Mark Cuban thought he had a fallback. The Mavericks were going to go hard after Deron Williams, but that might not work, the Nets were always in that picture (and really always in the lead).
But if D-Will didn’t work out — and he didn’t, he signed to stay in Brooklyn — then there was Jason Kidd. Cuban thought he had a deal there with a guy he could trust, a guy who was part of the Mavericks title team. Cuban thought he had a three year, $9 million locked in to keep Kidd.
Then Kidd backed out last minute and signed essentially the same deal with the Knicks.
Cuban is pissed. Still. His business sensibilities were offended, and his feelings were hurt. Here is what he said on ESPN Dallas Radio’s “Ben & Skin Show (via ESPNDallas.com).“I was more than upset. I thought he was coming. I was pissed,” Cuban said. “J-Kidd is a big boy; he can do whatever he wants. But you don’t change your mind like that. That was ... yeah. I’m sure I’ll get over it at some point, but as of now, I wouldn’t put J-Kidd’s number in the rafters.
“It hurt my feelings, period, because I felt that we had developed a relationship, and I thought that he was committed to the organization. It sure seemed that he was. I mean, J-Kidd was active in going out there and talking to Deron Williams the whole time. I guess it was more shocking and surprising than anything else.”
I’m sure Cuban has never left any of his business partners feeling this way. Well, except for the guy that sued him saying Cuban falsified the books for the Mavericks (a judge did toss that suit out). And there are probably a lot of other guys who feel Cuban stepped on them on the way to the top.
Cuban will eventually come around. Probably. But don’t expect Kidd’s number in the Dallas rafters anytime soon.
As for Deron Williams… that was business. No hard feelings there.“I don’t want to pick on Deron Williams because he’s a great, great, great player, and so it’s not necessarily him, per se,” Cuban said. “The conversation we had going back and forth -- and obviously the decision was to go for him -- but the conversation was, ‘OK, once you add $17.1 million in salary to what we’d have with Dirk and Trix (Shawn Marion), then what do you do?’ That’s your squad. And it’s not just your squad for this year. It’s your squad for next year other than the $3.3 million mini midlevel.
“So that was a challenge that we had because we want to win, and everybody talks about Dirk’s window. Well, not only would it have been difficult to add players, then it also would have been difficult to trade players, and in reality that was the same problem that Deron had. Because he looked and saw the same thing and said, ‘OK, now what are you going to do?’”