ESPN’s latest offseason grades put the Mavericks in a familiar spot: not broken, but not close to finished either.
Dallas came away with a B- when ESPN evaluated the league’s summer moves on Wednesday, and the biggest takeaway wasn’t praise for a splashy addition. It was a warning sign. The Mavericks have piled up size in the frontcourt, but the backcourt is thin enough to make Kyrie Irving’s return loom over everything else.
“The Mavericks now have a glut in the frontcourt, where they kept Daniel Gafford and Dereck Lively II and matched the Knicks' offer sheet for Moussa Cisse," Zach Cram wrote. "But little backcourt depth remains, which makes Kyrie Irving's return from an ACL tear even more important next season."
That imbalance has been building for a while, and it leaves Dallas in a tricky spot. The team has long needed more shooting, but the more urgent issue now is guard depth. Irving is still the headliner, and he remains one of the few proven starting-caliber backcourt options on the roster once he gets back.
The Mavericks did make a couple of moves to help. They added Marcus Sasser in a trade and used the 25th overall pick on Sergio De Larrea.
But they also sent Ryan Nembhard away in the deal that brought forward Zaccharie Risacher to Dallas, and Brandon Williams has not been re-signed in free agency. That leaves the Mavericks back where they started: short on guards and short on reliable creators.
Right now, Irving, Sasser and De Larrea are the only primary ball-handlers on the roster. That’s not exactly a comfortable setup for a team trying to enter next season with any real stability.
Irving is still the obvious centerpiece, but there are real concerns baked into that plan. He’s coming off a torn ACL and hasn’t played since March 3, 2025. He’s also 34 years old and hasn’t played in more than 60 games in a season since the 2018-19 season.
Sasser can handle the ball, but his game is built more around scoring than running an offense. De Larrea showed some promise as a facilitator in Summer League, but he’s still a 20-year-old rookie who averaged just 14.8 minutes between the EuroLeague and the Spanish ACB last season.
Dallas does have Cooper Flagg and Naji Marshall, two forwards who can take on some ball-handling duties. But that only goes so far. It still leaves too much on Irving’s shoulders, and too much uncertainty behind him.
The roster math is part of the problem too. After matching the New York Knicks’ offer sheet for center Moussa Cisse, Dallas is up to 16 players. Any further guard addition would require clearing two roster spots, which is easier said than done given the current logjam.
So the Mavericks are staring at a problem they can’t really afford to ignore. They may keep leaning on Flagg and Marshall to help initiate offense, ask Sasser to do more than he’s naturally built for, or fast-track De Larrea before he’s ready. None of those paths looks ideal.
And that’s why ESPN’s read on Dallas matters. The frontcourt may be crowded, but the real pressure point is in the backcourt, where the Mavericks still don’t have enough dependable creators.
In Other News...
How The Mavericks Landed Zaccharie Risacher Is Raising Eyebrows
The Mavericks kept working the edges of the trade market and came away with a notable swing, landing former first overall pick Zaccharie Risacher in a three-team deal with Atlanta and Oklahoma City. Dallas had to get creative to make it happen, sending Lu Dort and Ryan Nembhard to the Hawks while the Thunder picked up three second-round picks as the mechanism that helped the whole thing fit.
What makes the move stand out is how little margin Dallas had to operate with and how aggressively the front office pursued Risacher anyway. The Mavericks have been leaning on the kind of asset management that can open one door while closing another, and this deal only adds to the sense that they are willing to keep spending draft capital to chase the right young talent, even if it leaves them searching for more flexibility later. [Read more 🡒]
Mavericks Face One Tough Roster Decision Around Flagg And Kyrie
The Mavericks have spent the summer reshaping the roster around Cooper Flagg and Kyrie Irving, and the front office has clearly not been shy about adding more pieces. Dallas drafted Morez Johnson Jr. and Sergio De Larrea, acquired Santi Aldama and Tarik Biberovi, and also brought in Zaccharie Risacher, leaving the team with a deeper, more varied group than it had before the overhaul began.
Now comes the part that is always less glamorous than the shopping spree. Dallas is carrying 16 players and has to get down to 15 by opening night, which means someone has to go, and the real squeeze is showing up in the frontcourt and at center. P.J. Washington, Santi Aldama and Morez Johnson Jr. all bring power-forward traits, while the middle of the floor remains unsettled enough that the Mavericks are still sorting through how the rotation should actually look once the games start counting. [Read more 🡒]