Dallas Mavericks: 3 lessons the Mavs can learn from the Cowboys

What Dallas Mavericks can learn from Cowboys: 3. Avoid bad contracts

No team goes into a contract negotiation looking to make a bad deal. It happens too often in sports, and neither Dallas team is immune. The contract structures in the NFL and NBA are quite different. In football, a case can be made to avoid paying certain positions altogether because of their shelf lives and inevitable drop-off in play.

There may not be an equivalent in basketball, but teams can pay the wrong players or overpay on a talent.

In the Cowboys’ case, they’ve been a bit sentimental in overvaluing their players compared to what they would make on the open market. They now find themselves approaching salary cap hell as they try to figure out how to fit in their quarterback, Dak Prescott, with the rest of their bloated contracts.

The Mavericks are no strangers to this sort of behavior. Fans distinctly remember how painful it was to watch this team in the 2010s as they dolled out hefty contracts to undeserving players such as Harrison Barnes, Wesley Matthews, and Chandler Parsons.

In recent years, the Mavs have become much more frugal in their spending. They want space open to chase another star in the 2021 offseason. While this may well be a fruitful endeavor, the Mavericks can learn from the Cowboys. Do not pay good players like they are great simply to try to expedite the process of winning or reward loyalty too much.

Next: No. 2