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ESPNDallas.com will estimate the market value for each of the Mavericks' eight free agents and examine their worth to the Mavs in a once-per-day series.

Brandan Wright

Brandan Wright would like to be back with the Mavericks.

The Mavs would like to keep Wright, a young, athletic center/forward who took advantage of his return to the rotation in the final month and a half, averaging 11.2 points, 5.7 rebounds and 1.7 blocks as a 24-minute-per-night part-time starter in the final 23 games. Wright was a major reason why the Mavs went 15-8 during that stretch and probably earned millions in the process.

“The truth is Brandan is a very unique player. He fits in with us. He fits in with our personnel,” coach Rick Carlisle said. “There’s some teams that he really plays great against. That’s been consistent for both years. There’s other teams where it’s tougher for him because of the physical strength, some of the bruising type teams. But we like him. He has continued to get better.

“We met with him (the day after the season ended) and told him that we definitely wanted him back here. These decisions are going to come down to the money and the market and so on and so forth, but he’s a guy that we like.”

It could be more complicated than just the money. Timing of negotiations with Wright could be tricky, too.

Wright feels a sense of loyalty to the franchise that picked him up off the scrap heap after the lockout, but he’s facing the first major business decision of his career. He understands, however, that he won’t be the Mavs’ top priority this summer.

What if Wright gets an offer he likes while the Mavs are pursuing Dwight Howard or Chris Paul or whoever their Plan C, D, E, etc. might be? Wright might not have the luxury of waiting to see whether the Mavs would be able or willing to match.

There is strong mutual interest in Wright returning to the Mavs. Now, it’s a matter of whether the business of basketball gets in the way.

2012-13 stats: Averaged 8.5 points, 4.1 rebounds and 1.2 blocks while shooting 59.7 percent from the floor in 18.0 minutes per game. His player efficiency rating (PER) of 21.03 ranked 20th in the league.

Age: 25

Comps:

Brandon Bass – Averaged 8.7 points, 5.2 rebounds and 0.8 blocks while shooting 48.6 percent from the floor in 27.6 minutes per game. Signed three-year, $19.4 million deal in 2012.

JaVale McGee – Averaged 9.1 points, 4.8 rebounds and 2.0 blocks while shooting 57.5 percent in 18.1 minutes per game. Signed four-year, $44 million deal in 2012.

Ed Davis – Averaged 7.7 points, 5.7 rebounds and 1.0 blocks while shooting 53.9 percent in 20.1 minutes per game. Has one season remaining on rookie contract.

Amir Johnson – Averaged 10.0 points, 7.5 rebounds and 1.4 blocks while shooting 55.4 percent from the floor in 28.7 minutes per game. Signed five-year, $30 million deal in 2010.

Estimated contract: Bass got $18 million over four years after his two-season stint with the Mavs. Ian Mahinmi, another two-year Mavs project, got $16 million over four years. The bidding for Wright figures to start in that range.

Here’s how Mark Cuban views the first NBA postseason that doesn’t include Dallas in a dozen years: "Mavs fans just want teams with free agents to get eliminated early."

Well, then Lakers-Spurs couldn’t have gone better, huh?

After all, Dwight Howard’s team got swept. Heck, Howard didn’t even stick around the whole four games, getting ejected early in the second half of the embarrassing finale. And then he called his season in Los Angeles "a nightmare."

Howard, as expected, is sending all sorts of mixed messages about whether he’ll stay or leave L.A. It’s at least enough of a possibility that the Mavs must be fully prepared to make their best recruiting pitch.

And, no, there isn’t any question about whether the Mavs would want to take on all that Dwight drama. Here’s a pretty good rule of thumb for NBA GMs: If you can get the game’s best big man in his prime, do it.

Howard has plenty of baggage, but he’s a perennial All-Star who averaged 17.1 points, a league-high 12.4 rebounds and 2.4 blocks in a down year while coming off back surgery and dealing with a bum shoulder. He represents the Mavs’ best chance of pulling off the "quick rebuild" that Cuban is determined to make happen.

(That’s assuming Chris Paul stays with the Clippers, which we’ll probably address after the other L.A. team’s playoff run is over.)

