Mavericks Biggest Offseason Regret: Neglecting the PG Position
There are mistakes you can recover from with draft picks and patient development, and then there are oversights that bite you the second the regular season tips off. For this season, the Dallas Mavericks’ most glaring regret came when the front office failed to decisively plug the point-guard hole that opened when Kyrie Irving went down with a torn ACL. Instead of adding a true floor general to steady the ship, Dallas has spent the early part of the season improvising: trotting out the rookie Cooper Flagg in unfamiliar ball-handling minutes, leaning on a struggling D’Angelo Russell’s playmaking by necessity, and hoping an insurance signing would provide depth, only to watch that plan unravel. The result: an offense that looks more brittle than it should for a team built around stars.
Kyrie Irving’s ACL tear in March was a disruptive, high-stakes injury. It wasn’t hypothetical; the Mavericks spent the offseason knowing they would be without the guard’s scoring punch and veteran savvy for a long stretch. That should have put a premium on securing a reliable, NBA-tested floor general who could run a halfcourt offense, control tempo, and keep the supporting cast in positions to flourish. Instead, roster moves suggested Dallas favored preserving cap flexibility and building around frontcourt pieces, and a generational rookie, rather than signing a stopgap, true point guard. The gamble was not necessarily reckless on paper; upside and youth are valuable, but it left the team exposed the moment Irving’s recovery timetable pushed into the season.
Cooper Flagg has already been asked to initiate offense and accept heavy usage early in his pro career. That’s a huge request for an 18-year-old forward whose strengths project to the wing and frontcourt, not necessarily to serve as a traditional on-ball floor manager. Using your top pick to fill your most urgent veteran-level need is admirable in theory but relying on a rookie to be the team’s primary creator while he learns speed, spacing, and pro reads is a recipe for friction. Subsequently, the hoped-for veteran depth didn’t arrive intact. Dallas showed intent to keep Dante Exum as one of the guard options, but Exum’s offseason knee troubles turned into another blow: he was announced as needing additional surgery and is expected to miss the season, which removed a veteran backup plan from the equation. That leaves the Mavericks thin on experienced, steady ball-handlers.
The good news for Dallas is that this problem, while damaging, is fixable. The Mavericks don’t need a star point guard to stabilize the offense; they just need a reliable one. A midseason trade for a veteran facilitator, a buyout-market pickup, or even elevating a G League playmaker with natural point-guard instincts could immediately relieve the pressure on Cooper Flagg. Rebalancing the rotation to give Flagg more off-ball opportunities, simplifying late-game sets, and committing to a consistent ball-handling hierarchy would help restore structure to an offense currently leaning on improvisation.
