Next on the drive, Tim McMahon dropping dimes for your NBA daily assists, Van McMahon, Van McMahon. That is in old Land, Texas flood as it gets mud. He's man Van McMahon, Van McMahon.
Then man.
NBA All Star Weekend. Time for a little time off. I imagine our next guest, Well, maybe they're sending him to the bay, maybe they're sending him to San fran But Tim mcmanon Little NBA on a Tuesday, are you getting the hell out of dodge?
You got to cover this All Star weekend.
Taudy Partner, I will be nowhere near San Francisco. I'm gonna take me a little cist over the weekend.
That a guy. Is this a staycation?
Are you gonna be hopping on a plane and laying out a beach somewhere.
I am in a position right now where I'm not going to be sharing my whereabouts anymore than i have to. I've gotten some uh, some heats and some or some heat, and some unpleasant direct messages and all these kind of things lately. So yeah, I'm gonna keep it age, keep it age.
You know what, we might have to start referring to you as a celebrity reporter. We typically utilize that only for mcminimon But if you have evolved to the point where you are not willing to share your vacation plans, you may have arrived as a celebrity reporter.
Now, Tim ill just say, cautious reporter, A costious reporter? Who get this? You know what I'm being brained as by some mass fans right now?
What's up?
A mouth A mouthpiece for the Maths organization. That is one hell of a career term for me. Wow, only months removed from being the primary mass hater in the market, but now I'm the mouthpiece. It's It's funny how facts uh you know you can just consistently report facts, but feelings can can change rapidly.
Wait wait, wait, you have to educate me. Why is this happening?
What have you done to be branded something that you very clearly are not.
The number one thing I did was report the Mavericks reasoning for making the most shocking trading and be a history. Then the number two thing I did was report that Nico Harrison has received death threats and racial epithets and all the kind of awful thing that comes along with Sports, saying them in the social media and internet.
Era, Well, obviously it is chaos down there, so let's stay in the space and then we'll get to some jazz stuff. There just is not a lot of jazz stuff to get to tim as you know, so you know, no, there's not, so Ad goes down.
He's lost for weeks.
You know, ultimately they lose to Sacramento fans as you reference fire Nico signs, they're thrown out of the building. The early returns of what Dallason and Nico Harrison decided to do certainly not on their side so far. And I would imagine the natives are quite restless. That it's fair to say.
I mean, the Natives are short and there the restless. You know, it's just the whole thing's crazy. I don't understand the Mavericks approach as far as handling the backlash, Like, dude, you when you made his trade, you knew there was going to be massive backlash. You just traded one of the most popular players in the NBA, the most talented player in franchise history. And that's a mouthful because there was a dude who scored thirty one thousand, somewhat points
in the Mavericks uniform. He's twenty five years old entering what should be his prime I understand the concerns whatever, but you traded that guy's fresh off of finals appearance, Like, dude, there was going to be massive backlash, and you know, to try to silence that backlash within the walls of
your arena. I just I don't understand it. And you know, honestly, like I appreciate things like Patrick Dumont, the you know, the new owner of the team, given an interview to the Dallas Forny News and blasting Luca because it confirmed a lot of my reporting about how the franchise felt. But it's not exactly the smoothest pr move that I've ever seen in my life. So some of this stuff
has just been completely baffling. I'm like, listen, if people are yelling fire Nico or you know, wearing T shirts or whatever, like okay, that's part of the that comes along with it. If you're throwing those people out of the arena, that it becomes this international story and that's exactly where we're sitting right now.
You know, and you're well aware of this.
There are certain ownership groups that are just so tone deaf and they have no pulse. And oftentimes a lot of these uber wealthy people and obviously Dadilson and Dumont family are not wanting when it comes to revenue streams. So you know, when you exist in that type of wealthy you know, stratosphere, you're more or less numb to
the way the world works. And oftentimes we see these owners take over teams and because they have been successful in other endeavors, they believe they can transfer that skill set to running pro teams, and that's not how it works. Even Mark Cuban had to learn, and he will tell you himself, he had to learn that his success and other endeavors was not going to translate. So we had to adjust and he became a great owner. Help me understand though, the Adelson Dumont family, what is their deal?