Let’s make another thing clear: A lack of cap space won’t be the reason if the Mavs miss out on Howard. They’d have to move Shawn Marion or Vince Carter to be able to give him a max deal, but it wouldn’t be difficult to dump the salary of a quality veteran entering the last year of his contract. (CBA expert Larry Coon details the Mavs’ cap situation to the dollar here.)

First and foremost, it’s a matter of whether Howard is miserable enough as a SoCal scapegoat to leave the Lakers’ five-year, $118 million offer on the table to take $87.6 million over four years from another team.

If that’s the case, then Cuban, Donnie Nelson, Rick Carlisle and that goofy German guy must make a strong enough pitch to persuade Howard to pick Dallas instead of other potential destinations, such as Houston or Atlanta.

All due respect to Dirk Nowitzki, who is more than willing to become the second fiddle to accommodate a twenty-something superstar, but the presence of one of the all-time best power forwards can’t be the Mavs’ primary selling point. Not with Nowitzki turning 35 this summer and James Harden just approaching his prime in Houston.

The Mavs must sell Howard on their ability to build and sustain a contender around him. They did it for a dozen years around Dirk, and they need to make Howard believe they can do it for a decade around him.

Cuban, who is making the great sacrifice of not scheduling any "Shark Tank" tapings during the July free agency period, has to paint a championship picture for Howard. The big man has to believe, with the Mavs scheduled to have a ton of cap space again next summer, that the front office can put the pieces around him required to get another ring.

Two major pieces are in place: Nowitzki and coach Rick Carlisle, who can help the Mavs’ cause by showing clips of some of the plays the Pacers used to run to get Jermaine O'Neal the rock during his All-Star days.

And the Mavs must play to Howard’s flaws, convincing him that he’ll be comfortable in Dallas for the rest of his career. It helps that the front office has a strong relationship with agent Dan Fegan, who also represents Marion.

Is it likely that Howard will leave L.A. for Dallas? Nope.

But, hey, what were the odds in October that the Lakers wouldn’t win a single playoff game? That stunning development – and all the drama that unfolded this season in L.A. – certainly improved the Mavs’ odds of landing the NBA’s best big man as their next centerpiece.

ESPNDallas.com will estimate the market value for each of the Mavericks' eight free agents and examine their worth to the Mavs in a once-per-day series.

O.J. Mayo

After opting out of the second year of his contract, O.J. Mayo declared that he hoped to sign a long-term deal to stay in Dallas.

Coach Rick Carlisle, who had vented his frustration with Mayo just a few days earlier, made it clear that he’d welcome the shooting guard back.

“I like O.J. a lot,” Carlisle said. “I think he fits into what we’re doing. Like everything else in this world, this is probably going to come down to money.”

In relative terms, there wasn’t much of a market for Mayo last summer, when the former third overall pick hit free agency after struggling as a sixth man during his final two seasons in Memphis. He took a little less money to come to the Mavs, hoping that a year of work with Carlisle would boost his value.

We’ll see this summer whether that happened after a hot-and-cold season for Mayo that ended with an icy stretch.

The Mavs won’t break the bank to keep Mayo. They consider him capable of starting for a contender, but they don’t view him as a cornerstone player.

If Dallas doesn’t keep Mayo, the Mavs will have to address a major hole in the lineup. He led the Mavs in points, was second in scoring and second in assists.

But the free agent market will be flooded with starting-caliber shooting guards. Reasonably priced alternatives could include Monta Ellis, J.J. Redick, Kevin Martin, Tyreke Evans, Randy Foye, Tony Allen and Nick Young. (Not listed due to price/probability of staying with their current contenders: J.R. Smith, Manu Ginobili and Andre Iguodala.)

2012-13 stats: Averaged 15.3 points, 4.4 assists, 3.5 rebounds, 1.1 steals and 2.6 turnovers in 35.5 minutes per game. Shot 44.9 percent from the floor and 40.7 percent from 3-point range.

Age: 25

Comps:

DeMar DeRozan – Averaged 18.1 points, 2.5 assists, 3.9 rebounds, 0.9 steals and 1.8 turnovers in 36.7 minutes per game. Shot 44.5 percent from the floor and 28.3 percent from 3-point range. Signed four-year, $38 million deal in 2012.

Jamal Crawford – Averaged 16.5 points, 2.5 assists, 1.7 rebounds, 1.0 steals and 1.9 turnovers in 29.3 minutes per game. Shot 43.8 percent from the floor and 37.6 percent from 3-point range. Signed four-year, $21.4 million deal in 2012.

