Nico Harrison Says Kyrie Irving Is ‘Ahead Of Schedule’ In Recovery | DLLS Mavs Podcast

Nico Harrison Says Kyrie Irving Is ‘Ahead Of Schedule’ In Recovery | DLLS Mavs Podcast

Kyrie Irving ahead of schedule, Nico Harrison. What does it mean potentially for the Dallas Mavericks and their title aspirations? We’ll jump into all of it coming up next on the DLS Mavs podcast. [Music] [Music] [Music] Hey, what’s up DLSS Mavs Nation? It’s your man Kevin Gray alongside Mavericks beat writer Tim Ko Mavericks analyst Bobby Krell. We of course are DLSS Mavs. Your favorite guys come your favorite team every single day. Is Kyrie Irving ahead of schedule? Nico Harrison when it comes to his ACL recovery and what does it mean for the potential title aspirations for your Dallas Mavericks? Plus Beer Report released its top 100 players of all time and my guy Carella’s got some beef with the list. Dirt Nitzky when it comes to this alltime list. We’ll get into that a little bit later on in the show on this terrific Tuesday, gentlemen. What’s up, Tim Ko? How are we doing? Fantastic. Muted. Fantastic. I am. I’m doing fantastic. I’m glad. You’re going to have to do a little more to convince me. Uh, y’all look nice. Oh, why? Wait, why? You don’t usually compliment me. What’s going on? Have something to do with By the looks of it, y’all are wearing shirts I haven’t seen before. Brand new t-shirts, baby. Brand new t-shirt off the presses, baby. Looking sharp. Tim, you want to do a little twirl? No, that’s right. Not Not with the Okay. Yeah. Well, that one’s got something on the back. KG, does yours have anything on the back? I don’t think so. Uh, no. Nothing on the back. Pop it up again. Stson is looking shll. You can see I’ve got the uh the Dallas Maverick t-shirt of the Dallas collection. our Jack, our guy Jeff Kavanagh was wearing the uh the Dallas versus uh All Y’all uh t-shirt. Nolan Ryan kicking Robin Ventur’s ass in 8 bit or 16 bit. Uh we’ve got plenty of those where they came from. Shop.allcityetwork.com. Uh to get your Dallas collection, get all six of them. Uh of course being part of our DLLS sports family. We’ve got a lot to get into, gentlemen. Let’s go ahead and do that here on our show today as the Mavericks fell last night to Khan Canipple and the Charlotte Hornets in NBA Summer League. But it was Mavericks president and general manager Nico Harrison who had the most newsworthy comments last night during the NBA on TV broadcast when discussing Kyrie Irving and his return, his recovery from his ACL. Trigger warning, Nico Harrison video incoming. that Kyrie suffered back on March 3rd. Here is what Nico Harrison had to say about Kyrie Irving and his rehab right now. I saw on social media Kyrie’s excited. We know he’s a dog, but what’s the the latest on how he’s, you know, progressing? Kyrie’s ahead of schedule, but we kind of knew he would be because the way he attacks his his rehab and you know, he’s going two and three times a day, but we don’t want him to to rush it as much as he wants to rush it, but he’s going to be fine. Ahead of schedule is one Kyrie Irving. But Nico Harrison, as you heard, said they don’t want to rush Kyrie back from that ACL injury. Gentlemen, good news. No news. I mean, you’re missing one part of this. He is ahead of schedule. And they knew he was going to be ahead of schedule. So, is he even ahead of schedule? What a paradox. Maybe he’s actually on schedule based off their own schedule. Uh-huh. As opposed to some other schedule. Uh a and then also yet he’s not going to get rushed back. So we’re still where we were right before this. Obviously I like ACL are weird. You’ve seen players come back in 8 months and be fine. That is not the likeliest most common outcome, but there is no set outcome to an ACL injury. We’ve seen players need 14 months to come back. Uh we’ve seen players adjust right away when they get back. We’ve seen players struggle for years, never get back to the same place. It’s all unknown. Uh it’s not a, you know, the most important thing is is don’t rush it. You know, I think everybody should expect Kyrie to be some semblance of the player he was. You know, 80 90% of the player he was at some point uh in in this rehab. I think that is like a bar that that is is safe to assume. Maybe he’s back sooner. Maybe he’s just as good. Maybe he is uh what did he say? 15 115% better. 150,000% better. 150,000% better. Yeah. Don’t short change him. Yeah. So maybe he is gonna come back and be the best player of all time. We can’t we can’t we don’t know. But these comments just to me indicate we still don’t know. Yeah, we I mean we’re not in his rehab room and I haven’t seen the schedule. I don’t know, you know, when the the benchmarks are and the mile posts are and all that stuff, but I guess my my question is, you know, Nico praised him for going uh to rehab and getting in the gym two to three times per day. Uh why not five to six times per day? Why not 15 to 16 times per day? Why isn’t Kyrie just living at if if that would speed it up? Like, get get back out there, buddy. Like, he could have been healed by now. Well, the how would he have done a 24-hour live stream? That’s true. He’s putting content before the game, man. Who would do that? Certainly not us. Certainly not us. Um, yeah. I mean, you know, we’ve said it a gazillion times. If if Kyrie the longer Kyrie is out, the less likely the Mavs are to have a good season, um, or to even have an average season. And so, you know, if he comes back sooner, that would be great. But again, tap the brakes. Like, fans want a fan. We want to all get excited. I want to see Kyrie out as soon as I possibly can. I love when that guy plays. I love watching him play. Um, but, you know, air on the side of caution because the alternative could be completely catastrophic and and I still do believe Dallas is is going to be very cautious about bringing him back. Um, it’s like the the downside of making statements like this is that you’re setting expectations that Kyrie is going to try to, you know, be be expected to come back sooner because people are saying Nico Harrison is saying he’s ahead of schedule. I still don’t think there’s going to be any rushing him back and it takes till March than it takes till March. Uh, you know, I think everybody’s hope is that it doesn’t and there should be no rushing back of Kyrie Irving. We have talked about this before. When it comes to players recovering from ACL injuries, it’s usually a year after they’re removed from the ACL that they are back to their quote unquote normal selves. Now, athletes can have different timelines and recover quickly more than others. You think about a guy like Adrien Peterson, for example, who was back to MVP form uh less than a year after his ACL tear. You said Kevin, that has to do with the NFL and football. Uh the idea is that every athlete is different in terms of their recovery. and Kyrie Irving maybe even at the age of you know 33 34 years old be able to come back quicker than what we expect although I will point out that in the past that has not been the case for Kyrie and injuries he has had in the past this is a different injury but by that metric I agree with you but also by that metric if you’re looking for any reason to think that it’s not in his past uh history past injury history so with that being said you know making sure that he takes the as much time as he needs to be able to be as close to 100% when he does return to the floor so that it gives the Mavericks the best opportunity to make the kind of run that they believe that they can. Um, but the idea when it comes to the expectations for him, I think those need to be tempered given what he is dealing with, but more importantly what this team is trying to achieve in the wake of him being out because they’re going to need as close to 100% of Kyrie Irving as they can get uh in order to make this season as successful as they want to. But if you’re looking for encouraging signs, Nico Harrison discussing the idea of him being ahead of schedule, maybe you take that with a little bit of excitement, uh, given what this team is looking to achieve going into next year. Regardless though, take your time, Kai. Like recovering from ACL’s can be difficult, but at the same time, this team will love to have him back as soon as they can, especially with the excitement of Cooper Flag going into next season. The Mavericks did play last night against the Charlotte Hornets. They did fall. Paul Ryan Nhar continued to play uh much better in his third preseason game after bouncing back from that second one against the San Antonio Spurs as the Mavericks fell to Kanible and the Charlotte Hornets last night. Uh Bobby, I know that you were watching a little bit of last night’s game. What were some of the things that you took away from last night’s game? Uh Ryan Nimhard is now the best player on the team now that now that Cooper Flag’s been shut down. Um you know, he played a little more than half the game. And look, I mean, this it was a I wouldn’t describe it as a back and forth affair, but the game was pretty competitive for like two and a half, three quarters, and