You and I talked about the conspiracy theory going around that this was some sort of play for them to move the team to Vegas, which never resonated with me. And you're reporting is what we leaned on here on the show, and ultimately your reporting proved to be correct. But tell me about this new ownership group and sort of what the reaction has been now that they're kind of for the first time at least from my prism being a little bit more front facing.
Well, Miry Madilson, I don't know if she's aware of whether there's feathers in a basketball or there, so like, you know, she's really she'll show up every once in a while. Not involved at all. Is Patrick Dumont, her son in law the Las Vegas Sans COO. He's the guy who is in charge, and he's been you know, Cuban kind of indicated. They'd almost be like, I don't want to see absentee owners, but like show up every once in a blue moon type of thing. Patrick Dumont
has been pretty present. He was I was a little bit surprised he came last night fat court side, you know, was a little bit late coming on out after halftime and got loudly booed as he made his way to his court side seat along with the Dallas mayor, just trying to show, look what a Dallas mayor. We're staying Dallas, chill out on that crazy conspiracy theory. But he's in charge.
But he knows what he doesn't know, and you know he knows he doesn't know how to run an NBA front office, and so he has put full trust in Nico Harrison, and Nico said, this is why I want to make this move, you know, basically Nico essentially I'm paraphrasing here. Know what Nico told him is, Hey, I don't believe in Luca Dontis. I don't think we can create a good culture with Luca. I don't think we can count on this guy. I don't think we can
rely on this guy. I think a supermax investment in this guy, with his habits and with his approach, could absolutely blow up in our face. I know Anthony Davis. I just trust Anthony Davis. I believe in Anthony Davis. We should build a deal around Luca for a d And Patrick Dumont listened all that and gave the approval, and Mark Cuban got like a five minutes before it was done. Me like, there's a verbal handshake already, heads up on the thing. Zero percent chances trade happens under
Mark Cuban. Frankly, he's crushed about it, but he's still sitting there, you know, sitting courtside, turn around, telling Sans fans to sit the bleep down and shut the bleep up when they're chanting fire Nico during free throws mass free throws. But this is Nico Harrison's team. Jason Kidd does have significant same personnel. I'm a little bit skeptical on j Kids' claims that he had no idea this is happening until the eleventh hours he put it. Let's
just say it like that. But he's letting his basketball people run the basketball team, and if it doesn't work out, he's going to have to find some new basketball people.
Do you think this trade happens if Mark Cuban is the majority owner?
Ah, I just told you there's a zero percent chancel would have happened. Not a chance in hell. I mean, Cuban was on the record two or three years ago. Somebody asked him, that's a good the exact context, but basically he said, if he had to choose between his his wife and Luca, fine him and is at his
lawyer's office filed for the force. Like dude, there's Mark Cuban's top top priority for his final five and a half years as the majority owner of the Dallas Mavericks was Luka Doncic's happiness and that's really what's so about just this this shoe or there's a lot of things that are just crazy about what's happened here, But one of the most insane things and the shocking shift, is for all of Luca's career, the franchise operated in fear
almost and sometimes definitely in fear of him eventually having reason to want to leave, Like we can't put him in a position where it would be a rational decision to request a trade. Luca was never a guy who's looking to leave. You say what you want. The guy's got his flaws. He is a very loyal person. See him playing for the Slovenian national team every single Summer World Cup, euro Basket, Olympic qualify and all that stuff.