Eric Gordon – Averaged 17.0 points, 3.3 assists, 1.8 rebounds, 1.1 steals and 2.8 turnovers in 30.1 minutes per game. Shot 40.2 percent from the floor and 32.4 percent from 3-point range. Signed four-year, $58 million deal in 2012.

Joe Johnson – Averaged 16.3 points, 3.5 assists, 3.0 rebounds, 0.7 steals and 1.7 turnovers in 36.7 minutes per game. Shot 42.3 percent from the floor and 37.5 percent from 3-point range. Signed six-year, $123.7 million deal in 2010.

Arron Afflalo – Averaged 16.5 points, 3.2 assists, 3.7 rebounds, 0.6 steals and 2.2 turnovers in 36.0 minutes per game. Shot 43.9 percent from the floor and 30.0 percent from 3-point range. Signed five-year, $38 million deal in 2011.

Wesley Matthews – Averaged 14.8 points, 2.5 assists, 2.8 rebounds, 1.3 steals and 1.6 turnovers in 34.8 minutes per game. Shot 43.6 percent from the floor and 39.8 percent from 3-point range. Signed five-year, $26.8 million deal in 2010.

Estimated contract: How many millions did Mayo cost himself by struggling down the stretch? At the All-Star break, it appeared that Mayo might get a four-year deal in the $40 million range. Now, $25 million over four years sounds more likely. The Mavs might not want to go above the midlevel exception (four years, $21.4 million).

ESPNDallas.com will estimate the market value for each of the Mavericks' eight free agents and examine their worth to the Mavs in a once-per-day series.

Chris Kaman

Let’s put it this way: Chris Kaman isn’t going to invite coach Rick Carlisle to join him on one of his beloved hunting trips any time soon.

Unless, well ... never mind.

It’s an understatement to say that Kaman’s season in Dallas didn’t work out as well as anticipated. His frequent defensive lapses didn’t endear Kaman to Carlisle, resulting in Kaman spending much of the second half of the season on the fringe of the rotation, failing to get off the bench in several games.

“Frustrating,” was the politically correct way that Kaman often put it. Needless to say, that feeling was mutual.

While Kaman has repeatedly said he’d like to return to Dallas, it smacks of a veteran with precious little leverage who isn’t going to publicly close any doors. The Mavs’ quest to replace Tyson Chandler needs to move on to another big man.

The simple fact of the matter is that Kaman and German Olympic teammate Dirk Nowitzki don’t fit well together in an NBA frontcourt. With that duo playing, the Mavs were outscored by 59 points in 492 minutes this season.

As the Mavs rebuild around Nowitzki, they must find a starting center who is a better complement to him.

2012-13 stats: Averaged 10.5 points on 50.7 percent shooting, 5.6 rebounds, 0.8 assists and 0.8 blocks in 20.7 minutes.

Age: 30

Comps:

Nene Hilario – Averaged 12.6 points on 48.0 percent shooting, 6.7 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 0.6 blocks in 27.2 minutes per game. Signed five-year, $65 million deal in 2011.

Robin Lopez – Averaged 11.3 points on 53.4 percent shooting, 5.6 rebounds, 0.8 assists and 1.6 blocks in 26.0 minutes per game. Signed three-year, $15.4 million deal (last two seasons not guaranteed) in 2012.

Spencer Hawes – Averaged 11.0 points on 46.4 percent shooting, 7.2 rebounds, 2.2 assists and 1.4 blocks in 27.2 minutes per game. Signed two-year, $13.1 million deal in 2012.

Byron Mullens – Averaged 10.6 points on 38.5 percent shooting, 6.4 rebounds, 1.5 assists and 0.6 blocks in 26.9 minutes per game. Rookie contract that paid him $2.25 million last season expires this offseason.

Andray Blatche – Averaged 10.3 points on 51.2 percent shooting, 5.1 rebounds, 1.0 assists and 0.7 blocks in 19.0 minutes per game. Played this season for veteran’s minimum salary.

Estimated contract: It’s hard to imagine Kaman getting anything more than one-year offers. He might get half of the $8 million he made this season.

The Mavericks will explore all potential avenues of improving the talent on their roster, but upgrading at point guard is the top priority.

