The Mavericks are firing Harrison

[Shane612]

Now that you’ve wrecked my car can I have the keys back?

Yep. damage has been done.

 

[atlantacowboy]

DuMont married into it!

Okay. Well, that explains a lot!

 

[Vegas_Cowboy]

 

[Bamx]

 

[Shinaoi]

Such a mismanagement of resources. Trade Luka, well don’t, but if you must get back the best haul. We got beat up old Anthony Davis. Freaking ruby gorbert got way way more than Luka did. It’s the first thing to trade Davis because you have to get value, but how you turn a top 3 nba asset into basically nothing within a year is just bizarre.

 

[Robbieac]

Such a mismanagement of resources. Trade Luka, well don’t, but if you must get back the best haul. We got beat up old Anthony Davis. Freaking ruby gorbert got way way more than Luka did. It’s the first thing to trade Davis because you have to get value, but how you turn a top 3 nba asset into basically nothing within a year is just bizarre.

And yet there where Nico bots here defending that trade to the death for months after it happened…

 

[Aerolithe_Lion]

I have a weird question, and I hope someone here can answer it while understanding what I’m trying to say.

First I’ll start off by saying the Luka trade is the worst trade in NBA history; it’s even worse than the Chris Paul trade. While The Pelicans got absolutely nothing for Chris Paul, at the very least they had reason to consider trading him.

So Trade bad, Nico dumb, fans irate. Let’s set all that aside for now. Rough timeline:

- Nico decides trading Luka may be best for the team longterm, fine

- Nico convinces ownership trading Nico is best for the team, Ownership agrees. If Ownership said no, Luka is still a Mav. That part is obvious

- Nico trades Luka, everyone is mad but Ownership gets it

- Mavs miss the playoffs but Ownership backs Nico as it’s the short term reality of not having Luka

- Nico drafts Flagg, Ownership is elated

- Ownership then fires Nico less than a year into his longterm plan, despite Nico trading the player Ownership wanted him to trade and drafting the player Ownership wanted to draft

What is the miss piece here?

 

[VaqueroTD]

I have a weird question, and I hope someone here can answer it while understanding what I’m trying to say.

First I’ll start off by saying the Luka trade is the worst trade in NBA history; it’s even worse than the Chris Paul trade. While The Pelicans got absolutely nothing for Chris Paul, at the very least they had reason to consider trading him.

So Trade bad, Nico dumb, fans irate. Let’s set all that aside for now. Rough timeline:

- Nico decides trading Luka may be best for the team longterm, fine

- Nico convinces ownership trading Nico is best for the team, Ownership agrees. If Ownership said no, Luka is still a Mav. That part is obvious

- Nico trades Luka, everyone is mad but Ownership gets it

- Mavs miss the playoffs but Ownership backs Nico as it’s the short term reality of not having Luka

- Nico drafts Flagg, Ownership is elated

- Ownership then fires Nico less than a year into his longterm plan, despite Nico trading the player Ownership wanted him to trade and drafting the player Ownership wanted to draft

What is the miss piece here?

There was no long-term plan. AD and Irving are short-term win now options that he thought would be better than Luka and Irving. They just got hurt. Which AD is on Nico. That guy goes out for a week if someone so much as sneezes wrong around him. Harrison knew he was trading for fragile goods. Mavs fans are also pissed to see Luka having a career year in LA proving that Nic was an idiot.

 

[Aerolithe_Lion]

There was no long-term plan. AD and Irving are short-term win now options that he thought would be better than Luka and Irving. They just got hurt. Which AD is on Nico. That guy goes out for a week if someone so much as sneezes wrong around him. Harrison knew he was trading for fragile goods. Mavs fans are also pissed to see Luka having a career year in LA proving that Nic was an idiot.

I get the pissed fans thing, but Ownership giving up on Nico isn’t based on any of the moves he made, but instead on whether AD went on the injury report or not?

 

[VaqueroTD]

I get the pissed fans thing, but Ownership giving up on Nico isn’t based on any of the moves he made, but instead on whether AD went on the injury report or not?

?

Eberfluss had no idea his best defender was going to be traded a week before the season began. Does it excuse him from being fired?

It's a win now league. I don't follow the Mavs closely because they're not my team, so will let a Mavs fan comment on ownership. But they obviously made a huge mistake too. The hit from trading Luka was a PR, ratings and ticket sales disaster. They were EXTREMELY lucky they won the Cooper Flagg sweepstakes. That was not in the plans.

 

[Vegas_Cowboy]

despite Nico trading the player Ownership wanted him to trade

, but Ownership giving up on Nico isn’t based on any of the moves he made,

Except that's not the case at all. Owner Patrick Dumont all but admitted he had no idea what he was doing when they bought the Mavs and he leaned heavily on Nico Harrison.

Comments like "Yeah, he's a total rookie at this game, and he's the first to admit it." and "Patrick doesn’t know basketball, and he knows he doesn't." are direct lines from a league source close to the Mavs front office, as reported in The Athletic's article on the ownership and trade fallout.

Think of it like a tech bro buying a football team and okaying a QB swap without knowing a blitz from a screen pass. Dumont started to realize quickly that he put too much faith in Nico and was now attached to the worst trade in NBA history.

Off-season reports like from ESPN's Tim MacMahon in a late-August 2025

“After the Luka trade, one of Patrick Dumont’s quotes was ‘In Nico we trust’. I’m just telling you, the trust has disintegrated at this point.” Sources told MacMahon that Dumont started seeking input from external advisors on roster tweaks, a departure from his "blind faith" phase and was quietly second-guessing offseason moves like signing D’Angelo Russell as Kyrie Irving's injury replacement.