then the the fourth quarter was a little bit of a a little bit of sad times. Um, but you know, their shot quality, I would say, whenever he was on the floor was a lot better than it was whenever he was off. I mean, he was serving guys up with looks. Um, he had more than half of the team’s assists and he only had three of their 17 turnovers. So, that lets you know, I mean, you know, he was he was creating a lot of this stuff. And going into the game last night, you know, we we said that really no one else on the team, you know, Miles Kelly has been okay and, you know, he was three for 10 last night, a couple threes bounced in and out. So, it it is what it is. But outside of Nimhard, Kelly, and of course, Cooper Flag, like, no one else really on the team has made much of an impression. And the Mavs have one empty two-way spot available that they could use. Um, generally the conventional wisdom is if you’re worried that much about the 15th roster spot and the the third two-way spot, it could be a bad season. Like all those guys mattered a whole lot last year. So, I think that we should all worry about that a lot. Uh, and be be really concerned with that. Um, my prediction after three games is I do not believe that the third two-way spot will go to a player currently on the roster. Um, I think they’re going to have to look out elsewhere. Uh, Musa Cisce had an okay game, but really no one else on the team has popped at all. Uh, and Cece had a had a pretty rough first couple games. So, unless, you know, one of those guys find something. Yeah, he’s just Yeah, unless one of those guys finds something in the last couple games or really impresses in camp, which is still certainly a possibility. Um, I I would say the my my official prediction uh my my fishy dicty is that uh Yeah, let’s not do that. Is that the the two-way spot will come from another team? Yeah, you might want to leave that one alone. I’m usually I’m usually okay with most of them. I’m going to put my foot down. Yeah, you might have to leave that one alone next time. Can we not do that one? Yeah, next time. Workshop that before you try that. Okay, I will. Thanks. Uh, you know, shop is a an abbreviation of of workshop. You have a problem when people say, “I’m going to head to the shop.” Did you hear what you just said a second ago? No. No. What did I say? I’m not going to I’m not going to say it again. I’m going let you watch it back and then you can see what you said. Um, 8769 was the final score from last night. and Ryan Nhard and what was for him 11 points and eight assists last night in the game in the 25 minutes that he played going four of eight uh from the field. Miles Kelly going three of 10 from the field last night with seven points uh in the losing effort as the Mavericks fall to 1 and two uh in NBA summer league. So, we weren’t going to talk about this, but should we for two minutes since everybody in the chat is talking about the the LeBron rumors just acknowledge that they’re out there and still nothing has changed? Yeah, as far as we know, Twitter is buzzing, but that’s just what birds birds chirp. You know, the sports books I’ve noticed um certainly. Yeah. But again, I mean, and like you know, nothing. Yeah. Nothing but respect for Jeff Sherman from the Westgate. But like sports books are their goal is to win your money. Like they’re trying to take money away from you. They don’t they’re not a bank, you know? They don’t want to give the money to you. They they want to fool you. So just because the sports books say something doesn’t doesn’t really but they’re also reacting to a lot of the same information we have. Yeah. And so as more rumors go out there even and not from WinOAT and uh uh some dude I forget that guy’s name Jeff Perers or whatever like not a bunch of like fake Twitter accounts like re real stuff of sub of substance. For sure. For sure. For sure. Um I will say the weight of the rumors is it’s weightier than it’s ever been. Like I’ve I’ve even seen this like I’ve had a couple people text me if like do you think this stuff’s real? I just I don’t have any more information. I I think we’re still at where we were before which is the belief that why would the Lakers buy out LeBron and the Mavericks are posturing and I think they’re right to posture not to go trade players of value for a player who is 40 years old and and has less than 150 games left in his career. you know, there’s other bits of evidence you could you could point at and like build an argument that this is leading to this is leading to this and this is why it’s likely. Uh but but fundamentally that’s what I keep getting stuck on is that you know they shouldn’t trade younger players for LeBron James and Lakers should not buy him out. So the Mavericks have been installed as the new favorites to LeBron land LeBron James according to bravado official at plus 125. The Miami Heat, Cleveland Caval, Golden State Warriors, and New York Knicks fall in line as far as those odds to land LeBron James. And those are those are odds to land him if he were to get traded. I you know if you were to put the Lakers on that list of what team is LeBron going to play for next season that’s why they’re not doing that list because it would be the Lakers at the top overwhelmingly it would not be a very fun uh set of odds. There’s your obligatory LeBron report or the DLS mass. That’s right Tanner spamming LeBron. Uh but don’t go anywhere because we’re talking about it more at the end of the show. So stick with us all the way through to the end. Coming up next here on the DLSS Miles podcast, I had a chance to sit down with ESPN senior writer and basketball hall of famer Mark Spears to get his thoughts on not only Cooper flag but the Mavericks as title contenders if this stays true for them. We’ll talk about next mass podcast. Just like your favorite team needs a home court advantage, your home needs a home floor advantage and Empire Today can help you get it. 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So get control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code DLS atmon.com in your browser for half off your first year. That’s 50% off your first year at monarchmoney.com with code DLLS today. Real quick, KG, uh, within like 45 minutes of landing at the Vegas airport, Monarch sent me a little notification that said uh, travel budget has been updated. Oh, let’s go. They knew that uh I think they saw how much I withdrew from from my bank account. And uh, they they’re always keeping an eye out for you. All right. Hey, look at there. They’re always they’re always taking care of looking out for your money there. Let’s talk to Mark J. Spears of ESPN senior writer and basketball hall of fame. I had a chance to sit down with him while out in Las Vegas. I had a chance to talk to him about a lot of different things including the Mavericks title chances Cooper flag and this new coaching staff. Here is our conversation with ESPN’s Mark J. Spears. Mark J. Spears of ESPN joining us here on the DLS MAS podcast. Mark, how are you, man? This is cool. Appreciate it. Yeah. And and they gave me a glass of wine. He gave you a glass of wine. I’m not going to tell you how much I paid for it. And of course, and and the guy handed me a glass and he goes, “It’s a cab.” And I’m like, “Where?” From where? It’s a cab. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Of course, as you see, we’re here at the Westgate Superbook uh in Las Vegas, the official hotel of the DLS Mounds podcast, where of course Cooper Flag finished up his couple of games in summer league. Had 31 points against the San Antonio Spurs. he has done for his summer league for 2025. Your thoughts on Cooper Flag, his performance, went five of 21 in the first game, played much better from a shooting perspective in that second game. Uh what did you think not only of his performances, but you’ve watched this player for quite some time now? He had nothing to prove to me. Yeah. Like I was already sold. Um I figured it’d be like two games and your biggest concern is with him is don’t get hurt. Yeah. And so he had the one fall, came up holding his wrist and I’m like, “All right, this is his last game.” You know, when I saw that, but I I do think for him probably playing in summer league is a little difficult. Um cuz you’re playing with guys who are trying to get a job. Yeah. Right. So I’m watching the guards play and everything. I’m like, “This guy’s about to be the face of the franchise. I might feed him every shot. Don’t worry about your shot right now. You might want to give him the ball. He’s about to run this place. That’s right. Um, but I I first saw him face to face at the Hoop Summit. Funny how fast things happen. Yeah. Uh, the Hoop Summit in Portland in 2024. AJ the band said the next big name coming up. He was playing in it. Uh, VJ Edgecomb. That was the first time I saw VJ Edgecomb. Who’s Twins? Yeah. Um, no actually they weren’t there. Okay. Um, but there was a lot of talented players there and it was just he’s here. Yeah. Just a cut above the rest. He was cut above. I mean, obviously AJ was a little younger at that point, but