While Darren Collison confidently declared Thursday that he believes he could start for any team in the league, the Dallas decision-makers clearly don’t share that opinion. After all, they opted to start Derek Fisher and Mike James over Collison in a season that president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson described as a “point guard odyssey.”

PODCAST
Donnie Nelson joins Chuck Cooperstein and Tim MacMahon to discuss the Mavericks' season and the importance of this summer. Listen

The Mavs might welcome Collison back as a backup, depending on the price. They’ll search this summer for a long-term starting solution at a spot that coach Rick Carlisle calls “the most important position in the league.”

“We’ve been spoiled with Jason Kidd and Stevie Nash before,” Nelson said during a Thursday appearance on ESPN Dallas 103.3’s Galloway and Company. “I think the quarterback position is just a really, really important one. I’d say that that’s up there.

“That’s no disrespect for anyone. Darren Collison did a terrific job with a tough situation, and we’d certainly be open to the conversation of him coming back, but (upgrading point guard) has got to be in my mind first and foremost.”

The pie-in-the-sky scenario: Sign Chris Paul. Of course, the odds of him ditching a talented, young Clippers team to come to Dallas to play with a mid-30s core are awfully slim. As Mark Cuban recently said, he’ll be rooting for teams with free agents the Mavs might target to lose early in the playoffs. Would Paul consider leaving the Clippers if they flame out in the first round?

PODCAST
Rick Carlisle joins Chuck Cooperstein and Tim MacMahon to discuss the Mavericks' disappointing season and what needs to happen for them to get back to the playoffs. Listen

Paul will be the perfect fit, but the Mavs must be prepared to find their point guard of the future somewhere else. They might be able to draft next season’s backup with the 13th overall pick, assuming they don’t get amazing lottery luck, but a team determined to drastically improve its basketball IQ isn’t going to hand the reins to a rookie to run the show for 30-plus minutes a night.

It’s time for the Mavs to find a proven veteran point guard to fill Kidd’s shoes.

“I don’t know exactly what style, but the guy’s going to have to be able to score,” Carlisle said on Galloway and Company. “The guy’s going to have to be able to come off screens and hit shots, because when you’re come off screens from Dirk, you’re going to be open because of the way guys play him.”

A quick look at some of the other potential long-term upgrades available in free agency:

Jose Calderon: The Mavs have been involved in trade discussions about Calderon, as recently as midseason, when he got dealt from Toronto to Detroit in the three-way Rudy Gay deal. Calderon, who turns 32 in September, is a pass-first point guard who is a very efficient offensive player. He has career averages of 7.2 assists and 1.7 turnovers per game and is an excellent shooter (.483 FG, .399 3s, .877 FT). His flaws: He doesn’t penetrate well and is a poor defender, especially against speedy point guards.

Monta Ellis: The 27-year-old is not really a point guard. He’s a scorer (career 19.4 ppg) who sometimes plays point guard. He’s dangerous off the dribble and trouble in transition, but Ellis jacks up a lot of long jumpers and doesn’t make very many. He attempted 328 3s this season despite hitting only 28.7 percent, the lowest of any player with at least 200 tries. The idea of Ellis running pick-and-pops with Dirk Nowitzki is intriguing, but can a guard who has never averaged more than six assists per game in a season be counted on to consistently deliver Dirk the ball in prime scoring situations? And Ellis doesn’t exactly have a great defensive rep, either, despite his high steals totals.

Jarrett Jack: Jack, who turns 30 in October, is coming off his best season, averaging 12.9 points and 5.6 assists as the sixth man for a playoff team with Golden State. He’s an excellent midrange shooter and very effective hitting floaters off the dribble. He has a low turnover rate, the kind of strength and toughness Carlisle wants in a point guard and hit a lot of clutch shots for the Warriors this season. But Jack is really a combo guard who has never averaged more than 6.3 assists per season and struggles defensively against quick point guards. Like Kidd, he’s actually better defending shooting guards.

Brandon Jennings: Can the former lottery pick flourish under Carlisle’s coaching? Would it be worth offering enough to the restricted free agent for Milwaukee not to match? The 23-year-old Jennings, who has butted heads with his Bucks coaches, is on the record saying he’d love to play with Dirk and for Cuban and Carlisle in Dallas. His shooting percentage might soar in that situation, but the fact that it’s 39.4 percent for his career is a red flag. So is his slender frame (6-foot-1, 169 pounds). Oh, and so is the fact the Bucks have occasionally benched him during crunch time down the stretch this season. But Jennings (17.5 ppg, 6.5 apg this season) has shown enough flashes of brilliance to at least make him intriguing.

