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Dallas Mavericks minority owner Mark Cuban strongly criticized NBA players’ participation in the Olympics during a recent appearance on SiriusXM NBA Radio, calling for the tournament to be limited to players 21 years old and younger.
“I hated it,” Cuban said. “I complained about it every single year because with my attitude, guys going to play for the Olympics… Comcast NBC is making billions, right? The IOC making billions, even FIBA making a lot.”
Cuban argued that NBA players are sent to international competition without compensation while risking injury, placing the burden on the league and its teams.
“And we’re giving all these guys for free and taking all the injury risk,” he said. “Now there hasn’t been dramatic injuries, but all you need to know is if a guy is a free agent and hurt, he ain’t playing.”
His comments come in the wake of multiple injuries to key members of Team USA who participated in the 2024 Paris Olympics. While the United States captured the gold medal in Paris without incident, several players later suffered major injuries during the NBA season. Jayson Tatum tore his Achilles in the second round of the playoffs. Tyrese Haliburton suffered the same injury during Game 7 of the NBA Finals. Joel Embiid, who dealt with knee issues throughout the year, was limited to just 19 games.
Mark Cuban says he hates NBA players participating in the Olympics and believes it should be limited to players 21 years old and younger
“We’re giving all these guys for free and taking the injury risk.”
(🎥 @SiriusXMNBA ) pic.twitter.com/J3Xu36PIg0
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) July 12, 2025
Mark Cuban urges NBA to adopt soccer-style Olympic age limit and launch its own World Cup alternative
Cuban pointed to international soccer’s Olympic model as a potential blueprint for the NBA.
“What I would tell David Stern and then Adam [Silver]… you know how in soccer for the Olympics it’s 21 and under or 22 and under, whatever it is. And then they own the World Cup, and the World Cup is a bigger event – I’m like, give them more young kids, right?” he said. “Do the same thing as soccer, let the 21 and under play for the Olympics and then create our own international world cup, instead of just the All-Star Game.”
Cuban said the NBA has yet to fully consider the idea due to its existing contract with FIBA.
“They were like, well FIBA… we’ve got this contract with FIBA. Well, that contract will expire and immediately they won’t tell me anything like we just signed an extension with FIBA,” he said.
Cuban believes the NBA has the potential to rival the global scale of the FIFA World Cup and generate far more revenue for the league and its players than the Olympics currently allow.
“But just think about how much money is involved, right? The players, right? Literally, we could be almost as big as the soccer World Cup, which is one of the biggest sporting events in the world,” he said. “In soccer it’s bigger than the Olympics, so we could do the exact same thing and I think we should, and I think the players would make a lot more money from it. You could support a lot of the global teams, all the different countries but Adam wouldn’t go for it, that’s why I sold my team,” he added, laughing.
Cuban sold a majority stake in the Mavericks in 2023 but remains a prominent voice in league affairs.
