DALLAS (105.3 The Fan) - Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban agreed with his star player Luka Doncic when the all-star guard criticized the NBA's play-in tournament following the Mavs' loss to the 76ers on Monday.
In an interview with Tim MacMahon of ESPN, Cuban said the decision to hold the play-in games was "an enormous mistake," especially because of this season's compressed 72-game schedule.
"I get why the NBA is doing it," Cuban to ESPN. "But if we are going to be creative because of COVID, we should go straight up 1-20 and let the bottom 4 play in. This is the year particularly to do it since the 10 games cut [from the normal 82-game schedule] were in conference.
"The worst part of this approach is that it doubles the stress of the compressed schedule. Rather than playing for a playoff spot and being able to rest players as the standings become clearer, teams have to approach every game as a playoff game to either get into or stay in the top 6 since the consequences, as Luka said, are enormous. So players are playing more games and more minutes in fewer days."
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As MacMahon points out in his article, Cuban is a part of the league's board of governors, who unanimously approved the play-in tournament this season. The league also used a similar play-in model during the Orlando bubble last summer.
"In hindsight, this approach was an enormous mistake," Cuban told ESPN.
The Mavericks are in seventh place in the Western Conference standings, meaning that if the season were to end today, they would be forced to play a one-game playoff vs the Memphis Grizzlies (currently the No. 8 seed) at the American Airlines Center. Should they win that game, they would enter the playoffs as the seventh seed. If they were to lose that game, they would host the winner of the Spurs (currently the 9th seed) and Warriors (currently the 10th seed) for a win-or-go-home game for the eighth seed.
"In a regular season of 82 games where we aren't playing 30-plus games in 6 weeks, then it might have been OK," Cuban told ESPN. "But the compression of so many games into so few days makes this an enormous mistake. "If we had gone 1 to 16, with the top 12 in, it still would have been rough, but there would have been more separation between play-in and the top 12. This is a season where we have to rest high-usage players. We have no choice. And that can and will have consequences."
The Mavericks typically rest Kristaps Porzingis when the team has a back-to-back situation. Doncic has also been rested on occasion.
The K&C Masterpiece discussed Cuban's take in the video above and in the audio below.
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