Jeff Teague: He’s a restricted free agent on a playoff team that has a ton of cap space, so the Mavs would have to overpay to get Teague. The four-year veteran is a quality young point guard, averaging 14.6 points and 7.2 assists this season, but it’s difficult to envision the Mavs throwing a ton of money at him.

Mo Williams: The 30-year-old Williams is best suited as a scoring sixth man, not a starting point guard. He’s a good spot-up 3-point shooter and knocks down a lot of midrange jumpers off pick-and-rolls, but he’s never been more than an average driver or distributor. Plus, Williams has major durability issues, having missed at least a dozen games in seven of the last eight seasons, including 36 with the Jazz last season, when he averaged 12.9 points and 6.2 assists.

There are, of course, other ways for the Mavs to acquire point guards. Hey, maybe Cuban can come up with some kind of multi-team deal that lands Rajon Rondo in Dallas.

DALLAS – Dirk Nowitzki has made it clear that he can’t stomach the thought of finishing his career fighting just to make the playoffs.

That doesn’t mean he’s pondering ever putting on another NBA franchise’s uniform. He’s simply pointing out the importance of the front office making major roster upgrades this summer to give the Mavericks a chance to compete for championships again.

PODCAST
Rick Carlisle joins Chuck Cooperstein and Tim MacMahon to discuss the Mavericks' disappointing season and what needs to happen for them to get back to the playoffs. Listen

“Honestly, I can’t really see myself going anywhere else but here,” Nowitzki said at the beginning of his first playoff-free offseason since 2000. “Really, the pressure is on Mark (Cuban) and Donnie (Nelson) to get this franchise back to where it belongs, and they know that. Then we’re all good, everything’s fine.

“I mean, I belong to this city. That’s just the bottom line. I could never see myself playing for another franchise, putting another jersey on. That would be probably the hardest thing I’d have to do in my life. I want to stay here, but I also want to play at a high level with a good team that we can be proud of and represent this city and this franchise.”

Nowitzki, who intends to sign a two- or three-year deal when his current contract expires after next season, is willing to do anything he can to help the Mavs recruit free agents this summer.

Unlike most summers, he’ll be in Dallas instead of his native Germany the majority of the time. That’s largely because his wife, Jessica, is expecting the couple’s first child. However, Nowitzki said he planned to be in Dallas at the beginning of July for professional reasons anyway.

“It’s a big summer,” Nowitzki said. “I would have probably been here in July regardless to knock on Cuban’s bunker suite every other day and see what he’s got cooking.”

The ever optimistic Cuban recently noted that Nowitzki’s wife is much more attractive than him, so the future Hall of Famer must have some persuasive skills. Those will be tested in early July, with Nowitzki still holding out hope that he can help talk Chris Paul and/or Dwight Howard into leaving Los Angeles for Dallas – or at least help recruit more realistic talent upgrades.

“I can try, but I’m really not the most positive person,” Nowitzki said. “I guess that’s a German thing.”

Nowitzki can confidently talk in glowing terms about his experiences living in Dallas and playing for Cuban, Nelson and coach Rick Carlisle. Those three men would be a major part of Nowitzki’s basketball sales pitch.

“We have a great owner and a great GM in place. We have a great coach in place that coached us to win the championship,” Nowitzki said. “We’ve got a couple of veterans (Shawn Marion and Vince Carter) still under contract. We’ve got some veteran leadership already, and then we’ve got a lot of roster space.

“We’ve got some cap space and we can get some players in here that can help. I think all those three experienced guys, they’ve still got something left in the tank. Come on in, we’ll see how far we can ride it out.”

Nowitzki plans to ride it out in Dallas until he retires, which is at least three years away.

DALLAS -- The Dallas Mavericks do not celebrate mediocrity.

OK, maybe they enjoyed shaving a few days ago.

But a franchise that popped champagne in Miami’s Club Liv a couple summers ago in celebration of an NBA championship doesn’t get giddy about going .500.

