Tyson Chandler has no 'ill will' towards Mavericks, despite 'every right to be upset'

Back in Dallas in orange and purple, Tyson Chandler emphasized that he held no hard feelings towards the Mavericks after they let him walk this summer in pursuit of DeAndre Jordan.

"I don't have any ill will or animosity against Mark Cuban, and I damn sure don't have any animosity towards anybody under (him), because everybody else, it was always pleasant," Chandler said on Wednesday before a preseason game. "It didn't work out as far as negotiations and deals with my agent, myself and Mark Cuban, but it doesn't mean I have any animosity towards him or hatred. He did a great job achieve one of my dreams to win a championship. He's done a great job with this organization. I think he made two mistakes."

Chandler said he was convinced he'd return after Cuban said that he "learned from his mistakes" at the beginning of the 2014-15 season. He even said he thought he'd be back leaving the arena after his exit interview last May. But despite the way free agency turned out, he's not upset at Cuban or the Mavericks.

"I loved this city, I embraced this city, I still enjoy the people here," Chandler said. "You can't have animosity when you won a championship somewhere. You can be upset at the way things turned out, but I don't even have animosity against Cuban, to be honest. He made a decision. Do I agree with the decision? No, I don't agree with the decision, but it was his decision to make. It's his team. He owns it. He can make any move he wants to make. You're not always going to agree, but now I'm with a new organization. It's time to move on."

There were some hurt feelings about the deal, although Chandler said they didn't involve Cuban.

"What I was upset about and what I was thinking about was my son," Chandler said. "I walked my son into the arena and I already have my name on the rafters up there (on the championship banner), but I wanted to have my jersey up like. I personally felt like that the time I missed there in the four years (after 2011) and the four years now (had I re-signed), that there's a legacy that I could have left. It honestly came to my mind. It wasn't anything against Mark or the organization. I was thinking about myself, my son, my family. That's what I thought, like, 'Damn.' Then I had to move past that."

Cuban understands where Chandler is coming from.

"Like I've said before, he has every right to be upset," Cuban said. "It just turned out the way it did."

While Chandler said he felt disrespected -- or, at least, blindsided -- by the summer decision, Cuban disagreed.

"There was never any disrespect," Cuban said. "Tyson's a first-class guy in every way, shape and form. There's no possible way I could ever say anything negative about him."

Cuban has said he made a mistake not bringing back Chandler last time. What about this time?

"I don't know," Cuban said. "Time will tell. It depends on how we recover. If you were to base it around the first week of the season, yeah, absolutely, but that's not how you base it."

But clearly, Cuban showed no remorse with the decision this summer.

"I swing for the fences," Cuban said. "That's what we do as an organization. You've got to take chances to win and we've done it before and we'll do it again. Sometimes it works for you, sometimes it doesn't."

Tyson Chandler's come to Dallas twice now on the final year of a deal. Any chance to make it three in a few years?

"You never know what happens in this league," he laughed.