The Dallas Mavericks fired general manager Nico Harrison on Tuesday, an admission nine months later that the widely criticized trade of Luka Doncic backfired on the franchise.
The move came a day after Mavericks governor Patrick Dumont attended a 116-114 loss to Milwaukee in which fans again chanted “fire Nico,” a familiar refrain since the blockbuster deal that brought Anthony Davis from the Los Angeles Lakers and angered the Dallas fan base.
According to the Dallas Morning News, Dumont spoke with a teen fan, Nicholas Dickason during the game and expressed that the deal was a mistake. Dickason was then briefly interviewed by the news, where he said, “[Dumont] said he was trying to do what’s best for the organization, and ‘Sometimes you have good intentions and you make mistakes.’ We all do it.”
The Mavericks appointed Michael Finley and Matt Riccardi as co-interim general managers to oversee basketball operations.
Dumont’s hope for goodwill with the fans never came after Dallas landed No. 1 overall pick Cooper Flagg with just a 1.8% chance to win the draft lottery.
There have been plenty of empty seats in the upper deck of American Airlines Center this season, something not seen consistently since 2018, when the Mavericks traded up to get Doncic with the third overall pick.
Doncic was a 25-year-old generational point guard in his prime when Harrison unloaded him for the oft-injured Davis, who has missed 30 of 44 regular-season games since his arrival in February.
Harrison was in his fourth season and had engineered three trades that helped the Mavs on a run to the Western Conference finals in 2022 and the NBA Finals two years later.
The Doncic trade and a slow start to the first full season without the young superstar led to a stunning downfall. Dallas is 3-8, and Davis has missed six of the 11 games with a calf injury. Doncic is averaging 37.1 points, 9.4 rebounds and 9.1 assists per game for the Lakers through his first seven games of the season.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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