Hoops Rumors (July 2025): A league source noted Dumont "opted to continue backing" Harrison into the offseason but was "weighing in" more on injury timelines and free-agency targets, signaling doubt. “Patrick Dumont went from blind faith in Nico to now weighing in on whether a star can come back from injury.”

Dallas Morning News (September 2025): Preseason coverage quoted an anonymous exec: "Dumont's confidence may have waned."

Nico got himself fired the moment he traded Luka, Dumont just had to figure it out first. Nico trying to convince AD to play through injury despite the concerns from the medical team that AD risks tearing an achilles, in order to try and save his own ***, was the final straw.

 

[DFWJC]

I get the pissed fans thing, but Ownership giving up on Nico isn’t based on any of the moves he made, but instead on whether AD went on the injury report or not?

Ownership is not basketball savvy.
Saying they “wanted” to trade Luka is false.

Instead, Nico wanted to-trade Luka and convinced non basketball guys it was the right plan. 100% Nico’s plan

Management had no idea what the Mavs fans level of attachment to Luka was. They just were not dialed in to Dallas.
When the ENTIRE NBA community called the trade awful, they then begin to see theirguy was WAY wrong.

And when the fans massively rebelled, they were naively shocked by depth of anger out there. Season ticket sales tanked, etc.

Drafting Flagg was being lucky in the lottery.
Zero skill involved. No brainer

They cut loses

 

[atlantacowboy]

Ownership is not basketball savvy.
Saying they “wanted” to trade Luka is false.

Instead, Nico wanted to-trade Luka and convinced non basketball guys it was the right plan. 100% Nico’s plan

Management had no idea what the Mavs fans level of attachment to Luka was. They just were not dialed in to Dallas.
When the ENTIRE NBA community called the trade awful, they then begin to see theirguy was WAY wrong.

And when the fans massively rebelled, they were naively shocked by depth of anger out there. Season ticket sales tanked, etc.

Drafting Flagg was being lucky in the lottery.
Zero skill involved. No brainer

They cut loses

It appears Dumont didn't know anything about the NBA .its player hierarchy, or the connection of Dallas fans to the player, and Nico took full advantage of it. The dirty part here isn't the lack of knowledge but rather the trade itself and how it was handled. Just for comparison sake, in 2019 OKC traded Paul George to the Clippers for SGA, Gallinari, and 5 first round picks. Granted they lucked out on SGA who was still young and developing, but that's the kind of haul a team should get when they trade a young superstar. Nico knew this would be an unpopular trade and he did it fast offering Luka to only LA bc he didn't want anyone else getting in Dumont's ear. I think Dumont should sue Nico for damages not just fire him.

 

[jterrell]

Ownership is not basketball savvy.
Saying they “wanted” to trade Luka is false.

Instead, Nico wanted to-trade Luka and convinced non basketball guys it was the right plan. 100% Nico’s plan

Management had no idea what the Mavs fans level of attachment to Luka was. They just were not dialed in to Dallas.
When the ENTIRE NBA community called the trade awful, they then begin to see theirguy was WAY wrong.

And when the fans massively rebelled, they were naively shocked by depth of anger out there. Season ticket sales tanked, etc.

Drafting Flagg was being lucky in the lottery.
Zero skill involved. No brainer

They cut loses

100%.

Nico was doing a good job and helped them get to the NBA Finals.
He hustled mgmt into believing that was 100% him and that Gafford, DJJ and Lively were masterstroke GM genius moves instead of high-level defensive guys playing 100x better with Luka feeding them easy baskets and making them offensive threats.
Luka had Gafford/Lively looking like the best center duo in the NBA.

Mavs now have to rebuild around Flagg. Robbing us of Kyrie's last years and the career long excellence of Luka so Nico could win his battle versus Luka.
Now Nico can go down as a historically bad GM that made the worst trade in NBA history.

Mavs seasons ticket holders should literally be able to sue Nico. He crushed the value if their tickets.

 

[Vegas_Cowboy]

 

[Vegas_Cowboy]

"important players like Christian Wood"

 

[VaqueroTD]

"important players like Christian Wood"

 

[VaqueroTD]

Great article on the Mavs and Nico on ESPN.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id...ks-power-struggle-nico-harrison-vs-mark-cuban

Explains everything that went down. Answers more of the questions that @Aerolithe_Lion was asking.

If you don't like reading the long ones, basic summary:

• Both Mark Cuban and Nico Harrison are idiots. Cuban is an egomaniac who thought minority ownership would still allow him to try and call the shots. Jason Kidd and everyone had same opinion of Cuban as we have of Jerry Jones and his meddling. Nico was only hired by Cuban because of his contacts at Nike and players. No experience as a GM and was lost, and wanted to prove himself and resented that Cuban always stepped in and didn't allow him to be a true GM.
• New Owner walked into this mess. Like @Vegas_Cowboy alluded to, he had no sports smart whatsoever. When Mavs went to NBA Finals, new owner thought it was due to Nico, even though one of the trades only happened because the Kyle Kuzma trade was vetoed.
• Nico being Nico was in over his head. Blamed Luka for almost being swept by Celtics. Thought he couldn't play any defense. Was convinced he knew what would work for them, and made the trade. New Owner was aware of the trade and didn't object to Nico's order to be secretive about the entire process.
• After the trade, Nico could no longer sit on the sidelines. Had to watch games in tunnel with security. Refused to take media training suggestions from new owner. Threatened Cuban. Etc... New Owner realized he made a mistake, fired Nico, and is rumor to be looking at Detroit's #2 GM as the new GM. For now, Finley and the other guy are CO-GMs along with Jason Kidd and Mark Cuban, who all report now to the new owners as advisors.