Dallas Mavericks’ Championship Odds Plummet After Kyrie Irving’s Injury
According to ESPN’s Shams Charania, Mavericks star Kyrie Irving tore his ACL and is out for the season. The All-Star is expected to miss the vast majority of next season and perhaps could be sidelined for the entire campaign.
For example, while no two injuries are the same, Jamal Murray tore his ACL in April of 2021 and didn’t return until October of 2022. Murray’s injury came a month later into the season than Irving’s, but the Nuggets guard was also a decade younger. It’s impossible to know exactly when (if at all) Irving returns to pre-injury form, but it likely won’t occur next season.
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Dallas Mavericks’ championship odds plummet from Kyrie Irving news
With Irving sidelined and Luka Doncic traded, the Mavericks completely lack playmaking and self-created scoring. Their perimeter firepower is essentially non-existent outside of the occasional Klay Thompson 3-point explosion. That deficiency has a trickle-down effect, as Dallas’ bigs cannot dominate without proper spacing and precision entry passes or lobs.
The Mavericks are still able to hang their hat on a great defense when their centers get healthy, but the decimated offense is a championship killer. Online sportsbooks concur, as Dallas went from a strong contender to a team with odds as long as 250-to-1 to win the title at FanDuel.
Where do the Mavericks go from here?
Irving can become an unrestricted free agent this offseason if the former champion declines his player option. Should the veteran sign a long-term deal, he’s still an aging guard coming off a torn ACL. That’s not exactly an enticing situation despite his talent. Meanwhile, Anthony Davis is about to turn 32-years-old and seemingly cannot escape injuries himself. Key role players Daniel Gafford and PJ Washington become unrestricted free agents during the 2026 offseason, too.
By shipping off their 26-year-old superstar at the trade deadline, Dallas shrunk their championship window to the immediate future. Unfortunately, injuries likely just shut and locked the window.
The franchise cannot even re-tool because of their dire draft capital situation. They don’t control their first rounder in 2027, 2028, 2029, or 2030, which stops tanking for a superstar or exchanging a treasure chest of picks for another All-Star from being viable options.
Nine months – that’s all it took to go from making a run to the NBA Finals behind a generational superstar about to reach his prime to an organization that owns an extremely bleak basketball outlook and antagonized their fanbase through unjustified stadium ejections, raised ticket prices, and character assassination remarks directed at Doncic. It’s a masterclass for future general managers on how not to run an organization.
