. Despite Doncic’s 40 point effort, they failed to dispatch an inferior team and are playing their worst basketball in years.
Nico Harrison was brought in to add talent to the Dallas Mavericks roster
In the summer of 2021, Mark Cuban made bold moves on the Dallas Mavericks. After failing to attract top-end free agent talent for over a decade, the Mavs owner cut ties with his championship GM, Donnie Nelson, and championship coach, Rick Carlisle.
He replaced them with player friendly Jason Kidd and sneaker legend, Nico Harrison. Both additions had strong ties to the player community and were well regarded and even looked up to by the current generation of talent.
The idea was this new currently-relevant regime would finally attract talent and build a team around the Mavs generational super star, Luka Doncic.
As GM, Nico Harrison is specifically tasked with talent acquisition. It’s his job to get good players his coach can work with and Kidd’s job to get the most of it.
Since coming on board, free agency hasn’t offered the windfall of talent many were hoping it would. Players were off the market before they even entered and Nico has had very little opportunity to legitimately court the free agents he was brought in sign.
Which brings us to the moment of today. The Dallas Mavericks are in a free fall and desperately need something to shake things up. With the NBA Trade Deadline roughly two weeks away, the pressure is on Nico to put his business skills to work and pull off a trade that will stop the Mavs’ slide.
Last year, Nico did such things, sending Kristaps Porzingis to Washington for Spencer Dinwiddie and Davis Bertans. The trade propelled the Mavs to the Western Conference Finals – an overachievement that seems like a lifetime ago.
Today, the Dallas Mavericks sit as far away from being a contender as they ever have since Luka joined the team. The band-aids and jolts of personnel have done little to help the long-term positioning of the organization and Dallas seems to be wasting the best years of Luka Doncic’s career.
The task for Nico isn’t just to get the Mavs out of this slump and back in the mix, it’s to position the Mavs to be legit contenders in the somewhat-near-future. Moves that would position them for more moves, if you will.
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The clock is ticking and Luka Doncic and the fanbase is getting impatient. The Dallas Mavericks need better talent and it’s on Nico Harrison to get it.