Kyrie Irving has not been the boost Mark Cuban hoped he’d be when the Mavericks traded for the All-NBA guard on Feb. 8, and his future in Dallas has been left up in the air.
The Mavericks are 8-11 since the trade with the Brooklyn Nets, as of Thursday. Irving has missed seven games due to injury, and Dallas is 3-4 in those games, so the issue hasn’t entirely been on 31-year-old.
But what was supposed to be a promising development in Luka Doncic’s career has turned to disappointment that could be capped off with a failure to make the postseason. The Oklahoma City Thunder hold the tiebreaker for the final play-in spot over Dallas, as of Thursday.
Jason Kidd needs to be better as a head coach, especially helping his team play better defense. Irving, though, historically hasn’t been the strongest defender.
Despite the issues, Mavericks owner Mark Cuban was optimistic about keeping his team’s core together.
“I don’t think it’s J-Kidd’s problem that we didn’t have an identity,” Cuban told reporters Wednesday, per The Athletic’s Tim Cato. “The game changed in ways we didn’t expect it to change, so I blew it. It was on me personally because the game changed in terms of the take fouls and the speed of the game, and where you need to be defensively. We just didn’t make the right changes that we needed to.”
One change Cuban is unlikely to make is moving on from Irving. He told reporters he gave up a first-round pick with the intention to re-sign Irving, which will be a top priority this summer, per Cato.
Kidd echoed similar sentiments after his team’s win against the Sacramento Kings on Wednesday.
“Those two are meant to be together. It just takes time,” the head coach told reporters on the Doncic-Irving pairing, per Callie Caplan of the Dallas Morning News.
Irving will be an unrestricted free agent after the 2022-23 season, and his market will bring a lot of headlines, especially with the thought of him reuniting with LeBron James or Kevin Durant.
Cuban also is no stranger to being caught up in headlines, so that might not be a detriment in re-signing the eight-time All-Star. What could shift things is a potential bidding war as Irving as shown, when healthy, he still can play at an elite level.