he’s here. There was like no question about it that he was he was the best player there. And then I also saw him, you know, work out against a USA Olympic team. uh he was playing with basically the select team which they were used um last summer to get the get the senior the varsity team ready for the senior team ready. Yeah. And so you know I was talking to one of the coaches that was coaching with the select team which was all NBA players with exception to Cooper Flag and he said he was the best player on that team on the select team. I’m like the best. Everybody else was NBA. He was the best player. That includes, of course, Anthony Davis who was on that team. No, no, no. I’m not talking about the national team. I’m talking about the select team. Yes. Yes. Um, no, I ain’t say that. No, don’t get me. No, no, no. Don’t get the Twitter world. No, not at all. No, no. The select team. Yes. Um, and the coach was like he he’s coachable. He was asking vets questions. He wanted to get better and he wasn’t scared. And keep in mind that like at that time he was 17 cuz he doesn’t turn 18 till December, right? He was 17 years old playing against USA basketball’s Olympic team against them. That’s right. Not with them, right? Guarding LeBron, guarding Anthony Davis, his current teammate, making that amazing shot against Anthony Davis. So I like ain’t nothing he need to do to like he he could have been in the NBA this past season. He was he was ready and he probably leads to the argument that high school kids that are of a certain level should be able to come out. Yeah. Playing with a certain maturity and you saw that throughout, you know, the course of him getting ready to come to the NBA, getting drafted number one with this team. He goes to a situation in Dallas where there’s a lot of expectations obviously Kyrie Irving coming back from the torn ACL. They signed D’Angelo Russell. They get Gaffer’s extension done as well. Bring Dante Exom back. But this is all going to be when it comes to Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving. Where do you see where this team is, how they’ve done so far this offseason, even drafting Cooper Flag into the fold obviously as well. I mean, obviously Kyrie is the wild card. Like when is he going to be back? At what point? What impact does he make when he’s back? Is he himself? I expect him to be. Um I think adding to the Angelo Russell um at the number they got him under the circumstances was was brilliant. Yeah. you know, because he’s kind of Kyrieish. He could score. Um, played with Anthony Davis before. Kind of feels like he’s in a prove himself frame of mind. Like, I I really love that video of him and Nico and and showing his excitement. Um, said he’s got a chip on his shoulder coming to Dallas. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, he’s, you know, unfortunately for him, he’s become kind of a journeyman in this league. Bounced around a lot. Hasn’t found a home. Um, and and that doesn’t even mean Dallas is a home. I think Dallas is a place for him to prove like uh there’s a different level of maturity and game now that could be valuable elsewhere. Um, almost like a rental player. Yeah. But I think the bigger thing for him is he wants to win. Mhm. And if if and when this team is at full strength, talent, perimeter scoring, style of play, Anthony Davis, Kyrie, Super Flag, the Bigs, they’re a title contending team that is versatile with depth. Yeah. Like I don’t know if there’s any missed roster spots, right? And that to me is key for a championship team like no wasted roster spot and their their biggest problem is staying out of the training room. Yeah. Staying healthy all year. If they’re completely healthy, they’re scary. And I think with with Flag, it’s because this isn’t like a rebuild, reconstruction. He doesn’t have to come in and save the franchise, right? Like he just has to come in, I think, and just fit in and play his game. And yeah, okay, you try to double him, but I mean, Anthony D, you might want to double Anthony Davis over here, too. Man, you going to leave Clay wide open over here or DL wide open or Christy wide open or Hardy w like or there’s this lob threat like they kid got a lot of like and but it’s not on him right it’s not like when I covered Carmelo when he got to Denver when LeBron got to Cleveland where it’s on him to say the man immediately yeah I was trying to think of it somebody said Wimby I said that I was thinking Magic Johnson. Um maybe even Tim Duncan back in But they were trash. Yeah. Before he got there, like they were two years removed from the finals, right? Like I I don’t know that there’s another number one pick since Magic Johnson. Somebody said James Worthy. Somebody said, “Yeah.” Yeah. Um that walked into a situation with Was James Worthy number one pick? I don’t remember. Yeah, he was number one pick. Yeah. Yeah. Where they walked into a situation like this. Maybe James Worthy is a good comp. Um but he’s in a very very good place. Yeah. Like plug and play. Yeah. And doesn’t have to have the pressure of trying to be the man right away. He’s got a lot of veterans, but he will be the man. He Yes, he will be the man. I have no lack of confidence in him being special in this league eventually, for sure. And he’s got a lot of talent around him to be able to figure that out. the guy that’s gonna be coaching him as a man that you know very very well and Jason Kidd being from the Bay Area you’ve watched you’ve covered you’ve talked about and been long time with Jason Kidd as well he’s got a new assistant staff with him uh includes Popey Jones Phil Handy Frank Vogle who he used to be under him when he was in Los Angeles let’s talk about that coaching staff a little bit starting with what Jason Kidd has in terms of the departures of you know Jared Dudley and some and God Sham God uh and Sean Sweeney but really replaced them with some terrific names on the side He all those guys are great. Mhm. Sham God’s my guy miss. Well, I’ll see him in Orlando, right? Like like he he he’s has an aura about him. But these guys that they’ve added, I mean that that coaching staff is pretty sensational. Um you got three guys that obviously could be head coaches to me. Sure. Um Frank Vogle, I remember writing a story on Kid. I think Mass fans should look it up where he talked about when he got the Dallas job like how much he learned from Frank Vogle in Los Angeles like how remember he was kid was in transition he coached in the bubble got a championship as a co you know assisted with him came from Brooklyn and did all you know went there but he said his Frank Vogle experience made him a better head coach and having Vogle as your associate head coach is come on that’s pretty that’s pretty special pretty good they to reverse the role a little bit this time around. That’s why you it’s it’s key to keep your relationships, man, because you never know how life changes, right? That’s for sure. Um, Phil Handy, I’ve known Phil Handy since I was 18 years old. And Phil Handy was one of the greatest scorers I’ve ever seen in college. Yeah. So, he he played at San Francisco City College, but he also played at a school called Aloney College. I played at a junior college called Foothill College. And Phil, he hates me telling this story, but when we played him at when he was at Aloney before he went and played at Hawaii, he scored 40 on us. Okay. But we beat him by 40. You know what I’m saying? So, okay. He was He was over, but your team was over. Yeah, man. It’s nice. Hey, man. Yeah. Yeah. Good job. Congrats. You got your 40, dog. You know, but look at the scoreboard. We’re going to eat this W right now. So, but I known Phil a long time. he, you know, one of Kyrie’s favorite people, which I’m sure that is making Kyrie ecstatic that Phil’s on the staff. And I know I think he tried to get him on the staff with him before. Uh they obviously were connected in Cleveland. Um Phil is a masterful coach, player development coach, budding head coach, and uh I think that was a steal of a pickup. I think a lot of NBA teams were stupid not to add him after he, you know, departed from the Lakers and like how is he still in the market? Like Phil has such a strong presence in terms of um social media and stuff like that. Like I think it might be a little intimidating to some coaches and stuff. That’s silly. Like he’s working with a lot of players including Juju Watkins from USC as well. Like what an amazing addition for Jay Kid and obviously they coached together with the uh Lakers as well. Popeye Jones. It’s funny. I covered Popeye in in when he played for the Denver Nuggets. We got to be good friends. And you know, we actually had a radio show together in Denver. Yeah. Round Ball Rap. And it was me and Popey Jones, a weekly tell radio show. I think we both made about 150 each or something like that, right? Like And uh but it was good. Like we had good guests and everything. Mhm. And we were filming it then at like uh remember those sto those sports bars ESPN zone. Yeah. Yeah. I remember those. Yeah. His sons who are both like NHL players. One’s an NHL star. Yeah. Just one