Granted, a 41-41 record is a fairly impressive accomplishment given that the Mavs were 10 games below in mid-January. They can be proud about putting up enough of a fight to be on the fringe of the playoff picture until the final week of the regular season. And at least they didn’t have their first losing season since 1999-2000, finishing even after a 99-87 win over the New Orleans Hornets/Pelicans in Wednesday’s finale.

“Those are all good things, but I’m not gonna try to blow sunshine up your butt and try to tell you that we’re happy to be .500,” Mavs coach Rick Carlisle said, putting things in perspective in typically colorful fashion. “That’s just not how things go here.”

Who knows how things are going to go this summer in Dallas?

This much is clear: Major changes are coming for the Mavs. Owner Mark Cuban and president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson can’t miss again this summer.

PODCAST
Rick Carlisle joins Chuck Cooperstein and Tim MacMahon to discuss the Mavericks' disappointing season and what needs to happen for them to get back to the playoffs. Listen

“We’re going to do everything possible to get back to where we need to be,” Cuban said before Wednesday’s win.

Eight or nine players from the Mavs’ final roster will be free agents, depending on whether O.J. Mayo exercises his option to return for a $4.2 million salary or tests the market for the second straight summer. Almost to a man, they say they’d like to be back in Dallas, but that’s not the way the business works.

The Mavs, depending on Mayo’s decision and the salary cap figure the NBA sets, will have somewhere between $13 million and $18.7 million in spending money this summer -- unless they create more space with salary-dump deals. They need significant upgrades to have a serious chance of competing at the level they had become accustomed to over the previous dozen seasons.

“I’ve been saying it all season long: It’s a big summer for us,” said Dirk Nowitzki, who is the only player guaranteed to return to Dallas next season. “We’ll see what Mark and Donnie can come up with. They’re always geniuses at making stuff happen. We need a big summer, obviously, to compete again for the championship and not for the eighth seed.”

It’s especially not the way the business works for a franchise embarrassed by being average and determined to get on the fast track back to contender status.

Carlisle, Cuban and Nelson are embracing the challenge of attempting to buck the odds with a quick rebuild. Nowitzki has committed to do whatever he can to aid the recruiting process.

Average is acceptable in some NBA cities. It’s a disaster in Dallas.

“You just get fired up to go to work and make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Cuban said. “You can’t dwell, you can’t get mad. I’ve already broken up with this season, probably a game too early. I’ve already started the seven steps of recovery. I’ve been mad, and I’ll move forward."

“After tonight, it’s time to start looking forward to dating a new season," he said. "It’s been tough. It was definitely the date from hell.”

This is as far as the Mavs have been from guzzling bubbly in a long time. There’s no buzz, just a sick feeling in their stomachs.

DALLAS -- O.J. Mayo's role for the final game didn't change. Neither has Dallas Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle's belief in the 25-year-old shooting guard despite the coach's emotional postgame criticism of Mayo after Monday's loss to Memphis.

Mayo started the season finale against the New Orleans Hornets on Wednesday, just like he had the Mavs' other 81 games this season.

"He'll come out of this a much better and more experienced player," Carlisle told ESPN Dallas 103.3's Chuck Cooperstein in a pregame interview. "My feelings about him haven't changed."

Carlisle's on-the-record opinion about Mayo is that he can be a starter on a contender.

That was the Mavs' hope when they signed Mayo last summer to a contract that includes a $4.2 million player option for next season. Mayo has averaged 15.4 point and 4.4 assists while leading the Mavs in minutes during his up-and-down season.

Mayo also led the Mavs in tough love received by Carlisle, whose ability to develop players was one of the primary reasons Mayo signed with the Mavs.

The amount of time Carlisle invested in Mayo was one of the primary reasons the coach was so bluntly honest about his disappointment Monday night. Carlisle called the criticism -- which featured him saying Mayo "failed to compete" against his former team -- "a little out of character for me."

"I've spent so much time with him, I really feel like a Little League parent," Carlisle said. "So when there's an opportunity for him to step up, I really want to see him do well."

Mayo said earlier in the day he was not aware of Carlisle’s criticism of him following Monday’s game.

"Well, I don’t blame him," Mayo said after Wednesday’s shootaround when apprised of Carlisle’s comments.

Shooting guard O.J. Mayo, the subject of coach Rick Carlisle’s public wrath after Monday’s loss to the Memphis Grizzlies, wants to return to Dallas next season.

