The Dallas Mavericks shocked one and all by parting ways with Luka Doncic, and more details are now coming out on why they took that drastic step. On an episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast, insider Ethan Sands reported that the Mavericks were worried Doncic could become injury-prone like Joel Embiid due to his conditioning.
“The biggest thing, when talking to people around the league, obviously there was worry about Luka Doncic’s conditioning,” Sands said. “As we all know, as we all read, as has been reported, he’s gotten up to 270 pounds, right? And that’s something, that apparently according to my sources, that the Dallas Mavericks were feeling like it could end up being a Joel Embiid-type situation.
“And if that is the case, then it is completely—it’s not warranted, this doesn’t make everything okay,” Sands continued. “But to think about a star player that has come through the league, who has had that kind of impact on a team like Joel Embiid, but he’s not available and he wasn’t able to lead his team because of all these injuries and things like that, it makes it a little bit better, more easy to swallow.”
Doncic could turn out to be like Embiid in the future, but we have seen nothing so far that suggests that would happen. Prior to this season, the fewest games the five-time All-Star played in a single campaign in his career was 61 in 2019-20.
The Mavericks only played 75 games that season due to COVID-19, so he only missed 14 games. Doncic also played 70 games in 2023-24, and that’s something Embiid has never been able to do. So, as things stand, it would be unfair to lump him with the Philadelphia 76ers superstar, which makes this reasoning not all that convincing.
There is good reason to believe that the Mavericks were thinking along these lines, though. Doncic, who is averaging 28.1 points, 8.3 rebounds, 7.8 assists, 2.0 steals, and 0.4 blocks per game in 2024-25, has been out with a calf strain since December. You’d expect the Mavericks to have felt for him when it happened but NBA insider Tim MacMahon stated on 105.3 The Fan that the team wasn’t feeling too bad.
“I can just tell you that when Luka strained his calf on Christmas Day, there wasn’t like a big feeling of sympathy throughout the organization,” MacMahon said. “It was, “Man, this is what happens when you don’t care about condition, when you don’t care about diet.
“What the Mavericks were kind of slick about, that calf contusion that he suffered just before camp, there was also a strain then,” MacMahon added. “So, we’re talking four strains on one calf in three years. A chronic problem.”
That calf injury led to Doncic being overweight coming into the season, and the Mavericks weren’t too happy about that. MacMahon also reported that the Mavericks gave Doncic an 11-day midseason break in late November to lose weight. He had been listed out with a right wrist sprain but the real reason appears to be weight loss.
This clearly seems to be something the Mavericks were quite concerned about. It looks like believe Doncic’s body will break down a lot sooner than many expect and time will tell if they were right.
If the injury bug stays away, though, it’s hard to see how this won’t go down as one of the worst trades in NBA history. Not only did they let go of a generational talent, but they only got Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and a 2029 first-round pick in return for him from the Los Angeles Lakers. That’s simply not a good enough haul.
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