Marvin Bagley III is out the door, and that makes Moussa Cissé’s case in Dallas a lot stronger.
Bagley has agreed to a one-year minimum deal with the Denver Nuggets, leaving the Mavericks with one fewer body in the middle and one more reason to lock in their own restricted free agent. Dallas already extended a two-way qualifying offer to Cissé before free agency began, which gives the club the right to match any offer he signs this summer.
The need is pretty straightforward. Dereck Lively II is coming back from injury, Daniel Gafford has not been traded, and the Mavericks still have to be careful about what happens over the grind of an 82-game season. Bagley gave them reserve minutes after the trade deadline, but his departure opens up another hole in a frontcourt that can’t afford to get too thin.
Cissé arrived in Dallas last summer as an undrafted free agent and signed a two-way contract in July. Turning that into a standard deal wasn’t easy before the Mavericks moved Anthony Davis, D'Angelo Russell, Jaden Hardy, and Danté Exum to the Washington Wizards in February, when the team was much more squeezed financially.
What Cissé brings is hard to ignore. He’s 6-foot-11, with a 7-foot-5 wingspan and a 9-foot-3 reach, and he gives Dallas rebounding, shot-blocking, and energy without needing the ball. He finished the season with a 17-point, 20-rebound game against the Bulls, a reminder of how much impact he can make in limited minutes.
The Mavericks do have some interior pieces in place. Gafford and P.J.
Washington are still there, Lively is recovering from foot surgery, and Powell remains unsigned and may not return. Dallas also added Morez Johnson Jr. with the ninth overall pick in this year’s NBA Draft and traded for Santi Aldama from the Memphis Grizzlies, but neither one gives the same paint presence Cissé does at center.
That matters even more because Cissé is cheap. His qualifying offer is under $2.2 million, and any renewal would be close to the minimum.
With president of basketball operations Masai Ujiri, general manager Mike Schmitz, and head coach Dusty May building around Cooper Flagg, affordable young talent is the kind of asset Dallas needs to keep stacking. At 23, Cissé fits that plan and is still growing into it.
Dallas wants him back on a standard deal, and the timing is there for it. The Mavericks converted only Ryan Nembhard and limited Cissé to eight games, but Bagley’s move to Denver leaves little reason to drag this out. At minimal cost, keeping the rim protector is the cleanest move Dallas can make right now.
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For months, Mavericks fans have wanted a frontcourt addition who could help the offense breathe a little more, and Dallas finally found one. Santi Aldama gives the roster a different kind of big, one with enough shooting to pull defenders away from the paint and enough size to fit the lineups the Mavericks have been trying to build around their stars.
Aldama comes over after five seasons with Memphis, bringing a steady scoring presence and the kind of floor-spacing profile this team has lacked. He averaged 14.0 points and 6.7 rebounds last season while hitting 35 percent from three-point range, a useful blend for a Mavericks front line that has spent too much time crowded in tight spaces. [Read more 🡒]
Mavericks Just Lost Their Cleanest Daniel Gafford Trade Path
The Mavericks center picture has only gotten a little more crowded, and not in a way that helps Daniel Gaffords trade value. Los Angeles landing Walker Kessler changed one lane in the market, but Utahs move has a bigger ripple for Dallas because it takes away a team that looked like a clean fit for a rim-running big and a club with the kind of future assets that can matter in a deal.
For Dallas, the problem is less about Gaffords usefulness than about finding the right landing spot at the right time. Utah now appears set to build its frontcourt around Jusuf Nurkic and Jaxson Hayes, which leaves the Mavericks searching for another partner if they want to keep working the phones on Gafford. It is the sort of roster twist that can quickly turn a straightforward trade path into a much longer wait. [Read more 🡒]
Mavericks Just Got The Kind Of Trade Opening They Cannot Waste
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For the Mavericks, that kind of logjam is exactly the sort of situation worth monitoring. Dallas has been searching for ways to improve around the edges without boxing itself in, and the front office does have tools to work with, including Klay Thompson on an expiring deal, P.J. Washington in trade discussions and a $20.8 million trade exception. If Portland ever decides it needs to sort out its guard rotation, Dallas should be ready to pounce before another team beats it to the line. [Read more 🡒]