Mavericks Rebuild Gets Real: Rookies Shine, Kyrie Nears Return

For the first time since the Luka Doncic trade cratered the franchise's credibility, the Dallas Mavericks spent a week looking like a team with a plan instead of a cautionary tale. The rookies carried Dallas to a 3-2 finish in Las Vegas, with lottery pick Morez Johnson Jr. announcing himself before a calf scare cut his summer short. Kyrie Irving told the world he's "definitely close" to 100 percent in his ACL rehab. And hovering over all of it is the new brain trust — Masai Ujiri upstairs, Dusty May on the bench — tasked with building something sturdy around Cooper Flagg. If you've been avoiding Dallas Mavericks news since February out of self-preservation, this is the week it became safe to look again.

The rookies ran summer league, in a good way

Dallas went 3-2 in Vegas and closed on a high, beating Memphis 96-88 on Monday and finishing with a Friday-night win over the Knicks on July 17. The through-line all week: the 2026 draft class looked ahead of schedule while the older fringe guys mostly didn't. The headliners:

• Morez Johnson Jr. (No. 9 overall) erupted for 27 points on 12-of-17 shooting with eight rebounds in his debut against Golden State, and across his two appearances averaged 18.5 points, 6.5 boards, 2.5 steals and 3.0 blocks on 64 percent shooting. Calf soreness held him to those two games — the Mavericks, burned by recent history, took no chances.
• Sergio de Larrea, the Spanish first-round guard, barely shot (27.3 percent from the field) and it barely mattered: 8.8 assists per game, including a 14-assist night that set a Mavericks summer league record. Sixteen points and 12 assists against Memphis was the fullest version of what Dallas hopes he becomes.
• Tobi Lawal (No. 48) flashed elite athleticism and not much else yet; he'll develop on a two-way deal. Draft-and-stash candidate Vsevolod Ishchenko quietly impressed with 9.6 points a game and 40 percent three-point shooting.

The flip side: sophomores and two-way hopefuls like Ryan Nembhard and Tyler Smith did little to claim the roster's back end — Nembhard shot 3-for-11 with five turnovers against the Lakers, and Smith logged just 28 total minutes before sitting the Memphis game. That contrast gives the new front office honest questions to answer about the last few roster spots come September.

A rookie built to run with Cooper Flagg

The Johnson buzz isn't just about the stat line. Scouts and Mavericks staff kept returning to the same theme in Vegas: he's a 20-year-old who defends multiple positions, sprints the floor, finishes everything and genuinely does not care whether he scores 30 or seven. That profile matters because the entire organization is now oriented around one player. Flagg won Rookie of the Year at 21.0 points per game on a team that lost 56 times — a historically strange season in which the best thing in franchise history and the worst record in a generation arrived together. Johnson gives Flagg a running mate his own age who takes nothing off the table offensively and adds real menace defensively. That's how you build around a star without crowding him.

Ujiri, Dusty May and the great housecleaning

Zoom out and the past few months read like a controlled demolition followed by very deliberate rebuilding. Masai Ujiri was named president of basketball operations on May 4. Jason Kidd and the team parted ways on May 19 after a 26-56 season, with Dallas eating a reported $40-plus million in remaining salary to do it. On June 22, Ujiri landed his coach: Dusty May, 49, fresh off leading Michigan to the 2026 NCAA title and 64-13 across two seasons in Ann Arbor, with a Final Four at Florida Atlantic already on the resume. A college coach jumping to an NBA rebuild is always a bet, but May's teams defend, share the ball and develop young players — which describes exactly the roster he's inheriting alongside GM Mike Schmitz.

The demolition part came earlier, and it still frames everything: at February's deadline Dallas sent Anthony Davis — who managed just 20 games as a Maverick — to Washington in a three-team deal that also moved D'Angelo Russell, Jaden Hardy and Dante Exum, returning Khris Middleton, young pieces and a stack of picks while clearing roughly $57 million. One of those incoming first-rounders became the No. 30 pick in June. The AD era in Dallas lasted barely a year and will be remembered as the epilogue to the Doncic trade; the picks and the cap sheet are what's left, and Ujiri has already started spending them.

July's moves: Aldama in, dead weight out

Free agency itself has been surgical rather than splashy. On July 1 the Mavericks acquired Santi Aldama from Memphis for AJ Johnson, a 2030 first-round pick and two second-rounders — a 25-year-old stretch big who fits the Flagg timeline and gives May frontcourt versatility. Marvin Bagley III, a deadline throw-in, walked to Denver. Middleton, Dwight Powell and Brandon Williams remain unsigned free agents, and there's no indication Dallas is rushing to resolve any of them. For a franchise that spent two years lurching between win-now gambles, the restraint is itself notable: keep the books clean, collect players aged 20 to 26, let the stars determine the timeline.

Kyrie's rehab, and the season's biggest question

Which brings us to Kyrie Irving. The ACL tear in March 2025 cost him all of last season — the first full season he's ever missed — and on a livestream this past Friday he sounded like a man nearing the end of the tunnel, saying he's "definitely close to being over at 100 percent." Schmitz says Irving has been at the facility "almost daily." He's 34, with one guaranteed year left plus a 2027-28 player option, and Ujiri has been openly curious about the fit: there is, in his words, "huge curiosity in our minds to see how Kyrie fits playing with Cooper Flagg." Nobody in Dallas has seen that pairing yet — Flagg's entire rookie year happened while Irving rehabbed. Whether it's a bridge, a partnership or a trade chip depends on what October looks like, and de Larrea, for one, has already said he's eager to learn from him.

What's next for the Mavericks

The calendar ahead is refreshingly normal for a team that hasn't been normal in 18 months. Training camp opens in late September — May's first as an NBA head coach — with opening night in late October. Between now and then, watch for resolution on Middleton's free agency, the back-of-roster battles the summer league sophomores failed to settle, and above all the medical reports on Irving and Johnson's calf.

The Dallas Mavericks won't be confused with a contender in the West next season, and after 26 wins nobody should pretend otherwise. But the pieces finally point the same direction: a Rookie of the Year entering year two, a lottery big who plays like a bouncer with a motor, a pass-first rookie guard, a coach who just won a national title, and a Hall of Fame guard nearly back from the abyss. This week was the first one in a long while where following the Mavericks felt like anticipation instead of damage assessment. That's not a banner. It's a start.