Cooper Flag on Mavericks: Time bar of Dallas' unlikely journey to win NBA Draft Lottery

The Dallas Mavericks with a chance of 1.8 percent to win number 1 in the NBA design of 2025 does not even explain how inexplicable it is that you will probably select Cooper Flag as the next piece of the puzzle.

It does not begin with the NBA Draft Lottery Monday evening or with the number combinations that they needed the lottery gods to call. While Mavs fans complained about the existence and job of General Manager Nico Harrison after swapping Luka Dončić in February on the night of the night, this goes beyond him, the new property or everything that actually happened this year.

We should return by 2018 to start this stunning journey to draw how we came here.

The NBA design truck and the draft from 2018

Already on May 15, 2018, the Mavericks entered the night with a chance of 13.8 percent to win number 1. Dončić was the great price, but it was still in the air when this slowly foot -footed, dough -looking Slovenian child who played abroad would be the first name in June. The MAVS had the third best chances of winning the choice that night, and yet their lottery happiness was never.

The Phoenix Suns won the lottery with their 25 percent chance (the best chances), but the Sacramento Kings (5.3 percent, seventh best) and Atlanta Hawks (13.7 percent, fourth best) jumped up both the Memphis Grizzlies and the Mavericks. The kings took the second and the Hawks when the grizzlies fell to fifth place on the fourth and the Mavs. It was about as bad as it could be for Dallas, even in a rather loaded design.

Fast lead to draw the night and the sun seemed to be on it. Or should I say, the suns they shine on them because the owner at the time did not want to want to. He wanted Deandre Ayton with the first choice because she already had Devin Booker and Ayton was a child in Arizona. Why combine bookers with Dončić? Why not try to collect an additional hype with the local big man?

But only one team from Dončić removed before the Mavericks. They needed Vlade Divac, a former European wonder child to pass on Dončić.

It was true whether he just didn't believe in Dončić or the rumors that he did not take care of Luka's father, it doesn't matter. He passed on Luka for Marvin Bagley III. That threw the door from the strikers so that the Mavericks got their guy. They exchanged the fifth choice and a future first dealer for the Hawks against the third choice. The Hawks took Dončić for the Mavs and the Mavs took Trae Young for the Hawks to complete the deal. It was a miracle that this fell into her rounds.

Nico Harrison and the Kyrie Irving risk

In June 2021, the MAVs became creative with their top position on the front office. After 19 years as President of Basketball Operations, Donnie Nelson and the Mavs separated. They replaced him with Nico Harrison, a former manager at Nike. He had great relationships with high-ranking Nike talents, and Dallas believed that his knowledge of this talent and the game would help build the franchise near Luka. This next season the Mavericks made it to the Western Conference final, but did not maintain this success in the 2022-23 season.

Harrison saw the opportunity to take a great risk of a familiar face. Harrison decided to swap for Kyrie Irving after Irving Coarse Run with the Nets Boston Celtics and Brookly, which included several suspensions for non-basketball things. Many all over the basketball world vehemently questioned the trade, and the Mavericks did not even see immediate results. In fact, Mavericks decided in the last week of the season with Kyrie and Luka in towing the game tournament because they were in danger of losing a top 10-protected choice. They sat a few players in a game in the late season to make sure they keep the choice, took a fine of $ 750,000 from the league and ended after trading with Dereck Lively II.

This started Harrison's movement to expand his large, defensive front court.

The trading period of 2024

The Mavericks were a good team in the first 51 games of the 2023-24 season and set up a 28:23 record while he was eight in the Western Conference. They were 22 in defense and only reached the 11th on the offensive. Nothing that you can write home about. At the closing of the trade, Harrison made two franchise-changed movements that PJ Washington and Daniel Gafford acted. For most people, these trades seemed nothing more than decent movements, but they suddenly turned the entire team.

The Mavericks went 22: 9 for the rest of the season and achieved the third best record of the league. Her crime was for sixth place and her defense for seventh place. But when they brought it to the last 20 games of the season, we saw the Mavericks 16: 4 with the best defense in the NBA. They used this swing to defeat the La Clippers as 5-seeds in the first round in six games. Then in six games they took off the Oklahoma City Thunder No. 1 in Oklahoma City Dunder. Then they were a Buzzsaw in the conference finale through a hot Minnesota Timberwolves team and eliminated them in five games.