one just one was a Stanley Cup just this year. Yeah. He uh they used to come and we used to they used to get free tokens. They didn’t care about the podcast. I mean the radio show. The lady they got got sweet on the lady that was running the place loved them. Two little boys. So she gave him all the tokens they wanted, just go play all. So I just saw him play video games. But Papey left the show to become an assistant with Dallas and wow, I think he’s a future NBA head coach. Um he’s got a lot of experience under his belt. He’s really a talented addition and coming back home. Yeah. Fan favorite. He’s really really excited to come back to Dallas and I’m happy for him too. As we finish up here, when you look at the rest of the off season for this team going into next year, what’s the one thing that you’re looking at as we go into the rest of the offseason and say, “Hey, you need to watch out for this team because of X here when it comes to the Dallas Mavericks, whether it be Anthony Davis or the whome you may think of.” Who’s your trainer now? Uh, we’re still figuring that out. They did hire Jeff Ples, the head strength and conditioning coach from the Chicago Bulls. He’s the MVP of the team right now. He’s a He’s not the I mean, not MVP. He’s like the guy I’m paying attention to. Yeah. Which is an interesting thing when you think about NBA teams that you’re not thinking necessarily about the training staff, but I have no questions about the roster. All my questions about is keeping these guys out the training room and keeping them healthy cuz if they’re healthy, they’re a problem. Yeah. And this team on paper to me is better than a team that went to the finals. Wow. That’s a bold statement. That’s a bold statement. I think it’s bold. That team got lucky. They they were lightning in the bottle, man. Let’s not act like they like they were lightning in the bottle, man. And some fans may disagree with you on that a little bit. They disagree with me. Like they’ve disagreed before. Playoffs are all about health, matchup, timing, and luck. Yeah. And and it all fell into place for them and yay. Yeah. You know, and in reality hitting the in the finals, right? But Celtics team was good. Yeah. They made it. Um but this team is better that they’re healthy. Well, there you heard it here, folks. From the basketball hall of famer class of 2023. He’s a senior NBA writer for Anscaping. I mean, if I’m right, I mean, why would they be mad at me? No, you’re right. You know what I’m saying? I mean, you’re right. I don’t even know. Why would they hate me on this? You’re going to be wrong. Okay, then your teammate. You know what I’m saying? No, I know. I feel you. I feel you want me to be right. You We do want you to be right for sure when it comes to the Barrys. Mark J. Spears, senior NBA writer for Anscape and ESPN basketball hall of famer. Mark, thank you so much for the time. Really appreciate it. Thanks for jumping on the DLS man’s podcast. Thank you, sir. My pleasure. Shout out to MarJ Spears for joining us in Las Vegas at of course Westgate Superbook during our time in Las Vegas. Of course, basketball hall of famer, class of 2023 and ESPN senior writer for Anscape and ESPN. When we come back here on the DLS MAS podcast, Bleacher Report released his top 100 players of all time. Bobby Carella’s got beef with the list. We’re going to let him cook on what he’s got going on with this list next. on the DS podcast. No one likes the smell of musk. Must musk. What are you’re musty, right? Musty is when you’re you’re swe musky. Whatever. 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Again, 20% off sitewide, plus free shipping. Please support our show and tell them we sent you smell fresher, stay der, and boost your confidence from head to toe and everywhere in between with Mando. Started by two college friends, Saturday Neon makes officially licensed collegiate logo LED neon signs perfect for your home, your office, your dorm room, your fan cave, your bar, your bedroom, your uh RV, uh the backseat of your car, uh really anywhere, your lime scooter that you rent, uh you know, down on the street, pop on a pop pop a pop a neon sign from Saturday Neon because they have unlike traditional neon, you know, their LED signs won’t break, they won’t shatter, they’re still going to give you that uniform glow that you know and love. The LEDs last up to 100,000 hours. You’re going to be enjoying the sign for years to come. They’re also super easy to install. Uh you just got to use the provided hardware. Uh low voltage also, so they don’t get hot. They’re always safe to touch. Uh so head over to Saturdayneon.com and use code DLS for 10% off your favorite sign. Bleacher Report releases top 100 NBA players of all time. There is some disrespect going on with this particular list as Bleacher Report got folks talking about the greatest players of all time as ranked Michael Jordan came in at number one on the Whoa, spoilers. Well, come on, man. We know. I hadn’t got that far. It takes a lot of scrolling to get it really does. The top five players of all time according to Bleach Report, Michael Jordan at number one, LeBron James at number two, Kareem Abdul Jabbar at number three, Magic Johnson at number four and Bill Russell coming in at number five. Rounding out the top 10. Shaquille O’Neal at six. Tim Duncan. Bobby Carella at number seven. Larry Bird at number eight. What is Will Chamberlain at number nine? And Stephen Curry cracks the top 10 at number 10. But Bobby Carella, there’s some disrespect going on with this particular list when it comes to a certain number 41. Yeah, I figured we can talk about Dirk in the in the next part, but I wanted to get through the unobjectionable stuff first. Right. So, there’s quite a few Mavs, current and former on this list. Um, Klay Thompson made it at number 98. That’s right. Which honestly like feels a little low kind of like okay, Klay Thompson’s top 100 player all time. I I agree. But then you look around him on the list like is Klay better than Joe Dumars and Dave Debusher? Like maybe, probably. I don’t know. Is he better than Bernard King? I don’t know. Like maybe probably John Chanty Phillips I think for sure. for sure better than Clay’s better than So like I think Clay could have been a lot higher, but the way they did this is it’s like a panel. So they had a bunch of people rank them and then they kind of synthesize it all and uh spit out an average and that’s how they did it. Uh but here’s just like to put into context some of the things Klay did. So there’s just a little sentence of all of his achievements. He scored 37 points in a quarter in 2015. He made an NBA record 14 threes in a game. He needed just four dribbles in a 43-point game in 2019, 11 dribbles in a 60point game in 2016. And he’s known as game six Clay because he has just single-handedly like turned series around or closed him out. I was at one of those. I was at the 2016 I covered that. Oh, just an iconic iconic moment. I was in Arkansas watching that game actually. The whole bar was going nuts. Uh Jason Tatum number 93 is pretty interesting. I don’t know if Tatum is better than Clay at this point. Um, working our way. Was he greater? Was he greater? Yeah. Was he a greater player? Tatum? Yeah. Is Tatum greater than No, I don’t think so. Yeah, I would agree. I would agree. But that’s that’s what we’re measuring. Yeah. Measuring greatness. Yeah. And they they imply they also include like totality of your career and also cultural impact. And I would say Jason Tatum has had a large cultural impact for being a cringe lord. So I I I was like, where is he going with that? do think uh his his final celebration was just iconic. Uh Paul George number 78 uh number 78 for Paul George feels a little high. I think Klay’s probably had a better career than him. Even Clay is arguably the second greatest shooter of all time. Yeah, I think even titles aside, I think Klay might have had a better career. Uh Manu Gobbly, one of my one of the nemesis of my childhood. Is number 75. Chris Bosch 71. I don’t think Chris Bosch had a better career than Klay. Uh next should be higher. Next Mav on the list, Kyrie Irving. Okay, number 69 on the list. It’s a pretty nice ranking. I don’t know why you had to put emphasis on that. Um, well, just saying the number. I honestly I wasn’t even leaning into the 69 bit. I was literally just saying number 69. Um, I think Kyrie, like he didn’t make the 75 team because of stuff. Um, he’s easily one of the 75 best players of all time. Yeah, I agree. Yeah, there’s no argument there. Oh, all right. There’s no argument. Well, we agree. Yeah. Uh he could be higher, you know, in higher on this list. But yeah, he’s going to be a I think he plays a a couple like two or three more seasons about what he was last year. Two more seasons about what he was last year. If he’s able to get back and he gets another title. How about if he if he win? Relax. Oh, if he wins if he wins another title and goes maybe 50 40 90 in one of these next two, three years, uh he could get into top 50. He’s especially if you’re if you’re factoring in influence and just how