In a sit down on ‘All the Smoke’ podcast, Knicks guard Jalen Brunson revealed just how badly the Mavericks were ready to move on from him leading up to the summer of 2022. Apparently, he approached the Mavericks twice with a four-year, $55 million contract extension and was denied both times before ultimately signing for $104 million with the Knicks that summer.
“I really did want to stay in Dallas,” said Brunson. “Before my last season in Dallas, we tried to extend our contract. The most we could get was four years, $55 million. I wanted to do that, I wanted to stay there and I thought I’d be there for a really long time. My agent was like ‘you could get more you could get more’ but I’m saying I want to be safe… but they wanted to see where they were at like 20-25 games in the season. And then we get there and we go back and say ‘if the deal is still there we are thinking about it, I’ll do it like right now.’ Still, it was a no. Then the deal came on the table after the trade deadline and I was like… no. I think I’ve outgrown that now.”
It can be easy to forget just how good Brunson was for the Mavericks. While he has been better with the Knicks, Jalen was still a great co-star for Doncic with averages of 16.3 points, 4.8 assists, and 0.8 steals per game on 50.2% shooting.
Instead of settling for whatever offer the Mavericks gave him, Brunson bet on himself when nobody else would and it has paid off for him in major ways both on and off the court. This season, with career-highs across the board, Brunson was named to his first-ever All-Star team and it’s the latest milestone for his impressive rise to stardom.
The Dallas Mavericks Made A Big Mistake
Since leaving Luka’s side, Jalen Brunson has proven to be a bonafide star in the NBA and he’s the newest face of a Knicks team that has taken the basketball world by storm. As a leader, scorer, and playmaker for the Knicks, Brunson has impressed at every level and he’s on track to take the Knicks deeper than they’ve been in decades.
While Brunson is hardly alone on the Knicks and has help in the form of Julius Randle, OG Anunoby, and Mitchell Robinson (when healthy), it’s his rise to stardom that has breathed life back into Madison Square Garden. The height of this era for them was last year’s run to the East Semi-Finals, where they gave the Miami Heat a good fight over 6 games.
Meanwhile, in Dallas, the guy that they brought in to replace Brunson hasn’t quite lived up to expectations. While Kyrie Irving is still good for 25.5 points per game, he’s not someone who can be counted on to deliver from day to day due to injuries or some other personal reason. This season, Irving has only played in 33 of the Mavericks’ games so far and the team hasn’t really had an answer for his absence as they fight for a lower-seeded playoff spot.
Had the Mavericks just kept Brunson back then, and used their assets to acquire an edge defensively, they might be in an entirely different situation today, and Luka might have a better chance of winning his first NBA championship.
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