Mavericks fans wish Mark Cuban was back in charge after awful Luka Doncic trade

Dallas Mavericks fans thought that they were dreaming on Saturday night when it was reported that Luka Doncic had been traded to the Los Angeles Lakers in one of the strangest moves in sports history. It was unlike anything they could have ever imagined, and they woke up on Sunday morning realizing that the nightmare that occurred with the Lakers was true.

Dallas sent Doncic, Maxi Kleber, and Markieff Morris to the Lakers in exchange for Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and a 2029 first-round pick. It was undoubtedly one of the worst trades in NBA history, as the Mavericks gave up their 25-year-old superstar who hasn't even hit his prime yet for Davis, Christie, and one first-round pick.

Nico Harrison and the Mavericks went to the Lakers about this, and Doncic was blindsided by this. The early reporting indicates that Doncic had no idea that they were even thinking about this, and the overall feeling about the trade from the fanbase is overwhelmingly negative.

Mark Cuban loved his stars no matter what

This move happened just over a year and some change after Mark Cuban sold a majority share of the Mavericks to the Adelson family, and if Cuban were still in charge of basketball decisions, this trade would have never happened.

Cuban catered to and respected his stars no matter what, and what transpired on Saturday night had disrespect written all over it. They blindsided their franchise cornerstone and sent him to the Lakers with no notice, and as of early Sunday morning, Harrison hadn't even spoken to Doncic about it according to Brad Townsend of the Dallas Morning News. He had texted and left him a voicemail, and had been communicating with his agent Bill Duffy.

"My guess is he probably doesn’t want to talk to me," Harrison said.

Sure, Dallas' concerns about Doncic's conditioning ahead of giving him the supermax extension that he was eligible for this summer are fair. He consistently struggled with it, and it wasn't getting much better over time, but the full reasoning will never make sense. Any team in the NBA would have given Doncic this extension if they had the chance, and these two reasons are nowhere close to enough justification for trading Doncic.

You don't trade him in the blink of an eye for just that. You find a way to work with him, and Cuban would have done just that. Cuban would have done whatever it took to make sure Doncic was happy on and off the floor. He would have built around him for his entire career and pushed for a championship every single year that he is able to play like he did with Dirk Nowitzki. He wasn't perfect with the way that he handled Dirk Nowitzki and his career by any means, but he would have never even considered trading Doncic.

Cuban would have laughed and hung up the phone, and he would have never approached a team himself and pushed to trade the face of Dallas. He understood what Doncic meant to the city of Dallas, and he would have done whatever it took to help him through the tough moments and praised him like no other through every step of his career until he played his last game as a Maverick.

Cuban would have made sure that Doncic was truly a Maverick for life, and he would have had a statue next to Nowitzki at the American Airlines Center. Mavericks fans know that this would have never happened with Cuban in charge, and will forever wish that he never sold the team.