Dallas Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison, who's been at the forefront of some of the heaviest criticism any front-office executive in professional sports has ever seen after deciding to trade away Luka Doncic to the Los Angeles Lakers, raised even more eyebrows when he invited select media members to a roundtable discussion to talk about everything that went down leading up to one of the league's most perplexing developments.

Harrison then proceeded to invite more scathing criticism upon himself and the Mavericks organization with the way he addressed multiple aspects of the Doncic trade. Suffice to say, none of that is helping matters; in fact, it seems to have worsen fan perception towards him that was already in the gutter prior to the roundtable discussion.

But according to Shams Charania of ESPN, it wasn't Harrison who thought of hosting this roundtable with the media, it was Mavericks governor Patrick Dumont.

“Nico Harrison did not want to do this closed-door roundtable. This was not his idea. This was something that was enforced by their owner, Patrick Dumont,” Charania said on ESPN countdown prior to the play-in tournament clash between the Miami Heat and Chicago Bulls.

This roundtable was supposed to perhaps shed more light into the Mavericks' thought process behind the flabbergasting Doncic trade. But instead, Harrison's comments have only served to widen the chasm between him and the team's fanbase while proving how indefensible his decision to trade a perennial First Team All-NBA player truly is.

There were good intentions behind what the Mavericks did, but former general manager Bob Myers knows that this did not work out the way they had intended.

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“In a situation like that, they were trying to repair some things. It felt like that. [But] it felt like some of the comments did not land,” Myers said.

Nico Harrison's days with the Mavericks might be numbered

Dallas Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison walks off the court before the game between the Dallas and the Sacramento Kings at the American Airlines Center
Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

When an NBA franchise goes through this steep of a drop-off, there tends to be someone singled out as the scapegoat. For the Mavericks, there is no easier scapegoat than Nico Harrison, and he could very well be let go from his job if the team doesn't return to playoff contention next season.

Harrison has repeatedly justified the Doncic trade by saying that “defense wins championships”. If that vision of his doesn't come to fruition, then it might be best for the Mavericks to go a different direction moving forward.