Spencer Dinwiddie happy to be back with Mavericks

LAS VEGAS – Either Spencer Dinwiddie had a premonition, or he somehow glanced into the future and eventually made something become a total reality.

Back in March – while he was playing for the Los Angeles Lakers – Dinwiddie purchased a home.

In Dallas.

Then on Aug. 3, approximately a month after his contract with the Lakers expired, Dinwiddie signed a one-year, $3.3 million free agent contract with the Dallas Mavericks.

Talk about putting something out into the universe and aggressively making it come to fruition.

“Ironically, six months ago I bought my family a home in Dallas,” Dinwiddie said. “I get to now live in it, so it’s fun.”

Dinwiddie is on his second tour of duty with the Mavs. After being traded to Dallas on Feb. 10, 2022, in a massive deal that sent Kristaps Porzingis to the Washington Wizards, he averaged 15.8 points and 3.9 assists while shooting 49.8 percent from the field and 40.4 percent from three-point land in the final 23 games of the 2021-22 season for the Mavs.

In the playoffs that season, Dinwiddie also was a beacon with averages of 14.2 points and 3.6 assists while shooting 41.7 percent from downtown as the Mavs advanced to the Western Conference Finals where they lost to eventual NBA champion Golden State in five games. He scored 26 points and blocked two shots against the Warriors in the 120-110 series close-out game.

And in 53 games – all starts – for the Mavs during the 2022-23 season, Dinwiddie averaged 17.7 points, 5.3 assists and shot a healthy 40.5 percent from beyond the arc. After the Mavs traded Dinwiddie to Brooklyn on Feb. 6, 2023, the Nets shipped him to Toronto a year later. However, after the Raptors waived Dinwiddie, he had an opportunity to return to the Mavs.

Instead, Dinwiddie signed a free agent contract with the Lakers and it became a hot take on social media. But over the summer while the Mavs and Lakers were both again vying for Dinwiddie’s services, he knew his heart – and his house – remained in Dallas, and this time he signed with the Mavs.

“I had a decision between the Lakers and the Mavs – and a couple of other (teams) – but mainly those two,” Dinwiddie said. “Any time I’ve kind of been knocked down, I try to take the hard path, and not necessarily make it hard on myself, but just in terms of that growth. It was funny because both LA and Dallas fan bases kind of thought it was all about them, but it really wasn’t. It was really man versus bully.

“Given what happened with Brooklyn and being in the top five in multiple categories – points and threes and assists – to kind of have that exit play out like that, obviously it sucked, hurt, all those other things. So, the perspective is man versus bully. It really had nothing to do with either fan base, to be honest.”

In a nutshell, Dinwiddie wanted to get back to the place where he’s enjoyed the most success during his 10-year career, while also joining a team that has as much chance to win this season’s NBA title as any team out there.

“Probably the most consistent basketball I’ve played has been in a Mavs jersey,” Dinwiddie said. “The farthest I’ve gone in the playoffs – the Western Conference Finals – was in a Mavs jersey.

“I was faced with some adversity and tried to take a harder path in terms of just growth, and so far my life has pretty much served me well. It’s how I got to the NBA. It’s how I rehabbed an ACL in five months – the fastest in basketball history.”

A 6-5, 215-pound guard, Dinwiddie joins a deep and talented Mavs’ backcourt that includes Luka Doncic, Kyrie Irving, Klay Thompson, Quentin Grimes, Jaden Hardy and Dante Exum. Thus, he knows he likely won’t get the playing time he’s accustomed to.

“I played with Kyrie in Brooklyn,” Dinwiddie said. “I’m familiar with him, and obviously I’ve familiar with Luka (as his teammate) for a couple of years. Klay, I’ve never played with. Klay is a top two-three shooter of all time. Any time you’re top two or three in anything in the world, you’re amazing.

“On the better teams I’ve been on, it’s all about just kind of plugging in the gaps. If it needs to be a little bit of a (faster) pace — if Luka is tired or something — maybe I’ll do that. If it needs to be spot-up shooting because Kyrie is cooking, then I’ll do that. If Klay’s cooking and I need to be passing him the ball, then you do that. If all three are rolling and you need to play defense, you even saw that with the Lakers. In the last 15-20 games of the season, they relied on me as the end of the game stopper. Just doing whatever it takes to win.”

In essence, Dinwiddie is prepared to adapt to whatever minutes he’s given and whatever role the Mavs want him to accept.

“I’m always trying to win the game, so every decision I’m making is with that in mind,” Dinwiddie said. “I’m not coming in with preconceived notions or anything like that. But then two, probably because my basketball road has been very up and down.

“I wasn’t the No. 1 recruit in high school. So, at every point you kind of had to figure out how to play with a different team, a different big-time player. It could be that the big man is the big-time guy, so now you’re feeding him. It could be that there’s another guard that you’re playing off of. And then sometimes you are the guy, too.”

In so many ways, Dinwiddie is a security blanket for the Mavs, someone every team covets. Then again, it also helps that he came into training camp well aware of coach Jason Kidd’s system.

“The depth of our team, when you look at Spencer, he definitely helps us,” Kidd said. “He gives us options that we might haven’t had here before. We know what he’s capable of doing. So, hopefully we can get him on the floor with the right combination.”

That’s a plan Mavs forward Maxi Kleber knows should work.

“I think he can have a really big impact because besides the basketball talent that he is, he’s a really, really great teammate (and) a good locker room guy,” Kleber said. “He keeps the spirits positive.

“His expertise obviously from two years ago when we played together, he knows the system and will help us as well. But overall, he also understands the whole dynamics that have gone on, the positions that we have. He knows that we have Luka and Kyrie on the one and two playing. He’s the one who will sacrifice himself for the team and will not let his spirits down ever, so just having guys like him is really helpful in order to do what we do.”

While Dinwiddie’s basketball career has come full circle the past three seasons, he’s treasuring the moments of being back on the court and in the locker room with some of his old Mavs’ buddies.

“It’s great to be back,” Dinwiddie said. “We went to the playoffs and I had a little bit of success in that (2021-22) season, which was fun.

“Obviously, these guys are my friends. I’m still familiar with over half of the team. Just all the cornerstones of the Mavs franchise are all still here.”

Nevertheless, Dinwiddie, 31, knows Irving and Thompson weren’t with the Mavs during his first time being a part of this franchise. Yet he also is cognizant that both of those are high-caliber players who are some of the most proficient players the NBA  has ever had to offer.

In addition, Dinwiddie knows the Mavs lost to Boston in five games in last season’s NBA Finals, and believes he can help Dallas get those last three wins they left on the table against the Celtics.

“Obviously, this team is different, especially adding Klay and losing (Derrick) Jones (Jr.), who I thought brought a ton of that athleticism and defense obviously to the team,” Dinwiddie said. “But overall in the Finals, I kind of said the Celtics, they were able to put five guys out there that could all kind of shoot and it kind of bent the defense a little bit, and they knocked down shots and they were able to win a championship, so hats off to them.

“Obviously, the vets in this room all wants to win (and) understands where they fell short last year. We understand we need health, good fortune — all of that other stuff to go our way. But that’s the North Star, and that’s the goal.”

With that, this time it’s why Dinwiddie chose to sign with the Mavs instead of with the Lakers. He knows which franchise is closer to winning another title.

“You want to play meaningful basketball,” Dinwiddie said. “You had some other options, but priority again, it was like the Lakers or Mavs. So, I made a different decision this time.”

X: @DwainPrice