much they’ve impacted the game. He’s a top 50 player. He’s your favorite player’s favorite player. Yeah, he’s like everyone everyone in the league loves that guy. Yeah, if you’re really emphasizing that, he might be a top 25 player, but I think I think for a list like this, you know, top 50 makes it. Uh, number 65, former Mav Vince Carter. Love that guy. One of his probably one of his most iconic moments. Obviously, the dunk contest is like huge, but one of his most famous shots came in a Mavs uniform. So, that’s pretty cool. Uh, number 57 already, Luca Donuch. Bunch of AllNBA uh award, first team allNBA finishes, awards, honors, I guess. Uh, finals, couple conference finals runs. Luca had a pretty good career. Uh Ray Allen ranked ahead of him. Uh a couple other guys. Paul Pierce of Luca. Luca after his retirement in the summer. Yeah. Hanging on. It’s really tough for our comments, but yeah, you know, I I I hope I hope maybe he’ll change his mind and come back. Uh Anthony Davis number 45 on the list. So the Mavs actually got a steal in that trade. They got a better player and a pick in that deal. But, uh, Anthony Davis, the number 45 player of all time, 24 points per game, almost 11 boards, more than two blocks, more than a steel. Um, I think that’s 45 might be a little high, but he is a generational defender and at his peak was easily top five player in the league. Even now that on the other side of 30, he’s still probably top 10, top 15 player in the league. Won a title, was the best or second best player on that Lakers title team. I I think that’s that may be a little high for AD, but I could see it. If if you if you look up uh Hall of Fame probability, which a few places track and in this instance I’m using basketball reference, Anthony Davis is 44th all time in Hall of Fame probability with N986 or 99.9%. So, he’s a virtual Hall of Famer. Who’s ahead of him? Ray Allen is one spot as an active player. Uh Russell Westbrook. Oh, wow. Okay. also a guaranteed Hall of Famer. James Harden uh actually hits the uh the the celebrated 100%. Wow. There is zero doubt. I would there’s not thing is a sure thing. Something could always happen. All right. Hard and Westbrook are Yeah. They’re objectively Hall of Fame players. I know, but we never know. Yeah. LeBron, Kevin Durant, Chris Paul, uh Steph Curry, James Harden are all and and of practically Russell Westbrook, Anthony Davis, uh Giannis, Jokic, and Dame are all seen as lockers right now. Uh Mavs coach Jason George is the next, interestingly enough. JK number 33 on the list, finishing ahead of Steve Nash and Allen Iverson among other contemporaries. Uh that seems about fitting. JK is one of the best point guards of all time. I would say JK is legitimately top f definitely top 10, maybe top five point guard of all time. He would be in my top five. Kawhi Leonard ranked ahead of JK and so is Chris Paul. Kawhi Leonard. I think both are correct. Jeez, man. Both are correct. Chris Paul over JK’s That’s a tough one. Is he one of the more intriguing whatifs of all time? Chris Paul is why? Yeah. Like if he had just been able to stay Yeah. I mean, he’s the best player in the league whenever he’s right. Yeah. Like it just man Chris Paul should have had an MVP at some point. He made the AllNBA team 11 times. Giannis number 24, D. Wade number 23, Carl Malone 22, Moses Malone number 20. Now we’ve cracked into the top 20. And uh we can hit an early break if we want because the focal point of this entire thing for Mavs fans starts at number 18. God, if you haven’t been outside of the top 25 is kind of wild, but okay, I’ll allow it. He’s at 28, but I’ll You want to hit an early break? Yeah, let’s take so we can get to the absolute travesty. Giannis is 24th. That’s right. Yeah, I I honestly too high or too low. It might be a little low. Giannis might have I might be a little low. By the by the time Giannis is done, he’ll rank higher than Durk. And the guy that’s ahead of Durk on this list should not have ever been ahead of Durk. So, if they just straight swap, I wouldn’t even complain. But I got a lot of problems with you people. Bobby will tell you why next on the DLS Maz podcast. But first, hey, those guys are looking good. They’re looking good with the new merch, that stuff that we just dropped today. I look like a soccer player who just scored a goal and is pointing to the You got to point to that. Point to the crest. Point to the Crest. And that is a uh it’s all Dallas themed stuff. We launched our our the Dallas collection. It’s a city collection. Uh six shirts of things that are all related. There’s a there’s a mascot one in the middle if you’re just listening to the pod. There’s like Champ um Rowdy. Uh who’s the Rangers and the Victory Green? The Stars mascot. Who’s the Rangers mascot? Is it just the Peeagle? I don’t know. What’s It’s a Oh, it’s it’s a it’s also a horse, isn’t it? the Rangers mascot. Anyway, they’re all combined into one. Uh it’s like it’s like Sid and Toy Story. Sid, misunderstood character, by the way. Anyway, all of that stuff just launched on our website. Make sure and pick you up one. And if you become a Die Hard today, you can get one of those shirts for free right when you sign up. The cost of the membership is almost just worth that shirt. So, it’s basically like you’re getting a free membership. And that membership includes a bunch of other benefits that you want to take advantage of, including discounts on other merch that you might want. You get to join the DLS Die Hard Discord lounge. Great place to hang out. Uh talk with your fellow dieards, talk to uh us. We got to hang out with a couple dieards in Vegas, including Sarah’s in the chat right now. Um you also get to read the website alldls.com. Read stuff from Tim. Read stuff from Jeff on the Rangers. Read stuff from Clarence on the Cowboys. Read stuff from Sam and Shawn on the Stars beat. You also get your physical diehard card. Kevin Gray. Bam. Boom. We all have one of those. Mine is in my wallet. I always keep my wallet out there during shows. So if you ever want to rob me, just do it during a show. Although if you get up and leave during a show, I will be suspicious because like where are you guys going? And now that we know where your wallet is and trust me, there ain’t nothing valuable in there. All right, your physical die hard cards in there. What are you talking about? That’s right. That’s right. Come on. Anyway, uh thanks for becoming a Wow. Let’s finish up here on the DLS mouse podcast here. quite my wallet. Tim Ko, as we go through Bleacher Report’s top 100 NBA players of all time, we have cracked the top 20 where controversy abounds because a certain number 41 might be a little low on this list. Yeah. So, Dirk comes in at number 18 on the list. Now, again, this is a panelwide vote. Uh there’s a little like blurb under each player. There’s stats and all that stuff. And then it shows the highest ranking and the lowest ranking among the voters. Now, the highest ranking Durk had by a voter was 15. The lowest Durk had was 27, which is wild. Now, Nicole Joic, who yourself 27 voters. Yeah. Now, Nicole Joic finished 17th ahead of Durk, which honestly, no complaints there. Like, Joic is already one of the best players of all time. Uh, Joic’s lowest rating was number 28. So, someone is even lower on Jokic than they were on Durk. But the real problem that I have is with number 16 on this list. That is Kevin Garnett. Now, I am not one to diminish Kevin Garnett’s greatness. He is certainly one of the best defensive players of all time. He was basically the AD of his generation. Granted, I think AD has a much higher offensive ceiling than KG ever did, but KG was a generational defensive anchor. Uh 15 time all-star, 12 time all defense, ninetime AllNBA. His lowest ranking on the list was number 24. Now I it’s hard whenever you’re talking about players like ranking players which honestly you should never do but when you do it’s hard to talk about team greatness because like as we go through an entire list well there are like KG’s teammates in Minnesota were just a lot of he was on a lot of lousy teams you know um Durk meanwhile like while KG was kind of struggling in the west Durk was playing with Nash and with Finley and then later got Jay Kidd and you know all that stuff. So, I would say Durk never played on a team that was as good as the ’08 Celtics. Uh he’s he was never part of a big three that was close to those guys. But earlier in his career, he had better a better supporting cast than KG did. But if we’re talking about like greatness, dude, like KG was a singularly great defensive player, but I really feel like we’re we’re trying too hard to talk about defense. Like Durk was a singularly great offensive player. uh and cultural impact like not only the cultural impact of the international game and placing an emphasis on international scouting especially in Europe uh completely destroying the whole Euros are soft uh myth. Uh and then also completely changing the game like the culture of basketball like the way that basketball is played. Uh Kevin Garnett didn’t change any of that stuff. Kevin