The Mavericks' Meltdown

November 18, 2025·1 hr 4 min·5 clips

Dan Devine reveals how trading Luka Doncic crippled the Mavericks' future with injured stars and lost draft picks.

November 17th sets the table. Alex Kirshner opens a basketball-heavy Slate episode with sports business on the agenda, then the Dallas segment turns into a trust check. The tone is dry, which fits. The panel walks through Nico, an uncredentialed athletic performance hire, and ownership that may not understand the NBA ecosystem as well as it needs to. Fans do not get much comfort. Dallas fandom comes off as a bargain with a difficult ownership group, not some clean moral stance. That is the grim part. Rooting for the name on the front can mean swallowing front-office choices, player signings, and people with checkered pasts. The panel still finds a floor. Dallas has won the lottery and has a foundational piece, so the franchise does not feel fully hopeless. Even the hope comes with fine print. Patrick Dumont's public letter is treated as too thin because it never really owns the approval that let the mess happen. The lesson is plain. If ownership has learned how hot the stove is, restraint should come before another reckless swing. Cuban hangs around the edges. His minority shareholder role and possible return are framed as league memory, not a magic fix. The segment keeps moving from basketball into governance, credibility, and whether fans can trust power after watching it misread the room. Then the episode turns to subscribers. Slate Plus gets pointed to a bonus segment on Sanders finally getting into an NFL game and struggling. Show notes, email, ratings, production credits, and a remembrance of Zelma Beatty bring it back to podcast housekeeping.

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