There is real threat the Dallas Mavericks could lose Jalen Brunson in free agency, but by the looks of it, the team has no one to blame but themselves.
The New York Knicks are increasingly likely to land Brunson when free agency opens on Thursday night, with the team reportedly ready to offer him a lucrative four-year, $100 million contract. Not to mention that they are ready to give him the starting point guard role and the keys to the offense of the team.
Ahead of the expected massive contract Brunson could get, Callie Caplan of the Dallas Morning News revealed that Dallas could have signed Brunson for a cheaper deal. However, they never offered it to the rising star guard during last summer.
Since last offseason, Brunson has been eligible for a four-year, $55 million extension to the second-round rookie year contract he signed in 2018.
But the Mavericks didn’t present it to Brunson’s camp before the season or at the midway point — when an agreement before the trade deadline would’ve made Brunson ineligible for Dallas to include in a potential deal.
The said deal was the same contract Dorian Finney-Smith immediately signed with the Mavs midway through last season. With that said, the Mavs are probably regretting the decision now.
For what it's worth, after not extending the new contract in the previous offseason, the Mavs tried to present Brunson with a new deal once he started thriving in the second half of the 2021-22 campaign. Nonetheless, the 25-year-old guard refused to negotiate and wanted to focus on the task at hand.
Jalen Brunson could really end up with the Knicks when free agency opens on Thursday, and unfortunately for the Mavs, they cannot do anything if that happens.
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