The Dallas Mavericks want to hire their next general manager before the draft, and they want that person to be able to work with coach Jason Kidd, according to The Stein Line’s Marc Stein.
Since November, when the Mavericks fired Nico Harrison, the executive responsible for sending Luka Dončić to the Los Angeles Lakers in arguably the worst trade of all-time, they’ve had co–interim GMs: Matt Riccardi and Michael Finley. The Mavs are expected to consider Ricciardi and Finley for the full-time role, but when the search gets serious after the regular season ends on April 12, owner Patrick Dumont plans to shoot for the moon. Sam Presti, Brad Stevens, R.C. Buford, Bob Myers and Tim Connelly don’t seem like realistic targets, but they’re on Dumont’s list, according to The Stein Line and Sports Illustrated’s Chris Mannix.
The Kidd buzz is interesting because it doesn’t exactly jibe with the GM buzz. If you’re trying to lure a big-name executive to run your basketball operations department, why wouldn’t you let that executive decide what to do with the coach?
It’s also interesting because it follows minority owner Mark Cuban’s recent comments implicating Kidd in the decision to trade Dončić for a package headlined by Anthony Davis, whom Dallas more or less dumped to the Washington Wizards in February.
“I think there was animosity between our former general manager and some people on Luka’s team — his agent and some of the people that worked around them,” Cuban said on the Intersections podcast. “I don’t think they got along. I think there were issues that J-Kidd had coached with Anthony Davis and was close to him and Nico was close to AD since he was, like, 13 years old. And so I think you talk about confirmation bias, there was some of that as well. But that doesn’t justify it for our coach and our general manager to stand up and trade our best player.”
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Kidd told the Dallas Morning News’ Brad Townsend on Tuesday that he had called Cuban earlier that day, following the release of the podcast. In the interview with the Dallas Morning News, Kidd didn’t directly address his role in the trade, but he has previously said that he only became aware of it when it was close to completion. He repeatedly said that the Mavericks have to “focus on the present and the future” and wasn’t pleased about being inserted into what he sees as a dispute “between the two owners.”
Dallas hired Kidd and Harrison in June 2021 and announced the moves simultaneously. Seated next to Harrison at a press conference the day after the Dončić trade, Kidd said, “When you look at the vision of the team and what Nico wants to build, I truly support that and truly believe the players we’re getting are ones that can help us win a championship.”
At a lunch with reporters on Tuesday, Mavericks CEO Rick Welts said that “there is no specific set of characteristics” for the team’s new GM and called the hire “the most important decision that the organization is going to make for the coming seasons.” The team has not retained a search firm, and Dumont himself is the “point person,” Welts said.
Despite the Dončić debacle, the team’s 24-52 record and the first-round draft picks it has traded away, the presence of 19-year-old phenom Cooper Flagg makes Dallas an attractive situation for a lead executive. As important as this search is to the franchise, are the Mavs going to complicate it by insisting on the continued presence of Kidd?
