With the Dallas Mavericks ready to usher in a new era with Dirk Nowitzki’s career winding down, their roster is continuing to add young talent. They drafted point guard Dennis Smith Jr. to pair with a frontcourt duo of Harrison Barnes and Nerlens Noel and also have nice complimentary backcourt pieces in Yori Ferrell and Seth Curry.
Outspoken owner Mark Cuban knows his team has talent but is also aware that his team is working through a rebuilding stage. When asked about the state of the Mavs franchise during a recent summer league game, Cuban says his team is only going through a rebuild due to the loaded Western Conference and that they would be much more relevant if they were in the East. Following from ESPN’s Tim McMahon:
“We’re rebuilding. Right?” Cuban said during the ESPN broadcast of the Mavs’ 88-77 win Sunday over the Phoenix Suns in the Las Vegas Summer League. “There’s no question about it. If we were in the East, we would not be rebuilding. We’d be handling things completely different. I think I’m going to kidnap [commissioner] Adam Silver and not let him out until he moves us to the Eastern Conference.
“Given where we are, given where the Warriors are and what’s happening in the Western Conference, it kind of sealed what we have to do.”
The topic of combining conference has been brought up before and has never had a stronger case than it does now. Considering the immense talent the Warriors currently have, teams have gone all out in adding stars just to be able to compete, making for some stacked teams atop the Western Conference.
Though they have some solid players to build around, the Mavs are still ways away from competing out West and no one knows this better than Mark Cuban.
