Dallas Mavericks: 3 reasons to build a contender now

2. No significant long-term money allotted

Luckily, the Mavericks don’t have much in the way of “bad money” contracts, whose monetary number far exceed their value. Undoubtedly half of the Mavs fans right now are yelling “DeAndre Jordan!” but his $22.9 million contract (deep breath) expires at the end of this season. Wesley Matthews‘ $18.6 million is also expiring.

The only sizable contracts Dallas is carrying into next year are Harrison Barnes, who has a $25.1 million player option that he is 100 percent picking up, and Dwight Powell, who also has a player option for $10.3 million. Powell will likely pick his up, but that’s not a terrible number for him.

What this all means is there is somewhere in the neighborhood of $50 million available under the cap in the short-term, and that’s a neighborhood that a max player can easily move into. Two max players may be technically possible, but that would mean filling out the roster with minimum deals. As useful as Dorian Finney-Smith and Maxi Kleber are, they aren’t starters on a team with championship aspirations and it’s unlikely they would take the minimum again.

Of course, everyone wants a top player and the Dallas Mavericks haven’t always gotten top free agents. Recently, their big free agent signings have been Wes Matthews coming off of an Achilles tear, Harrison Barnes trying to find his own team, and a sometimes-animated corpse that resembles DeAndre Jordan. Although, in fairness, they’ve signed Jordan one and a half times now.

The Big Ks of free agency in the summer of 2019 — Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard and Kyrie Irving — are unlikely for Dallas to the point of hilarity. The next level down — Jimmy Butler, Kemba Walker, DeMarcus Cousins, Khris Middleton — are more realistic, but many teams have wasted away waiting for a star to sign. Luckily for the Mavs, there is another way.