The Dallas Mavericks brought Klay Thompson in via free agency with the specific goal of putting him alongside Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving. Thompson is no longer the player he once was during his heyday, but he still remains one of the most high-volume three-point marksmen in the entire association. Thus, replacing Derrick Jones Jr. with Thompson means that Doncic and Irving will have even more space to work with.
However, there's no reason for the Mavericks to risk the health of either Doncic or Irving after the grueling playoff run they had, so it makes sense that they had to sit out their preseason contest against the Los Angeles Clippers on Monday night. But this meant that Thompson had to take on the role of the first offensive option — something he's not particularly equipped to handle at this stage of his career.
Thompson promptly went on to put up a goose egg during the Mavericks' 110-96 preseason defeat to the Clippers. In a performance reminiscent of the way he performed during the Golden State Warriors' play-in tournament loss to the Sacramento Kings, Thompson missed all nine of his shots from the field, with six of those coming from beyond the arc.
At this point, giving Thompson such a huge offensive burden is setting him up for failure. Fans circled Thompson like vultures following his dreadful performance, with many making fun of his putrid night for the Mavericks.
“trade klay if he ever does some s**t like this again,” X user @Nowitzki_szn wrote.
“Did this fool Klay Thompson forget how to shoot or what bruh? 🤦🏽♂️,” @Leek_Stackhouse wondered.
“Heard someone say Klay’s improving cuz he only went 0-9,” @ShaiSweep furthered.
Just to make matters worse for Thompson, he is shooting 3-28 from the field over his past three games. That is not a good sign at all for the Mavericks.
Things will look different for Thompson and the Mavericks once Doncic and Irving are back on the active lineup. But this Monday night preseason performance did not give fans any reason to be confident in a career revival for the future Hall of Famer.
Some Mavericks fans preach patience amid Klay Thompson's struggles
Klay Thompson is in the middle of a rut, there are no doubts about it. But his long track record of solid outside marksmanship should ease some of the Mavericks' fans worries surrounding Thompson.
As the Mavs Film Room account on X (formerly known as Twitter) pointed out, Thompson, in his final 25 regular-season games for the Warriors, shot 41.6 percent from deep on 9.7 attempts per game. Thompson still requires plenty of defensive attention along the perimeter, and the Mavericks know that he'll be playing a much more comfortable off-ball role when Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving are back.
Moreover, a Warriors fan on Reddit reminded the Mavericks faithful that Thompson is a notoriously slow starter. This, perhaps, is even truer now that Thompson is older and worse as a player. At the very least, Thompson is already getting the bricks out of his system in games that don't count in the win-loss tally.