The Mavericks were back in the NBA final since 2011, and it looked as if the Mavericks were on the top of the world. They lost in five games in the final against Boston, but they had a blueprint for the win. Luka and Kyrie were great, the defense around them was solid and they only had to add a few role players to add everything.

The betrayal

I spoke to Harrison for a preview show by Mavericks in Siriusxm NBA Radio. His message in many of his answers: He said people all summer about the Mavs, “a Klay removed”, to honor from the championship. The MAVs brought Klay Thompson and his four championship rings during the free agency and proudly swept this acquisition as the last piece to compete with Boston and everyone else with championship struts. We didn't know that Harrison was no longer in love that Luka led the franchise.

Fast lead until early February. In the middle of the night on a Saturday evening we all had to make sure that the social media notifications were not wrong when we saw that Harrison Dončić exchanged for Los Angeles Lakers with Anthony Davis, Max Christie and a choice in the first round. Since then, Maverick's fans have not protested and cursed. They molested him and hammered him every chance they get. You are angry with the organization. “A Klay removed” turned out to be “a Klay away” as long as we get this Slovenian guy out of here so that I can instead bring in a much older, often injured power striker who hates playing in the middle. “

The injuries

After the controversy and a lot of hated trade for Davis, the Mavericks fell into a nightmare situation with their injuries. Davis was injured in the first game he played for Dallas. He missed the next 18 games and the Mavs went 6-12 when they plunged overall. As soon as Davis returned, he was unable to build chemistry with Irving because Kyrie tore his ACL halfway up to this section of the games that were missed by games. The Mavericks had so many injuries at one point (how many injuries did you have?) That they were in danger of extending games because they may not be able to create eight healthy players and could not add any because they could exceed the hard cap. This meant that they could not sign 10-day players to get only healthy bodies in the team.

At the end of the season, the Mavs collapsed enough to make the game tournament as a 10-sea and to beat a Phoenix Suns team that also fell apart. If the sun had finished in front of them, the Mavericks would have ended with different opportunities and ping pong combinations in the lottery and thus a different result. The Mavs defeated Sacramento, but lost to Memphis to eliminate the landing of the 8-seeds. She brought it into the lottery and tied her with the Chicago Bulls.

The coin flip

There is this 2022 Liam Neeson film that almost nobody saw as a “memory” in which he plays a Hitman, the Frühahalzheimer -Alzheimer begins. His brother in the film also suffers from Alzheimer's and in one of the scenes he goes to the nursing home where his brother lives to visit him. His brother can't communicate with him, but Neeson still wants to speak to him. He tells him about a core memory for both when they were younger basketball fans in 1969: the story of how the Milwaukee money and its beloved Phoenix Suns were tied to the top election in the NBA design, and needed a coin flip to decide the fate of both franchise.

He complains “The G-Damn Bucks” that he got Lew Alcindor, who later became Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, one of the biggest players who will ever know the league. It is probably the only thing I remember this film and I saw it too long ago.

I can imagine that one day Jason Statham will make a similar film, except that he will use the example of the bulls and the MAVS, which are for an apparently insurmountable opportunities in 2025.

This coin flip changes the history of the MAVS completely from the 12th choice in this design in position to get Cooper Flag. A coin flip.

The 1.8 percent

Think of all the things that led to this 1.8 percent chance that Nico Harrison and the Mavs gave a second breath.

• Fall to fifth place in 2018.
• The suns and kings and Hawks indicate Luka and Atlanta who exchange him at Dallas.
• Set Harrison and he exchanges for Kyrie Irving.
• Tank of the end of the 2022-23 season and with a lively end.
• The business in the period of 2024, which she ran to the final.
• The betrayal, the injuries, the coin flip.

And now you have won the Cooper Flag competition. He is not Luka, but he will be an incredible player in this league. He gives the Mavericks a new gust of wind in their sails, which takes much longer than this four -year window, about which Harrison discussed (and probably wrong). When Davis is injured, Flag can intervene and reduce a large part of its absence. It enables you to move part of your traffic jam on the front square so that you need help to the circumference. If Flagg is even 75 percent as good as the experts say, he will be one of the best players in the franchise story.

The basketball gods seemed to hate the Mavericks for what they did to the fans, but we learned on Monday that the basketball gods and the lottery gods do not necessarily share the same values. Would it be shocked, of course, if Nico decided not to take flag or to drive it out against something that Mavs fans angry and relaxed a completely different series of events?

(Topto by Nico Harrison: Petre Thomas / Imagne Images)