It’s been nearly three months since Nico Harrison was fired as general manager of the Mavericks, and the player he preferred to help bring the franchise another championship over Luka Doncic is headed to a new destination.
Anthony Davis is headed to Washington as part of a massive deal including multiple players and draft picks.
Davis, a 10-time NBA All-Star, will be joining the Wizards along with Jaden Hardy, D’Angelo Russell and Dante Exum in exchange for Khris Middleton, AJ Johnson, Malaki Branham, Marvin Bagley III, two first-round and three second-round draft picks, a person with knowledge of the decision confirmed to The Dallas Morning News.
Davis and Kyrie Irving were supposed to take the post-Doncic Mavericks back to the NBA Finals, but they played just three quarters together, and they never had an opportunity to play alongside No. 1 pick Cooper Flagg as a versatile trio of No. 1 overall picks.
The Mavericks mortgaged their future in the years leading to their 2024 Finals run to build around Doncic. Once they acquired Davis, they were left with control of their own 2026 first-round pick and a 2029 first-rounder from the Lakers until 2031.
By trading Davis, they added two more first-rounders to that batch, including the least favorable 2026 pick that will be the least favorable between the LA Clippers, Houston Rockets and Oklahoma City Thunder, along with a 2030 pick that originally belonged to the Golden State Warriors.
Davis’ days in Dallas were seemingly numbered as soon as Harrison was relieved of his duties on Nov. 11, which prompted immediate speculation about his future with the franchise. Davis tried to ignore the trade rumors and said his focus was on basketball, but he hasn’t been able to play much of it because of constant injury misfortune.
“Man, look. Y’all make it like we’re going to war or something. This is basketball. It comes with it,” Davis said on Nov. 26. “I think everybody in their career has been involved in trade talks, or been traded or some type of move. That doesn’t affect me.
“I’ve been in trade talks for a while. My job is to do what I do when I’m on the floor, play basketball and try to lead this team. Whatever comes out of that, comes out of that. I don’t really have any control over that, but I do have an open line of communication with the front office and I’m just ready to get back on the floor.”
He was traded a couple of weeks after he underwent a medical evaluation of his left hand sprain, which is expected to take six weeks to heal.
Mavericks governor Patrick Dumont elevated former assistant general managers Matt Riccardi and Michael Finley to the role of co-interim GMs in November and the duo orchestrated one of the most important trades in franchise history.
Davis and his agent, Rich Paul of Klutch Sports, desired a contract extension when he’s eligible this summer and it appears the Mavericks weren’t willing to make that promise. He is under contract for one more year with a player option for the 2027-28 season.
Those conversations will now be delegated to the Wizards, who could use the entire month of March to integrate Davis into their lineup if he’s healthy enough to return ahead of the playoffs.
The Mavericks, under Harrison, paid an expensive price for 32-year-old Davis by trading a 26-year-old Doncic, a generational superstar who led the franchise to the 2024 NBA Finals alongside Irving. The move was made to fit a three-to-four-year timeline set by the former general manager.
However, Davis was only healthy enough to play in 29 regular season and two Play-In tournament games since the Mavericks acquired him on Feb. 1 2025.
Davis arrived in Dallas with an abdominal strain and suffered a left adductor strain in his anticlimactic debut against the Houston Rockets on Feb. 8, 2025. The Mavericks appeared to be a defensive juggernaut with Davis in the first three quarters until he left the game with an injury. It stands as the only game Davis and Irving played together as Mavericks teammates. Irving’s season was prematurely ended less than a month later when he suffered a torn left ACL.
Since then, Davis underwent an offseason procedure to repair a detached retina and sustained several minor injuries, including a left calf strain, bilateral Achilles tendinopathy, adductor soreness and ligament damage in his left hand that preceded his exit from Dallas.
Davis was dominant when healthy, averaging 20.2 points, 10.8 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.8 blocks in 29 games with the Mavericks. But for all his talents scoring the ball, rebounding and blocking shots, Davis struggled to stay available and he was the physical embodiment of the trade that altered the course of the Mavericks’ history.
The Mavericks will move on from Davis, just as they were forced to do with Doncic. Everything suddenly shifts toward the development of Flagg, the favorite for Rookie of the Year. He may be on a team that has a challenging path toward the Play-In tournament, but the Mavericks begin a new era with he and Irving as the team’s pillars going forward.
In less than a year’s time, Davis had a grand opening and grand closing during his once promising, but complicated tenure in Dallas.
Story by Mike Curtis, The Dallas Morning News