Garnett did not change any scouting. Um Kevin Garnett did not change any sort of I mean if he was one of the first uh high school success stories so I guess there is something to be said for that but um KG did not change anything about the game anything about the way the game is played or any of that stuff. So I think Durk not only was a singularly great offensive player for my money one of the five or 10 best offensive players non-center division of all time um if not higher than that. KG might be one of the five or 10 best defensive players of all time, but he’s not one of the top 200 offensive players of all time, if not even lower than that. And so, I just think I I think it’s we’re really underrating offense here and really underrating Impact. And I think Durk has always been better KG. Better than KG. And I don’t even mean Kevin Gray, I mean Kevin Garnett. Kevin, you’re better than Durk. But Kevin Garnett, you’re not. Uh, okay. It’s Yes. Now, there the point of being Yeah. Durk torched Garnett a lot in the post in the postseason all the time. That’s not and in the regular season. Durk gave him that freaking work, dude. Even whenever he was on the Celtics, dude, the 2011 Mavs steamroll Mavs beat the Celtics all the time. The part that is interesting that you did say though that I think allows the argument in terms of where this ranking is to be compelling. I would personally have Dirk ahead of Kevin Garnett. where it does get compelling. You said that Derrick was one of the five 10 best offensive players of all time. In the same sentence, you said Kevin Garnett is one of the five 10 best defensive players of all time. Maybe that’s but even if it’s a maybe now we’re having different discussions about which one is of more importance because if you’re going to look at Kevin Darnett Kevin Garnett excuse me um purely from the defensive side I mean 12 time alldefensive player and a defensive player of the year award winner. Nothing to sneeze at man. Yeah, but like I like again I would have Durk ahead, but I can see where the argument starts to come in if you’re looking at what’s more important in terms of the offensive and defensive sides of the basketball. Like Kevin Garnett’s an all-time defensive player. Um just like Durk is an all-time offensive player. He is. Yeah, I mean Kevin Kevin Garnett is great. Kevin Garnett is great. But here, let me let’s let’s run down let’s run down a couple couple staties. All right. So, in 0405, the Mavs in the clutch led the league in win percentage. They won 70% of their clutch games that year. They actually won 69.8%. So, how about that? 0506, the Mavs won 72.7% of their clutch games. That was second best in the league behind only the Spurs. So, that’s over a 2-year period, they were winning more than 70% of their clutch games. How about 0607? In the clutch, the Mavs went 32-6 in the clutch. They won 84% of their clutch games in ‘ 06 07. For a three-year period, coin flip games. The Mavs were damn near unbeatable, dude. Like, and that is all Durk. Like, Kevin Garnett was a great defensive player, but Dirk was great at playing I win. You know, for Durk’s entire career, the Mavs had the second most wins in the NBA behind only the Spurs. It’s like a once in a lifetime dynasty. And the Mavs didn’t even finish that that far behind San Antonio during that. So put so put KG on those Mavs teams. How much better is Kevin Garnett if he gets the kind of support? I mean Mavs aren’t they would have to totally reinvent like KG would not have been a good fit I think with with like Nash and Finley. I think you needed like that open kind of Durk spacing thing. Now KG on the finals team they wouldn’t have won the finals. KG was older by then. Like stylistically like I don’t even know if they would have won like let’s say like early kid era like kid Jet Josh Howard Garnett that’s not that team isn’t doing anything. I Durk was so Durk was so freaking No, I I agree like absolutely incredible. I’m just thinking about in terms of where these players are in this ranking. It’s interesting a couple of the numbers from um the Garnett side of things. Garnett and Akima Lajan the only players with at least 2,000 blocks and 1,800 steals for their careers. And Garnett is tied for the all-time lead with nine alldefensive first team honors. Apparently, he was the highest. All defensive voting is a little wacky though. Let’s be like really uh what I what I’ll say about KG is that the the advanced metrics looking back on his career vindicate a lot of the choices that voters made about him at the time. Uh he didn’t like he won an MVP and and a kind of forgettable MVP. He was MVP runner up twice more. Uh then another time he was third. You know like this was a guy who was who was often often considered to be you know one of the very very best players in the NBA and his advanced numbers like you know even simple stuff like win chairs have always you know expanded and expounded upon how important how good he was. The argument with Durk is that the numbers still don’t fully capture what Durk was able to do and I 100% believe that. I do think that it takes a lot of watching Derk Nitzky and knowing Maverick’s history to fully grasp that, but it is, you know, on one hands, it’s stuff like just being a a clutch demon, you know, being able to get those wins in those moments when you need to. But we’ve never been able to fully define, you know, spacing. you know, the the impact that the, you know, most unique shooter had in the NBA on the Mavericks offense year over year over year. Uh he’s not, you know, Derk Nitzky is not getting assists just because two defenders ran at him and we’re scared of him shooting the ball and one of his teammates dunked it instead. Uh we still don’t have a perfect way to define that. I don’t think there’s any doubt in my head that, you know, when you look at the numbers, the metrics that that that Derk is not fully We have some uh breaking news real quick and Stein has it as well. So, uh I can’t believe Stein is interrupting Dirk talk. This must be important. Derek Lively I uh recently underwent a procedure in his right foot uh followed by a placement in a boot. Um, so Lively is out of the boot after having bone spurs. I reported after the season this was possible. Bummer. Bummer to to see it. But yeah, I knew I knew we knew this was we knew that he wasn’t, you know, even even when he was coming back and playing some that that there were complications still ongoing with his situation. Yeah. So, Dallas’s uh Derek Live II recently underwent a procedure on his right foot. Uh as Markstein has reported, followed by a placement in a boot. Um again, Lively, according to Markstein, is now out of the boot after having bone spurs uh removed out of that right foot. So, another Maverick with um an offseason injury to deal with. Uh Kyrie Irving, of course, recovering from the torn ACL. We learned recently that Anthony Davis uh underwent surgery to um for a detached retina. Uh and now Derek Lively I recently going under a procedure uh for his right foot. So more injury uh news when it comes to the Dallas Mavericks uh moving forward here. So, uh, appreciate Sarah who is in the chat, uh, alerting us to that news, uh, coming through there as well as we continue to scour, uh, social media. But Mark Stein reporting that, uh, Derek Live the second having underwent a procedure on his right foot action catch up. Yeah, it’s a bummer. Sucks. Uh, you know, this is, you know, bone spurs is a is a cleanup procedure. I’m not, you know, expert on it, but it’s it’s uh, you know, it’s it’s not a not a six-month recovery process. There is reason to believe that that Derrick Lively should be ready for training camp and early in the season, is expected to be healthy for training camp. And there is reason to believe that uh, you know, as that this is a procedure to try to make him healthier in the years to come. But this is his big question. He is a sevenfooter, a 7 foot one guy who moves uh like not a lot of sevenfooters move and he has had injury complications dating back even before Duke. And that’s the big question, you know, being able to see if he can get past that and move past that and hopefully this is a step in that direction. I just really want that guy to be healthy so bad cuz he’s he’s so good. He’s so good. And um you know obviously for the Mavs like him you know struggling with injuries last year was devastating uh to their chances especially after Gafford went out as well but you know just for him individually like after this season he’s up for a contract extension negotiations and stuff and what you don’t want to be having is missing more than half your career games you know due to various injuries and you don’t want to be 71 72 with foot problems like you don’t want any of that you just you don’t want any of that. Coming up here momentarily, uh Mark Stein wants to join us here on the DLS mask off today. Uh well, he’s reporting news, so he’s not apparently. Hey, he’s worse at vacation than you. He’s coming on the show on his day off. I’m pretty bad at vacationing. Uh you’re bad, but at least you just stay in the