NBA commissioner Adam Silver joined ESPN’s “The Pat McAfee Show” on Thursday ahead of the playoffs, which get underway on Saturday. To little surprise, the Luka Dončić trade, which is still commanding headlines months after it was made, was one of the many topics that Silver discussed.
Silver reiterated that he had no authority to veto or rescind the trade. The only reason former commissioner David Stern was able to veto the trade that would have sent Chris Paul from the New Orleans Hornets to the Los Angeles Lakers in 2011 is that he was acting as the Hornets’ owner at the time. Silver, of course, is not in that same position with the Mavericks.
Later in the discussion, Silver spoke about the frustration. “I get the fans’ passion. I understand why Dallas Mavericks fans are so upset,” Silver said. At the same time, he attempted to defend the Mavericks’ ownership group and front office. Here are Silver’s comments in full:
“In terms of the trade itself, it’s obvious time will tell. The only place where I feel defensive on behalf of the Dallas Mavericks and the new ownership there is there were some suggestions early on that the trade wasn’t done for basketball reasons, that somehow the new owner didn’t want to pay a maximum salary or was focused on building a real estate development or something else.
“The only thing I can say, and I feel very confident in this knowing Patrick Dumont, who is the governor of the team, and the people involved: they believed that they were making the best trade on behalf of the Dallas Mavericks. Whether that turns out to be true, only time will tell.
“I’ve known Nico Harrison for a long time. He was a long-time executive at Nike before he was with the Dallas Mavericks. Again, whether or not he made the right trade, he’s a really decent person. I know he’s trying to do the best he can to run that franchise.
“It’s been a rough time since they made the trade, no question about it. Combination of Anthony Davis, my god, going down in the very first game he’s playing for the Mavericks, Kyrie [Irving] then with the season-ending injury. I’m proud of that team. They’re still playing hard, they still have a chance to play into the playoffs tomorrow night.
“I get the fans’ passion. I understand why Dallas Mavericks fans are so upset. I personally am a fan of Luka Doncic. I think he’s a great young man. Let’s see how this turns out. I want him to be great, I want the Dallas Mavericks to be great. There’s no doubt, I’ve been in the league a long time. It’s been remarkable how much interest there’s been in this trade. Maybe because you have the Lakers on the other side of it, you have the happenstance that Mark Cuban just recently stepped out as the owner of that team, so a lot of chatter around it. We’ll see, when they play the games, how this works out.”
As the commissioner of the NBA, Silver cannot directly criticize one of the teams for a personnel transaction, but his acknowledgment that he understands the fans’ frustrations is a sign that the trade surprised even those at the highest levels of the league office.
Harrison and Mavericks CEO Rick Welts held a closed-door press conference with reporters earlier this week to try to explain their decision to trade Doncic, but only dug themselves a deeper hole.
Nico Harrison has ‘no regrets’ about Luka Dončić trade: What Mavs GM said at strange, overdue press conference
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The Mavericks defeated the Sacramento Kings in the No. 9 vs. No. 10 Play-In Tournament game on Wednesday, 120-106, and will now face the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday, with the winner earning the No. 8 seed in the playoffs. Regardless of the outcome of the contest, Mavericks fans aren’t going to quiet down any time soon.