A proposed three-team trade would send Michael Porter Jr. to Dallas, but the medical risk, contract situation and cost make it hard to justify for the Mavericks.
Seven days before the draft, mock trade proposals are getting increasingly creative. Brett Siegel of ClutchPoints put together a three-team deal involving Dallas, Brooklyn and Boston in his latest mock draft that is ambitious enough to stop you mid-scroll. The structure has Dallas sending Klay Thompson, the ninth pick and Daniel Gafford to Brooklyn and Boston in exchange for Michael Porter Jr., Day’Ron Sharpe, the 27th pick and three future first- and second-round selections. Siegel frames it as Masai Ujiri taking a swing early in the Cooper Flagg era.
On the surface, there is some kind of logic Dallas ranked near the bottom of the league in 3-point shooting last season and Porter averaged 24.2 points, 7.1 rebounds and 3.4 3-pointers over 52 games this season before a hamstring injury ended his year in early April. He is a career 40.9% 3-point shooter who would give the Mavericks real spacing alongside Flagg and a returning Kyrie Irving. The future draft capital returning in the deal also speaks to a real organizational need.
But the medical history is the first problem and it is a significant one. Porter missed his entire rookie season with a back injury after being drafted 14th overall in 2018. His 2021-22 season was cut short by a herniated disk, leading to his third back surgery. He has dealt with back, hamstring, knee and ankle issues across his career, appearing in more than 50 games in a season just three times in eight years. This past season alone, he missed time with a back injury, a knee injury, a hamstring strain and an ankle sprain.
Dallas spent two years watching Anthony Davis barely play after acquiring him despite a known injury history. Adding a player whose entire career has been defined by durability concerns is not learning from that experience.
The contract structure makes it worse; Porter is entering the final year of his deal at $40.8 million. He will be extension-eligible in July and, following a career-best season, is expected to seek significant long-term money. According to ClutchPoints, league sources are skeptical about whether Brooklyn will commit to a major extension given his injury history and its rebuilding timeline. If Dallas acquires Porter and cannot sign him to an extension, it will have traded the ninth pick and two rotation veterans for one year of an injured player and nothing else.
The future picks returning sound appealing until they are examined. The most meaningful first-round pick coming back is a 2029 selection that is the least favorable of three options, meaning Dallas likely receives a pick at the bottom of the first round. A 2031 Boston second-round pick is six years away. Day’Ron Sharpe and the 27th pick round out the return.
Here is the honest truth, though. Nobody outside the Mavericks’ war room has any real idea what Ujiri and Matt Schmitz are planning. They have been in Dallas for six weeks. They have been running workouts, taking meetings and building a framework the public has not seen. What Ujiri has proven over two decades in Denver and Toronto is that he does not make decisions that look good on a tweet. He makes decisions that hold up five years later.
The Siegel trade does not pass that test. Whatever Ujiri and Schmitz ultimately do June 23 will be built for the Flagg era, not borrowed against it.
