Cooper Flagg Should Threaten to Go Back to College if Nico Harrison Isn't Fired
Just wanted to float this out there in case Cooper Flagg is an avid reader of the Barstool Sports blog in the Year of The Snake, 2025. The Dallas Mavericks won the NBA Draft Lottery on Monday night. They had a 1.8% of chance getting the first over pick, and it happened. They we're literally, according to the NBA's new stupid format, a "playoff team" this season. Had they not lost the 8th-seed play-in game to the Memphis Grizzlies, they wouldn't even have been in the lottery. They likely wouldn't have been in that position at all had their GM Nico Harrison not made arguably the worst trade in NBA history by sending Luka Doncic to the Lakers for Anthony Davis. Even if Luka Doncic balloons up to 800-pounds this off-season. Even if Luka Doncic never plays a game of basketball again and Anthony Davis rattles off six straight NBA championships, making that trade is still a fireable offense because he didn't bother putting in the work to shop his superstar player around for the best offer. The move was so unprecedentedly bad, people thought it must have been part of a conspiracy to tank the Mavericks franchise and move them to Las Vegas. And now, since they've won the lottery, people believe the trade to be part of a different conspiracy in which the NBA promised Dallas that if they traded Luka to Los Angeles, they would rig the lottery for them in the upcoming draft.
I don't quite buy all that lottery conspiracy talk. It would have all been contingent on the Mavericks not making the playoffs. Maybe Adam Silver could have given Nico Harrison a vague IOU, and it just so happened the opportunity presented itself right away. But that's not the point. Mavericks fans hate Nico Harrison. They were livid with the Luka trade. There were protests outside the stadium.
The whole fanbase hates him. The entire NBA thinks Nico Harrison is a joke. Every decision he makes seems to be the wrong one. He's firing beloved Mavericks staffers while they're home with their dying mother. He's driving Dirk Nowitzki away from the team.
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He's kicking fans out of games for voicing their opinions.
Every time he steps up to a mic (or to a podium in a closed door, no-cameras-allowed press conference) he says something to make things worse.
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I can't speak for Mavs fans, but I'm pretty when they won the lottery, as thrilled as they all are to be getting Cooper Flagg, it still probably sucks to see Nico Harrison be rewarded for his incompetence, and fail upwards yet again. I'm sure in some ways it's a bittersweet thing. It must be terrible to have your interests as a fan be aligned with the job security of a man you so deeply despise.
Which means Cooper Flagg has a chance to do the funniest thing ever. He could be a hero to the city of Dallas. A hero to the world of basketball as a whole. Maybe I'm grossly misjudging how much power Cooper Flagg & the Mavericks fan base have, but hypothetically speaking, what would happen if Cooper Flagg came out tomorrow and said he will not play for Dallas, and go back to college unless Nico Harrison is fired? Would that work? It would almost have to. I can't imagine there would be a single Mavericks fan outside of Nico Harrison's immediate family who would choose him over Cooper Flagg. I don't think there's a basketball fan in the world who wouldn't take immense satisfaction in watching Cooper Flagg force Nico Harrison out of Dallas.
Cooper Flagg could do it purely for petty reasons and fans would largely be on his side. But as a potential future superstar in the league, you could argue it would be in his best interest. He saw what Nico Harrison did to Luka Doncic, a player who was doing everything for that franchise. Someone who could not have been more beloved by the fan base. Who wants to play for a GM who would do that to his superstar player, fresh off an NBA Finals appearance? Especially in the NIL era, where Cooper Flagg could go back to college and barely take a financial hit. He could enter the NBA now and sign a 4-year rookie deal that'll net him about $60 million, or go make roughly $10 million for another single year of college. Financially speaking, it would not be that crazy of a move.
Now it might be a crazy move in the sense that Cooper Flagg is walking into an awesome situation with the Mavericks. Nico Harrison aside, the eventual starting five for Dallas next season could be a good, if not better than any starting five a #1 overall draft pick has ever walked into before.
There's some injury concerns there. Kyrie isn't even going to be ready by the start of the season. It's certainly not the youngest group of stars the NBA has to offer. But to risk passing on that situation only to end up playing for someone like the Wizards, where best case scenario he ends up like Cade Cunningham on Detroit as part of a long rebuild, and still only be knocking on the door of contending four years later. It's entirely possible the Mavericks owners would tell Cooper Flagg to go fuck himself. It's pretty clear their new ownership group isn't made up of Mark Cuban's who want nothing more than to win basketball games. If that happens, then Cooper Flagg ends up in a situation where he has to decide between going back to college, or letting the Mavericks call his bluff and join the team with his tail tucked between his legs. But even if they did call his bluff, I think Mavericks fans as a whole would still appreciate his effort. They would probably love him even more for it.
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But I really think it would work. If the Mavericks ownership cares about money, and are not actively trying to tank the franchise to move them to Las Vegas, I don't know how they could choose a universally hated GM over Cooper Flagg. The fans would demand it. They would riot over it. Even without Cooper Flagg in the picture, Mavericks fans already want Nico gone. The only reason I can see them wanting to keep him around is if they truly believe he's part of a greater NBA conspiracy that will benefit the Mavericks in a long run. Like if they think even after the draft lottery, Adam Silver might still owe them one. But if conspiracy theories aren't in play, I gotta believe it would result in Cooper Flagg walking into an awesome situation with the Dallas Mavericks, under a new GM, as the hero who ran the evil Nico Harrison out of town.
Just an idea, Cooper.