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News broke Thursday evening that Dallas has entered negotiations to hire Jason Kidd as it’s next head coach.
The rumors began early in the day with former coach Rick Carlisle suggesting to EPSN’s Tim MacMahon that he’d like to see Kidd get the job in Dallas.
Rick Carlisle on his Mavs: "It's hard to put an exact finger on it. It’s just a feeling that I had that it would be mutually beneficial. My hope is that Jason Kidd will be the next coach of the Mavs because he and Luka have so many things in common as players."
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) June 24, 2021
An odd thing for the former coach to suggest, unprompted, on the same day he lands his new gig in Indiana. What many initially brushed off solidified later in the day as news broke from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and MacMahon that Kidd was indeed the front runner for the head coaching job, and it was apparently given the green light from a yet to be announced GM. This is despite the fact that Cuban stated he wanted a GM in place before making a coaching hire.
The Dallas Mavericks are closing in on the hiring a new GM and Jason Kidd has emerged as a strong frontrunner to be hired as head coach, sources tell @espn_macmahon and me.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) June 24, 2021
Shortly after the news from Woj and MacMahon, Marc Stein of The New York Times published a tweet that went even further, saying the team and Kidd were already in contract negotiations.
The Mavericks have opened contract negotiations with Jason Kidd to be their next coach, league sources say, with support from their leading (but not yet identified) top candidate for head of basketball operations.
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) June 24, 2021
All of this has come as a bit of a shock to MFFL twitter, as Kidd was perhaps the name most often brought up as the name they’d least want to step into the empty coaching position. Our own Doyle Rader just today went through the reasons Kidd would be a bad pick for the job, noting his shortcomings both on and off the court.
Nothing has been finalized, but it feels like we’re just short of an official Mavericks press release at this point. Kidd currently serves as an assistant coach for the Lakers after previous head coaching stops in Brooklyn and Milwaukee.
Here’s our episode of the Mavs Moneyball Podcast discussing the Dallas Mavericks hiring Jason Kidd and Nico Harrison. Search Mavs Moneyball Podcast on your favorite app to find the episode, click the link, or press play in the player below.