“Yeah, I’d like to be back here,” Mayo told reporters after Wednesday’s final shootaround of the season.

Mayo, however, said he has yet to consider whether he will exercise the player option for the second season in the contract he signed with the Mavericks last season. Mayo can opt to make a $4.2 million salary from the Mavs next season, or he can decide to test the free agency market for the second consecutive summer, perhaps signing a long-term deal with Dallas.

“I haven’t really sat down and talked to Cuban about it or my agent,” said Mayo, who has averaged 15.4 points and 4.4 assists while playing a team-high 35.6 minutes per game this season. “I think I’ll probably take a week or so off after this season and get together and meet.”

Midway through the season, it appeared that it’d be an easy decision for Mayo to test the market again. He averaged 17.9 points per game while shooting career-best percentages before the All-Star break.

But Mayo’s production has dipped drastically in the second half of the season. He’s averaging only 9.0 points per game on 38.9 percent shooting in eight April games.

Carlisle, who has made Mayo somewhat of a pet project since last summer, sounded like a disappointed parent when he called out Mayo for failing to compete in Monday’s loss. Carlisle called a timeout midway through the fourth quarter specifically to bench Mayo, who had two points and four turnovers in the loss.

Mayo claimed Wednesday that he hadn’t heard about Carlisle’s postgame criticism, which dominated the media discussion about the Mavs over the last 36 hours.

"Well, I don’t blame him," Mayo said when informed of Carlisle’s comments.

Carlisle kept his comments about Mayo brief after the final shootaround of the season: "He's ready to go. He's ready to go."

DALLAS – Say farewell to another streak for this proud franchise.

The Mavericks’ 11-year run of 50-win campaigns ended last season, when their winning percentage during the lockout-compressed scheduled meant no asterisk was necessary.

The 12-year playoff streak, which was the longest active streak north of San Antonio, was snapped last week.

And now the Mavs are assured of not having a winning season for the first time in a dozen years. The Memphis Grizzlies handed the Mavs loss No. 41 on Monday night.

“It’s disappointing,” Elton Brand said. “Playoffs is one thing, but you could have hung your hat on, ‘Hey, we had a winning season at least.’ Now, that’s impossible. The goal is now not to have a losing season.”

Added Vince Carter: “It definitely is tough, but 50 percent is not bad, either. It’s not losing, you know what I’m saying? We definitely want to go out there and get a win and accomplish that.”

And coach Rick Carlisle: “I’m just disappointed for our fans. I’m disappointed for my owner. I’m disappointed for our vets.”

It was an especially difficult pill for Dirk Nowitzki to swallow. As the lone constant on the roster during the dozen-year run, Nowitzki put a lot of pride into trying to at least salvage a winning record out of this season.

Nowitzki is now resigned to shooting for .500 in Wednesday’s season finale against the New Orleans Hornets.

“I feel like we should have competed a lot better there in the second half,” said Nowitzki, who scored a game-high 26 points. “Disappointing, but now we’ve got to make the best out of it. We’ve got one more game Wednesday and somehow crawl out a win.”

1. Carter passes Clyde the Glide: With a pretty reverse layup in the first quarter, Vince Carter moved past Clyde Drexler into 27th place on the NBA’s all-time scoring list. Drexler joined Hal Greer, Larry Bird and Gary Payton as Hall of Famers that Carter has passed this season.

“You accomplish something like that and you don’t pull out the win, it’s always tough,” said Carter, who had 22 points on 8-of-11 shooting, giving him 22,214 points in his career. “But I’m very thankful for the milestone. It’s just amazing. You just think of the names of the people you’ve passed that you’ve looked up to, played against, consider legends, so on and so forth.

“It’s just like, ‘Wow.’ To even hear your name passing those people is very humbling.”

2. Grown-ups’ table: Carlisle arrived in Dallas with a reputation as a coach who was hesitant to play young players. With a handful of under-25 players in the rotation, this has been a trying season for Carlisle’s patience.

“Look, I know Nowitzki is going to compete on every possession,” Carlisle said. “I know that Marion and Carter and Brand, those guys are going to show. I mean, that’s what they’ve done for a lot of years.

“But you know, beyond that, they’ve got to want it as much as everybody else wants it for them. That’s been the issue. Some of our younger guys have had the opportunity to sit at the grown-ups’ table this year and see what it’s like to have more responsibility. It can be a daunting thing.