chat. You just stay in the chat. I do stay in the chat. Um actually, you know what’s funny? And it will be funny. So, remember when Luca did that interview uh with Malikica Andrews and he was, you know, talking about, you know, Nico Harrison and all this other stuff? I was actually in Vegas uh at WrestleMania when I put that, you know, I saw that and watched that put that out there on social media. Uh so, no, I’m horrible at vacationing. It’s just unfortunately a bad thing. Um, but no, Mark S is gonna call in here in just a moment uh to discuss the latest when it comes to Derek Lively II and his recent procedure that he went uh for his right foot to clean up bone spurs uh in that right foot. So, um that’s some more of the injury news when it comes to the Dallas Mars. We’re reacting to that here as we had just finished up going through the uh top 100 players of all time uh as far as Bleach Report is concerned uh discussing where Dirk Ditzky uh ranked in that. But as again we recount the injury situation that the Mavericks have gone through so far uh this offseason. Obviously Kyrie Irving recovering from the torn ACL. We learned that Anthony Davis uh had a procedure to repair a detached retina. Now Derrick Live the second the latest in terms of injury offseason surgery for him. And this is off of a season where you mentioned Daniel Gaffford who had the knee injury. Dante Exom um had the wrist and the hand injury for him. a lot of guys and Kyrie Irving forgot had to deal with the back injury throughout the course of last year as well that he played through before. I’m going to have to go back and look at the context of these specific questions asked of him, but Nico Harrison did answer uh questions about whether Anthony Davis or Derrick Lively would have offseason surgeries and said in both cases they would not. Uh and of course the retina might be something different and it might not be in the context of what was asked. So, that one I’m willing to brush aside, but you know, I reported after the season that uh there was an expectation Derrick Lively may need summer surgery. You know, these are things that were asked. Uh and yeah, it’s it’s uh you know, you can say whatever you want in a press conference, but this is kind of adds to some of the hesitancy to always trust everything Nico Harrison is saying. Uh this kind of adds to it. Uh it was I remember he very directly answered the the lively one and said uh he would not. The conversation continues over at all dls.com. Uh make sure you follow all dls.com for everything when it comes to your Dallas map. Momentarily be joined by national NBA insider Mark Stein here on the DLLS Mavs podcast as we react to the breaking news. Derek Live II recently had a procedure done on his right foot to get bone spurs removed from that foot. uh according to our very own Mark Stein who will have the latest details on that surgery for him. Um also we had forgotten to mention Anthony Davis who had been dealing with the adductor strain u when he had came over from the Lakers was able to come back eventually um but also was dealing with that throughout the course uh of his time here in Dallas at the end of last year as well. So hopefully he’ll be obviously fine when it comes to that this upcoming year. but just more when it comes to the injury front uh for this Dallas Mavericks team that they will have to continue to monitor. And this gives more credence to the idea who Daniel Gaffford to sign that threeyear $54 million contract uh with the Dallas Mavericks an insurance policy when it comes to the big men in the middle uh for this basketball team to be able to have as much front court help as they need to if they’re going to play this type of style being as big as they are. um that Daniel Gaffford extension seems that much more prudent now given uh what we’re learning about Derrick Live II and his injury. Yeah, it was always prudent and and this is you know this is a situation where Lively is expected to be back for for uh camp and you want him to be healthy and you want you know but we always understood that part of the idea of keeping Gaffford like having this many guys it makes sense if players are just injured the entire time. That’s not a that’s not the situation you want to plan for. You’re not the team’s not trying to go into next season, you know, wanting Anthony Davis and Dererick Lively to be out because those are two of the team’s best four players, you know, more more more or less. And so if if Daniel Gaffford is an insurance policy, that makes sense to an extent. It also means your team’s going to be worse because the players that are better than him are going to be missing games. So, it’s kind of like kind of you kind of weigh it both ways, you know. Oh, we’ll have Mark here in just a moment. Um, as we await him, we have more in the chat as well with reaction to the injury. Um, Sarah says, “Get these guys a podiatrist on staff.” Shout out to you, Sarah. Always looking out for the uh for the team. Um so that is that news then when it comes to Derek Live II then having gone uh undergone that surgery to clean up the bone spurs in the right foot. Um according to our very own Markstein who of course is all over that. He was with us in Las Vegas as well. Um Stein also saying additionally the Mavericks were hopeful that Lively would not require offseason surgery after being limited to 36 games by the injury last season, but the expectation is that the 21-year-old will be available for the start of Dallas’s training camp in late September. Uh so additional context there from Mark Stein when it comes to Derek Lively’s um surgery as far as his foot is concerned that he is expected to be ready uh for training camp in late September. So we were looking for good news. We have any idea when he’s going to be on cuz like we’re straight up just killing time right now. All right. Moments away. Moments away. Excited to get the update. Any other qualms with the top 100 list? Um, no, not really. I mean, I don’t remember where we left off on that one. Um, yeah, I just don’t really remember. Oh, I think like Yeah, and it’s not just like the the Durk and KG thing again. It’s not just like uh well, defense matters. I mean, it’s they’re even saying like impact on the game. Like what what impact did KG have on the game? You know, like Durk changed they changed the whole like freaking way that it’s play. You know what I mean? Like Yeah. No, they changed the rules. They changed everything. The impact of the game that Dirk and Nitzky had. He changed the way that the modern four is playing. You think KD exists if Dirk is not like Yeah. Kevin Dirk is KD’s favorite player. We should get How’s that for impact? Thoughts on this? We’re gonna get Mark. Is Dirk better than KG? Okay. Hi guys. Hello. Thanks for the softball question to welcome me in. We were talking about a list, a top 100 list of all time. Uh we can come back to that though. Uh your breaking news though, Derek Live II recently undergoing a procedure to remove bone spurs from his right foot. What more can you tell us about this for Derrick Lively? Yeah, you know, obviously I think the Mavericks were hopeful that no offseason procedures would be required after this injury obviously severely affected Lively season. Uh the procedure required his foot to be placed in a boot. I was told this morning that he is now out of the boot. They are optimistic that he’ll be ready for the start of camp and that’s really as much as we have at this point. Um, but look, I mean, I think you guys can state the obvious here and we all we all can see it and understand it. Kyrie Irving, Anthony Davis, Derek Lively. I mean, Lively is certainly going to be the first of those guys or, you know, would be projected to be the first of those guys to actually, you know what, I shouldn’t even say that cuz I I I don’t know that. So, scratch that. I I don’t know that because I don’t know I don’t know AD’s status. The Mavericks have said that they the anticipation is that both Derek Lively Actually, you know what? I’m trying to do this on the fly, guys. I don’t I don’t even want to go there. Like I I mean that that’s the difficulty with the some of these some of these things is like I I lit I literally have reported everything I know. Um we don’t have a firm injury timetable on any of the three players. So I think we’re going to have to take a wait and see approach. you know, the there is undeniable optimism that Lively would be ready for camp um on Anthony Davis. I think you have to wait and see cuz that’s obviously an eye injury and that’s a serious thing to just even say out loud and talk about. And you know, Kyrie Irving, I know a big part of today’s show, you guys were talking about Nico Harrison’s comments on the Summer League broadcast. Nico Harrison has publicly said the Mavericks, he’s publicly said that Kyrie’s ahead of schedule, but what that actually means for a timetable and we we don’t have a firm injury timetable on any of the three players. And that’s the most accurate thing that can be said. Until we get some recovery timetables, I do not want to I do not want to make