But you know, if, for example, when they had that season where they made the blockbuster deal after bungling the Brunson deal and then they have to tank, if they follow that up last season and fall flat on their face or even get Boodoo in the first round, he might have been in a situation as I go, okay,
this is this is rough. They went to the finals to turn around after six years of prioritizing his happiness and trying to convince him that you can be a contender right here in Dallas, of succeeding and building that contender around him going to the finals, and then before the next trade deadline, you dump him in the middle of a Saturday night. Absolutely shocking. Somebody should write a book on it. Oh, I've written a book. Yeah, there
we go, pre order that bad Boy. Actually I've written most of the book because I I've got about halfway more of the final chapter that bad Boys do Fridays. So probably let me go. Man, I got a bunch of worse to do.
I'll let you go in a moment.
But you definitely should look at Tim's Twitter out of ESBN underscore McMahon and the link to the book is there the Wonder Boy Luka Doncic in the Curse of Greatness?
Did you have to rewrite these?
Now? Hold on, don't read the comments, just look at the just look at the posts.
Oh yeah, no, no, no, quick man, I am not on I'm not on Tim McMahon's level, but I'm on a level enough to you have several fan bases try to get me canceled here in state. So I may don't read the comments guy as well, So I'm with you.
I went down to the Jazz Warriors game last week with the intent to talk to people about this specifically, and I had three front office people all say that something is up that we don't know, and they all said, we'll probably find out like Summer League, when we're all together, when people are actually talking off the record. Like I said, we have relied on your reporting for our content surrounding
this deal on this station. But do you believe that there is some sort of situation out there that nobody knows about as of now, that at some point will come to light.
I don't. I don't think there's some like shocking scandal or anything that's coming down the pike here. Like you know, could there be stuff coming out regarding Luca's abbots or you know, his lack of care for conditioning. Yeah, there could be whatever, But like that's stuff that people know. I'm just telling you. This is Niko Harrison, who is
Kobe Bryant's right hand man. Nike, you for years and years and years saying I know the kind of guy that you know that can be a multi time championship player. I know the kind of guy you can build a culture around. Luca is not that kind of guy. Now you know what lukea is is to dude to just average thirty four to ten and nine and went to the finals. Well, Luca is is a five time first Team All NBA selection at the age of twenty five.
So it's not all the concerns I get. I could not have given up on him at the age of twenty five. I just could not have done it. But Nico Harrison decided that he couldn't keep a eye on him. That's that's what happened here, all right.
Before I said you loose, we did see the debut of Elijah Harkless last night.
Everybody was tuned in for that.
Obviously, obviously we get a little first look of Luca and Lebron and I think it was windhorse this morning on first take that said, Unfortunately it came against an unserious basketball team, as the Jazz are not trying to compete. But when this and I'm talking about this year only, when when they start to get their rhythm, what do you think best case is for the Lakers with these two this season?
Yeah, listen, they're gonna sign Alex Flynn. But like if Alex Lyndn's your answer, Center, It's not a great answer. You know, I could see them being a second round type of team. I don't. I think they're going to have to get a legitimate, you know, Lucas style of big, that rim running, lob threat, rebound and rim protecting type of big in there, which they tried with Mark Williams and then they flunk them on the physical I honestly, I can't see them beating Oklahoma City. I can't see
them beating Denver. Those are the two teams I just can't see them beating. And so I think the ceiling for the Lakers this year's probably in the second round.
All right, get back to writing, Tim, do you is there a place you want to send our listeners to get the book or is the Twitter page the spot to go?
Yeah, just hit the Twitter page just pinned up top. You can read the comments if you want to hit. In the presence of children.
All right, man, thanks for the time you get Okay, appreciate you, Bartlin Hi. Tim McMahon NBA Daily Assists Style on a Tuesday afternoon, brought to you by our friends at Harmon's Valentine's Day ride around the corner. Say it with flowers this Valentine's Day With Harmon's Flower Shop, every arrangement is crafted by a Harmon's floral designer, adding a thoughtful personal touch to your Valentine's gift. Partner with the best growers to bring you fresh, long lasting flowers to
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