BOSTON – The NBA trade deadline passed on Thursday afternoon and in a stunning development, the Mavericks did nothing.
But after the tremors they sent through the league earlier this week with the trading of Luka Doncic, nothing was a nice change of pace.
A plethora of deals took place on deadline day, but the Mavericks already had done all they could do. And it was plenty.
And with the deadline passing, everybody could exhale and understand that this, in all likelihood, will be the Mavericks’ team that will either sink or swim or do something in-between the rest of this season.
“It’s helpful for players and also coaches now that there’s no more trades,” coach Jason Kidd said. “Now the buyout market begins for some teams. There is still going to be change. But for us, this is our group. We want to get healthy. And we got to push forward and find a way to win.”
The Mavericks have no doubt in their mind what their primary focus must be the rest of the way.
“The difficulty is actually in figuring out who we are,” Spencer Dinwiddie said. “That’s kind of going to be our process the rest of our season, trying to figure ourselves out.”
And they don’t have time to do anything but work on that. The shock of trading Doncic for Anthony Davis and Max Christie won’t go away overnight. But the Mavericks have no choice but to get over it.
“Honestly, the crazy part about this is that we’ve dealt with so much uncertainty this season that we’ve had this next-man-up mentality,” Dinwiddie said, referring to all the injuries the Mavericks have had. “And I think that’s almost how we feel with this trade. I don’t know if we even have time to be pissed off or excited. I think it’s just next man up and try to do the best job we can for Dallas fans.”
And speaking of the fans, Dinwiddie said he can totally understand their emotions after Luka was traded.
“I think it’s completely understandable,” he said. “It shows how much the fan base loves him, still loves him. And if you look at it from a fan base that had Dirk (Nowitzki) for 20 years and seemingly right when Dirk was ready to retire, they got Dirk 2.0, in a sense.
“It’s understandable. So nobody is mad at Dallas fans for their reaction. And like anything emotional, you got to give it a chance to process and live in the moment.”
Dinwiddie also said it’s important to give the new Mavericks a break.
“You’re losing what was your best player and adding what probably is your best player,” Dinwiddie said. “I’m friends with both of them.
“It’s a crawl-before-you-walk. You put one foot in front of the other. There’s no way to replace Luka with a carbon copy. And I don’t think there’s any way to replace A.D. with a carbon copy. They’re different. So we have to adapt and blossom with the differences.”
Briefly: In addition to Davis, who sat out with abdominal issues, the Mavericks were missing Dereck Lively II (right ankle), Caleb Martin (hip), P.J. Washington (personal) and Dwight Powell (hip) . . . Memories of the NBA Finals were not exactly flooding back to the Mavericks. Too much has changed. But Kidd did say: “Boston was the better team, for sure. Going to the Finals was a great experience. But we felt we had to get better. So we believe what we’re doing right now is part of that journey to get better. And this is just the start of that. Hopefully with the changes we’ve made, that can lead us back to the Finals and find a way to win.”
X: @ESefko
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