guesses cuz I am I am not a doctor and not qualified to do so. Yeah. And it’s those three players are the Maverick’s three best players. Or at least you can make an argument for it. Obviously, I am a, you know, a bit of a lively truther, you know, after watching that that run to the finals. But I think he’s that good. And so, uh, yeah, this is a scenario where Dallas is going into next season with, you know, like, yes, we we’ve talked about how this team is deep, maybe too deep if they’re, you know, going to be missing Anthony Davis and Derek Lively to start the year. Again, not saying you we do not know that. Not saying you said that, you know, but if there’s even the the tiniest chance that that that those guys won’t be out to start the year. Uh it does explain and show why Dallas is so deep because a lot of these players uh who haven’t been moved who might be in minute crunches uh you know, they’re they’re set to get minutes right away. uh you know, in that fully hypothetical scenario. Uh but it also means that it’s it’s a lot harder to see Dallas having a a successful year if if they have to start off on the wrong foot that early and and and that painfully. Yeah. I mean, look, this is it’s going to be, you know, you it’s not a new team, but you know, this is the first training camp after this trade that changed everything around here. So again, the expectation is that Derrick Lively is going to be ready for training camp on Anthony Davis. I feel like we have to take a wait and see approach there because I mean that is a scary surgery that, you know, we just don’t know that much about yet. when I’ve asked I’ve heard similar optimism but again in none of these cases do we have a teamisssued recovery timetable yet and I think until we have that it’s hard for us to make projections but I mean look I mean this is obviously it’s going to be I’m sure received as jarring news at the minimum just because we all know how important Lively is to this team’s future. And last season, he was only able to play in 36 games because of this injury that did cause a lot of tension and a lot of stuff last year, obviously. So, I mean, the good news is, like I said, I was told this morning that he’s exited the boot and that it was, you know, removing bone spurs was the objective of this procedure. So, you know, Derek Lively has has been through enough injury torment in his first two seasons. Let’s hope that he can start next season in training camp and that that this stuff is going to be behind him by then because he’s just it’s just been it’s just been too many things for a player who does have a lot of promise and it is hugely important to this franchise. Uh and real quick too, we obviously have been talking about the detached retina for Anthony Davis. um to your knowledge and and you may have to do more reporting on this. Uh as far as the adductor strain that he suffered during the season, um where is Anthony Davis with that? Is he, you know, healthy from that going into next year? We have not really discussed that since the season has really uh been over with with respect to him either. Yeah, I got to say, I mean, I don’t have a reportable update on that. I’ve had no access to to AD since the season ended. So, I really don’t know. You know, I think, you know, this is the kind of event we typically would would have seen Anthony Davis attend. I mean, he’s he’s always someone who comes to summer league, but, you know, eye surgery, detach retina, that is, you know, stuff that needs to be handled with the utmost sensitivity. So that obviously takes travel off the table. You know, I think it’s safe to connect the dots to presume that that’s why we didn’t see him in attendance here at Summer League because of this because of that surgery. So, um I think the Mavs hope in both AD’s case and Derek Lively’s case was that was that neither player would have to undergo anything this off season that they could just heal naturally. And you know, I’m sure as the summer unfolds, we’ll get more on AD, the adductor strain, but I just I can’t give you that right now cuz I don’t have it. That’s on me. Mark, I mean, you go ahead. Oh, do we lose him? Mark. Mark, I was going to ask you to make me feel better. M Mark, do you read me? We have an opto optometrist in the uh in the chat who says uh optometrist here. Yes, air travel nogo after that kind of surgery. I liked uh I think David Mason has also a very important comment. We saw a facetiming with DLO on DLO’s YouTube and AD still had both eyes. That’s good. That is that is good. That is good news cuz I was going to say man like their three most not even Stein had that. Their three most important players having surgery on knee, foot, and eye. Like if you’re going to power rank the three most important things or the three scariest things to have surgery on as a basketball player, those would probably be in the top five. Mark, I’m back. So, is there something we can feel good about? This is a lot of bad news. What what can we feel good about? Make me feel happy about something, please. Uh, I do think it was good to hear that Kyrie’s ahead of schedule. I don’t I mean, I would imagine you guys liked hearing that. I imagine you liked hearing that the Mavericks won the lottery and drafted Cooper Flag. I imagine you guys are still basking in the afterlow of a good week in Las Vegas. My quest to catch up on sleep is well underway. Yeah, same. Same. This is this this can’t even count as a consolation, but um I have been chasing this story for a good bit here. And I am at least glad that I was able to report it while you guys were still on the air so I could jump on here. I was worried that this I was going to be reporting this after you guys were off the air. So, I mean, again, that I don’t even want to paint that as a consolation, but I was, you know, I’m glad that I’m at least able to come on here and try to add a little bit. It’s tough. I know. Look, I I can’t see the chat. I’m sure everyone has a zillion questions. They’re all valid. I wish I had more detail. I’ve I’ve really reported everything that I know at this point. And crucially, we do not have specific timets for recovery on any of the three players. So, it’s just it’s hard to make projections without that. And I know that’s what everybody wants and I’m sorry that I can’t provide it. Well, no, the uh reporting that you’ve already done uh alerting us to this news here with Derek Live the second, obviously timely here with us on the DLS mass podcast. We really appreciate you taking the time with us uh to hop on with us here on the show and uh we’ll talk to you here next time. Appreciate you. All right guys, talk soon. Be good. Bye, Mark. Appreciate our guy Mark Stein for joining us here to discuss the breaking news with Derek Live the second having underwent a procedure to remove bone spurs from his right foot. We will be back tomorrow. H real quick. I got to I got to clean up something earlier. So, I did not know the Rangers mascot. It’s of It’s obviously Rangers Captain. Yeah. So, the DLSS mascot conglomeration aggregation smores board shirt. Uh, it’s Rangers captain Victory Green. I think DLSS Rangers should go after you like DLS Stars went after Tim McMahon. Okay. Well, I didn’t know that this this hipster mascot. All right. I just didn’t know. Wow. You just leaned all the way into it. Nice job. Yeah. Uh, we will be back tomorrow at 12:00 p.m. right here on the DLS MAS podcast. Make sure you follow us at DLLS_mask for all the latest when it comes to your Dallas Mavericks. Shout out to our guy Tanner for making us look good and sound good as always. Thank you, sir. Thanks, Tanner. Our Mavericks analyst, Bobby Car. That’s our Mavericks beat writer, Tim Kdo, holding the mic. My name is Kevin Gray. We are DLS Mavs. We’ll talk to you tomorrow at 12 p.m. right here in honor of the best player of all time. Y’all be good. Ditzky. See you. Peace. [Music] We all silly like the mayor.

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During last night’s Summer League game, Dallas Mavericks GM Nico Harrison said Kyrie Irving is “ahead of schedule” in his rehab process coming back from a torn ACL. Harrison also said the Mavs don’t want to apply too much pressure to rush him back. Is this a positive sign? The DLLS Mavs crew reacts to his comments. They also dive into Bleacher Report’s Top-100 players of all-time list. (Spoiler alert: Dirk is too low.) They end the show reacting to the breaking news that Dereck Lively II underwent offseason surgery with a special report from Marc Stein.

#dallasmavs #nba #cooperflagg #anthonydavis #kyrieirving #dangelorussell #derecklively #pjwashington #danielgafford #klaythompson #najimarshall #jasonkidd

00:00 Intro
02:50 Nico says Kyrie is ahead of schedule with his rehab progress
08:59 Summer League game vs the Hornets reaction
12:02 The LeBron rumors won’t stop
17:28 Marc J. Spears joins the show
34:36 Bleacher Report’s Top-100 Players of All-Time
45:49 Where did Dirk rank on the list??
54:03 Dereck Lively II had offseason surgery
01:04:20 Marc Stein joins the show

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