Cuban, Mavericks won’t tank games to improve draft position
Don’t mention anything about tanking games or playing younger players just to get a better position in next year’s NBA Draft to Mark Cuban.
The Dallas Mavericks owner doesn’t want to hear such nonsense. Despite an NBA-worst 3-131 record the Mavs own after Sunday night’s victory over the New Orleans Pelicans, Cuban has never been one to throw in the towel in hopes of greener pastures somewhere down the road.
“There’s a faction of fans that just say go backwards, blow it up,” Cuban said. “And if you’re going backwards and it’s not looking good enough like right now, they say you’re horrible, you’re idiots, you don’t know what you’re doing.
“Haters are going to hate. We think that you always compete, and if you’re competing when the league is better like it is this year, if you don’t do well you’ll be in position to get a good pick.”
Cuban thinks it sends a horrible message and establishes a bad precedent to the young players on his roster to lose games on purpose. Besides, Cuban said: “I don’t see any Shaqs or LeBron James’ or Tim Duncans in this draft, so I don’t think that’s the right way to do it.
Haters are going to hate. We think that you always compete, and if you’re competing when the league is better like it is this year, if you don’t do well you’ll be in position to get a good pick.
Mavericks owner Mark Cuban
“If there were two of those guys — three of those guys in this draft — we’d be winning 12 games. So you just ignore the haters and let them [complain] and go about your business.”
It’s not that Cuban distrusts the draft as a place where he can rebuild his team. And even though the 2017 draft is considered deep, Cuban knows it is an inexact science.
“Remember,” Cuban said, “even if you have the worst record in the NBA there’s a 75 percent chance you’re not going to get the top pick.”
Although Mavs fans are unhappy with the team’s record, Cuban isn’t about to panic and jump off a cliff in disgust. He still believes his team has a chance to make the playoffs for the 16th time in the past 17 years.
“If we were six games out with five to play I’d be panicking,” Cuban said. “If this was the middle of the season and we went through a patch like this, people would panic, but we say there’s a long way to go.
Remember, even if you have the worst record in the NBA there’s a 75 percent chance you’re not going to get the top pick.
Mark Cuban
“I look at it this way: We’re six games out of the playoffs with (66) to go. I went back and looked at a text Dirk (Nowitzki) sent me in 2011 where he said all kinds of not so complimentary things about our squad as we were going through a 2-9 stretch where we were shooting 32 percent without him.”
The Mavs rebounded once Nowitzki returned in 2011, and went on to capture their lone NBA title. Cuban’s not saying that’s going to happen this year.
But he wants to stay in the game, not tank games, and give his team a fighting chance.
Dwain Price: 817-390-7760, @dwainprice
This story was originally published November 27, 2016 at 8:49 PM with the headline "Cuban, Mavericks won’t tank games to improve draft position."