Mavericks' humiliating Luka Doncic analogy proves the doom is just beginning

The Dallas Mavericks continue to make things worse for themselves when it comes to the events following the most shocking trade in sports history that saw Dallas trade Luka Doncic to the Los Angeles Lakers for Anthony Davis in the middle of the night on February 1, and things reached an entirely new level on Tuesday morning when the team decided to host a secret press conference for local Dallas media to speak to Nico Harrison and Rick Welts at the American Airlines Center.

This wasn't just any press conference though.

There were no cameras allowed and no live tweeting, and the attendees were hand-picked to throw Harrison and Welts questions about the wildest move in NBA history. This type of secretive press conference was unprecedented, and the Mavericks still haven't made Harrison available to field questions from all of the local media, and frankly, that may never happen.

Tuesday was the first time that Harrison has spoken in a press conference since the brief media availability he participated in alongside Jason Kidd in Cleveland the morning after the trade went down, and while not inviting all of the local media that has been covering the Mavericks diligently all season long to Tuesday's press conference was a problem in itself, the quotes coming out of this discussion between the media and Welts and Harrison are just as agitating.

Rick Welts' Luka Doncic comparison will infuriate every Mavericks fan

Harrison repeatedly uttered the phrase that "defense wins championships" when answering a handful of questions while also acting as if there was a chance Doncic didn't want to sign a supermax extension with Dallas this summer (which has proven to be false by Doncic's words and actions), and while these brutal quotes from Harrison are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the damage the franchise continues to self-inflict on itself, one of the worst quotes of the day didn't even come from Harrison.

It came from the man sitting next to him, Rick Welts.

Welts is the CEO of the Mavericks, and in the middle of the press conference, he tried to compare Dallas trading Doncic to the Lakers to when the Golden State Warriors traded Monta Ellis to the Milwaukee Bucks for Andrew Bogut.

He tried to make this point stick by talking about how fans were furious with the team for making this move when it happened, but Stephen Curry's emergence following the trade helped win fans back. This couldn't be further from the truth when it comes to what is going on in Dallas right now, and comparing the Doncic trade to a Monta Ellis for Andrew Bogut swap is unbelievably out of touch and disrespectful to Doncic, quite honestly.

Not only is it out of touch, but Welts had the roles wrong in his fearless analogy.

The Mavericks don't have a Curry waiting to become a star to win the fans back over on their roster; they sent him packing and broke his heart. Nothing about the Mavs' current situation resembles what the Warriors had in 2012, and the Mavericks' future is no longer as bright as the sun.

While Kyrie Irving is loved in Dallas and has built an incredible legacy with the Mavericks over the last two and a half years, he is entering next season coming off a torn ACL, and he could decide to opt out of his contract this summer and become a free agent. He may never return to the player that he once was, and not having Doncic next to him in the backcourt could make things even harder for him.

Doncic was Dallas' Curry, and Harrison's decision to trade him for Davis leaves the Mavericks in a challenging spot moving forward. Dallas is only getting older, and their championship-level roster from last season, which was headlined by Doncic, is nowhere to be found.

The Warriors have Curry.

The Mavericks had Doncic.

Only one of those franchises realized what they had before it was too late.