The Dallas Mavericks became the most watched team in the NBA in the 2023 offseason, and their guard Kyrie Irving, who was hard to spend a high price to acquire in the 2022-23 season, was finally re-signed by the team.
Although Kyrie Irving has many problems off the court, he is still the league's top guard when he focuses on the field. In 2022-23, he played 20 games for the Dallas Mavericks, averaging 27.0 points, 5.0 rebounds, and 6.0 assists per game. This performance is also one of the best performances of Kyrie Irving's career.
Unfortunately, the 2022-23 Dallas Mavericks failed to make the playoffs, which also led to a lot of scandals on the team about Kyrie Irving being signed and then sent away by the team. Finally, the Lone Rangers offered Kyrie Irving a three-year, $126 million contract extension in the 2023 offseason.
Although Kyrie Irving can't team up with LeBron James again as he wishes, teaming up with Luka Doncic to create the league's strongest backcourt double gun is also full of highlights. Kyrie Irving assists Luka Doncic, which obviously seems unlikely for Kyrie Irving, because he asked the Cavaliers to let LeBron James assist him and serve as the leader of the team, but he was forced to fail and was traded to the Boston Celtics.
Now after several turns, he has come to the Lone Rangers to join Luka Doncic, and it is unlikely that he will be the leader of the team. Because team owner Mark Cuban has publicly stated that the leader of the Dallas Mavericks is Luka Doncic, which is Luka Doncic's team.
"I think Kyrie Irving is mature now, he knows it's Luca's team and Luca knows that. He knows that's what matters, and he's willing to play more of a shooting guard. When Luca is not there, we have a point guard who can score and create opportunities for other people, and they are all players who make teammates better, and we didn't have such players before. ”
Mark Cuban added: "Once Luca was out, we struggled, we struggled very much, Luca had to do too much and we put a lot of pressure on Luca. We did struggle defensively after the trade, but there were a lot of reasons for that, not Luka or Kyrie Irving, but offensively, you know, we had a top-tier lineup and we were the top two or three in the NBA. ”
In the 2022-23 season, Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving played 16 games together, the team only achieved a 5-11 record, the team only achieved a 38-44 record, and finally deliberately gave up to enter the playoffs. Mark Cuban still likes Kyrie Irving's words, because Mark Cuban loves basketball and likes players with top basketball ability. Kyrie Irving's idol is Kobe, who in turn is Mark Cuban's favorite rival player.
"Kyrie Irving just loves basketball and loves going to the game, so I'm not worried about that. But we traded him because we wanted him to be a long-term piece, you know? I think Kyrie Irving was just misunderstood. Everyone sees the noise and everything around him, but I like him when you really talk to him. He's open, he's smart, he's always trying to learn, he's a fun guy. ”
Kyrie Irving always plays a pleasing basketball game on the court, which is one of the reasons why he is still loved by the fan media even if he has a lot of off-court questions.