1. MAVS IN ON MELO, PAU: Over the weekend, Marc Stein had this little bit of information, with free agency only a week away:
Free-agent whisper one week out: Mavs not only expect to have chance to make face-to-face pitch to Melo but also plan to pursue Pau Gasol
— Marc Stein (@ESPNSteinLine) June 22, 2014
Of course, we all know how well the Mavericks pursuit of big name free agents has worked out in the past, and popular sentiment seems to have a few other teams in the "lead" for Carmelo Anthony's services. Pau Gasol is a more interesting prospect, however. We've talked about his fit with the Mavs over the past few weeks: Rami Michail has a breakdown here, and Hal Brown had a breakdown in a recent edition of Statsketball. Check those out if you haven't already, and let's hear your thoughts in the comments!
2. SB NATION BLOGGER MOCK DRAFT IS LIVE: Over at Ridiculous Upside, the SB Nation Blogger's Mock will be updating throughout the day. Tim Cato and Alan Smithee collaborated on the Mavs' pick, and from things they told us other writers, sounds like it was pretty insane. We'll have the stream on our front page here at MMB for your convenience, or head over to their site for some draft prospect research of your own.
3. SPEAKING OF DRAFT PROSPECTS: Some very sad news for Baylor star Isaiah Austin: just four days before he was likely going to begin his NBA journey, a diagnosis of Marfan syndrome means he has to stop playing basketball altogether. Considering he had already overcome the odds to get to this point -- Austin has been blind in one eye since age 16 -- just heartbreaking.
4. MORE DRAFT: Meanwhile, potential number 1 pick Joel Embiid has suffered a stress fracture in his right foot, which will keep him out for a while and could cause his draft stock to fall.
5. DIRK PLAYED SOME BASEBALL: In case you missed it, Tim Cato and I had wall-to-wall coverage of Dirk's Heroes Celebrity Game from Dr. Pepper Ballpark in Frisco this weekend.
While Chandler Parsons didn't make the trip, to my disappointment, many of the Mavericks and Cowboys and a few others were there to pick up the slack. Check out the batting practice report, game preview and how the teams fared. It was a lot of fun, and a sellout crowd:
9200 people came. Insane. Sell out. You guys are amazing. Thanks for supporting my baseball game.
— Dirk Nowitzki (@swish41) June 22, 2014
If you're in the Dallas area, I highly recommend checking it out next year.