The Mavericks' tank just backfired in the worst possible way

After Monday afternoon's tiebreakers for positioning in the 2026 NBA Draft Lottery, the Dallas Mavericks met their harsh fate. Despite losing 56 games, their second-worst season of the 21st century, Dallas has just the eighth-best odds of receiving the No. 1 overall pick, with the New Orleans Pelicans having the seventh-best odds.

The Pelicans beat them in the tiebreaker today since they had identical records, and Mavericks fans having to cross their fingers for a coin toss to go their way exposes how badly Dallas messed up their tank. Now they're being forced to pay for it with the draft lottery being less than three weeks away.

Dallas' odds should be far better than this

Odds are obviously odds, and the Mavericks still have a chance to move up in the draft lottery. Dallas landed the No. 1 overall pick last season despite having just a 1.8 percent chance of doing so, and they'll be hoping for more of this luck once again on May 10.

Mavericks fans are clinging to this same optimism with the hope that the team can draft an elite co-star for Cooper Flagg. Still, they should have much better odds than they do.

They have a 6.7 percent chance at landing the first overall pick and a 29 percent chance to jump into the top four, but these odds shouldn't be this low.

Dallas made their direction clear the second that they traded Anthony Davis and three other players to the Washington Wizards for Khris Middleton, Marvin Bagley III, Tyus Jones, AJ Johnson, and draft capital. This move was made to create future financial flexibility, and they punted on the season by trading away the player they got in exchange for Luka Doncic for expiring contracts and a handful of draft picks.

They went all-in on a future headlined by Flagg, and they further emphasized this by shutting down Kyrie Irving.

Both of these moves prioritized next season and beyond, but Dallas' play on the court did not.

The Mavericks' moves and play didn't line up

Even though they lost 30 of their last 37 games, the Mavericks won some meaningless games at the end of the season that could end up costing them valuable draft positioning.

There's no doubt about it, Dallas tanked some games. Jason Kidd pulled the Mavericks' starting lineup with less than five minutes to go in a close game at the end of the season, and this resulted in a loss.

Outside of a few games at the end of the season, though, Dallas was trying to win. They won three of their final nine games, including victories over the Los Angeles Lakers and Portland Trail Blazers, two playoff teams.

The Mavericks could've easily lost both of those games, and if they had, they would've had the sixth-best odds of receiving the first pick.

Dallas was playing with fire before the draft lottery

While picking eighth isn't a nightmare scenario considering how loaded this year's draft class is, falling to ninth or tenth would be a disaster. They have a 38.1 percent chance of falling below eighth, and Dallas would be out of luck to land one of the top-tier guards.

Kingston Flemings, Keaton Wagler, Darius Acuff Jr., and Mikel Brown Jr. are all poised to be selected in the top eight at this point, leaving the Mavericks with players a tier below them, such as Brayden Burries and Labaron Philon Jr.

Both Philon Jr. and Burries look promising at the very least, but they're not in the same class as the aforementioned guards.

The results of today's coin toss showed exactly why the Mavericks should've taken their tank much more seriously, as this is the only first-round pick of their own that they fully control until 2031. This was their one chance to maximize their lottery odds for Flagg's sake, but they dropped the ball.

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