Dallas Mavericks Are Bringing Him Back At Last

The tale surrounding Porzingis’ return to Dallas for the NBA Finals has received less attention. A former Maverick has stated that he shouldn’t anticipate a warm reception upon his return to DFW.

This Thursday, June 6, marks the beginning of the NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and Dallas Mavericks. While most of the conversation centers on Kyrie Irving and his impending return to Boston, where he has a tense relationship with the fans, Boston’s Kristaps Porzingis will also be playing against his old team. And if one of his former teammates is to be believed, Porzingis probably won’t get along well in Dallas.

On FanDuelTV’s “Run It Back,” Chandler Parsons—who played for the Dallas Mavericks in 2014–15 and 2015–16—discussed Porzingis’ return to Dallas and how he and Doncic don’t really get along. Parsons is still friendly with Mavs minority owner Mark Cuban.

“Don’t get it confused, they don’t like [Kristaps] Porzingis in Dallas, but it will be lot more vicious towards Kyrie Irving in Boston. Playing alongside him was unpleasant for Luka [Doncic], since there is a real beef there that will result in him being jeered every time he touches the ball.” Parsons would later be pressed to elaborate on these remarks, saying, “Those fans in Dallas are proud, but it didn’t work out for whatever reason.” Should you be injured, unable to play, or not performing to the same level as you did in the years prior to joining the Mavs… You want to show them what they’re lacking and prove something when you play that squad again because the game has more juice to it. Now we’re talking about the NBA Finals.”

Parsons has his own history of being booed by fanbases, so he’s speaking from experience there. After signing a 3-year/$46 million deal with Dallas in 2014, he opted out of the final year to sign a 4-year/$94.4 million contract with the Memphis Grizzlies, notoriously one of the worst contracts in NBA history, where he’d play in just 95 total games and average 7.2 PPG before being traded to the Atlanta Hawks due to injury.

Dallas took a big swing on Porzingis, trading for him, Tim Hardaway Jr., Trey Burke, and Courtney Lee at the 2019 trade deadline in exchange for Dennis Smith Jr., DeAndre Jordan, Wesley Matthews, a 2021 first-round pick and a 2023 top-10 protected first-round pick (Dallas tanked the final two last lasts season to keep that pick and used it to draft Dereck Lively II, the pick rolled over to this season, where it’ll be the 24th overall selection). At the time, Porzingis was out for the season with a torn ACL, but the Mavs were willing to bet on the talent and signed the Latvian to a max contract worth $158 million over five years.

Less than three years after signing that contract, Porzingis was essentially salary-dumped at the 2022 trade deadline along with a second-round pick to the Washington Wizards in exchange for Davis Bertans (who had a bloated salary himself that Dallas would later have to dump) and Spencer Dinwiddie. Dinwiddie was a big part of Dallas’ run to the Western Conference Finals that season and was used to acquire Kyrie Irving the next season, so the Mavericks’ made the most out of his acquisition, but the trade away from Dallas for Porzingis paled in comparison to what they gave up for him. After one season in the nation’s capital, he was traded to Boston as part of a 3-team trade.

By his own admission on an episode on “The Old Man & The Three” podcast with J.J. Redick, Porzingis said that he and Doncic had some tension early on, but they tried to make it work. He said he could’ve been more mature about the situation and both should’ve communicated better but denied not getting along with Doncic by saying it was the “biggest misconception” people had about the situation in a press conference after the trade.

Parsons is exaggerating with his take here, as Mavericks fans don’t have as much beef with Porzingis as they do frustrations from his time with the team as someone who was constantly injured. He came to town with a torn ACL, then tore his meniscus in the 2020 playoffs in the bubble, forcing him to miss games there. His injury history page reads like a CVS receipt but that’s not necessarily something he could control, as players his size are more injury-prone.

Nonetheless, if he’s healthy, his play in this series will be something to monitor as playing against a former team does provide a little extra motivation, as Parsons was alluding to.