LeBron James to the Mavs will only happen in Kyrie Irving’s delusional dreams

Criss ParteeCriss Partee|published: Mon Jun 05 2023 20:10
source: Getty Images

Kyrie Irving may have finally lost his ever-loving mind. Rumors of a reunion between Irving and LeBron James have been tossed around like cornhole sacks over the past few months. But that scenario usually involves “Kai”  heading west to join James and Anthony Davis in Los Angeles. It was reported Monday morning by Shams Charania that Irving has reached out to James about the King making a move to Dallas, joining him and Luka Dončić.

On the surface, Mavs fans might get excited by this news, but we’re going to burst your bubble right now because there’s no way it’ll happen. Dončić, Irving, and James will not be part of the Mavs’ NBA opening day lineup for the 2023-24 season. Dallas doesn’t have the assets to acquire LeBron via trade, and James leaving Hollywood for North Texas isn’t likely.

Oh look, Kyrie is being weird again


Whether this is realistic on the part of Kyrie won’t matter. Even if Dallas could pull off the trade and Irving convinced James to do it, this setup probably wouldn’t work. All three players are accustomed to operating with the ball in their hands. Add to that the lack of depth the team would suffer from based on the contracts of three guys. Not to mention how much tougher the new CBA would make it to form this new super team.

The Mavs aren’t in a great spot currently, based on how deep the Western Conference has become, but the only thing this trio would guarantee is selling out every home game without much effort. Signing Irving to a long-term deal, to begin with, is viewed as a risk based on the past few years of his career. It sounds like he and LeBron want that old thing back, but that championship run in Cleveland was so long ago. It’s been seven years since Kyrie hit the biggest shot of his career in game seven of the NBA Finals to defeat the Golden State Warriors.

Nostalgia is terrific in the right setting, but this reunion isn’t suitable for Dallas, and Luka should want no part of it. Anybody that plays alongside LeBron becomes second fiddle, even at this stage of his phenomenal career. Then you’d have Kyrie trying to be the leader nobody wants to follow. They’d win some games, but ultimately they’d get exposed in the postseason because they’d play one-on-one hero ball all day.

This all sounds like a ploy and a way of leveraging contract talks and getting the Lakers to take the bait on bringing Irving to LA. If there’s any chance James might want to leave, maybe LA flips and signs Kyrie to keep King James happy. Honestly, it sounds like a stretch, and it sounds like LeBron is the primary advocate for Kai joining the Lakers. While that also seems unlikely, it’s more believable than James going to Dallas.