“A lot of guys say they want it. If they want it, then how they show up, there’s got to be more presence. I think that’s a great word. A guy can have a bad shooting night, but he can still have great presence in the game. That’s what this franchise is looking for.”

3. One last stand: Carlisle’s expectations for the season finale are very simple.

“I am all about enthusiasm this year, really, and I’ve been very consistent with that,” Carlisle said. “But, you know, if you’re not going to compete, don’t show up at all.”

 

DALLAS -- Rick Carlisle bolted a couple of steps onto the court, right in the path of O.J. Mayo dribbling up the sideline, to frantically call a timeout midway through the fourth quarter.

After the referee blew the whistle, Carlisle shot a disgusted stare toward Mayo. The Dallas Mavericks coach appeared to resist the urge to rip the ball away from his 25-year-old shooting guard, who had two sloppy turnovers and a weak foul on a made layup in the minute and a half before that uncomfortable moment.

“I called that timeout just to get you out of the game!” Carlisle screamed at Mayo in the huddle, according to one player.

Just in case Mayo didn’t get the message, Carlisle made his criticism loud and clear during his postgame news conference after the Mavs’ 103-97 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. Mayo had a miserable performance against his former team, scoring only two points on 1-of-6 shooting and committing four turnovers before watching crunch time from the pine.

“I just want to see him show up,” said Carlisle, who was as harsh publicly with a player as he’s been since calling out Lamar Odom at the end of Mavs short-timer's strange midseason sabbatical. “I just want to see him show up and compete. He didn’t compete tonight.

“And I tell you, with all the time we’ve put into helping him develop and bringing him along, in the biggest game of the year -- an opportunity to be a winning team -- for him to show up like he did tonight, I was shocked.

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"Look, sometimes guys have bad nights, so make sure to put that in there, too.”

The trouble is that Mayo tends to have bad nights against the West’s best teams. He has averaged only 10.6 points while shooting 38.2 percent from the floor and 19.0 percent from 3-point range against the conference’s top five seeds. Not coincidentally, the Mavs were 3-15 in those games.

Mayo was especially poor all season against the Grizzlies, a team that tried to trade the former No. 3 overall pick repeatedly and showed no interest in re-signing him last summer. He averaged only 8.5 points and had more turnovers (15) than assists (11) against Memphis this season.

“He just had a bad night,” Carlisle said after making a point to mention that the coaches showed Mayo film at halftime “where he was virtually just standing around defensively” and essentially implored him to mentally check into the game. “I guess I’ll write it off to that.

“But I tell you what, if I was playing against my former team, I’d come out ready to go. I’d come out ready to go at them. But that’s me. You know, that’s me.”

The bad nights have come in bunches for Mayo lately. His production has plummeted since the All-Star break, when he was averaging a team-high 17.9 points per game with the best shooting percentages of his career. His numbers have tailed off drastically in the last month and a half, averaging 11.8 points in March and only 9.0 in April.

Mayo’s good games, such as his 20-point, six-assist outing in last week’s upset of the Denver Nuggets, have been the exception recently. The poor performances are increasingly becoming the norm.

“Well,” Carlisle said, “the good news is there’s only an opportunity for one more.”

Just one more game before the Mavs begin the franchise’s longest offseason in a dozen years. And that wasn’t exactly a case of Carlisle, who had previously stated that he thought Mayo could be a starter on a contending team, welcoming Mayo back next season.

It’s been widely expected that Mayo, who has a player option in his contract for a $4.2 million salary next season, would decide to test the free agency market again this summer. However, Mayo recently told ESPNDallas.com that he hasn’t made a decision on whether to exercise his option to return to Dallas next season instead of looking for a long-term deal.

How many millions has Mayo lost in the last month and a half? At this point, it might make sense for him to try to put together a consistently solid season before testing the market again.

Mayo apparently didn’t have anything to say after Monday night’s loss. He dressed and left the locker room by the time the media was allowed to enter.

“I don’t know. You’ve got to ask O.J,” Dirk Nowitzki when asked about Mayo’s performance, considering Carlisle’s comments. “There are some nights where your jumper’s not going. We all go through it. You have to compete and play hard on both ends of the floor and impact obviously the game on other levels. That’s really all I can say about it.”

Carlisle can live with off-shooting nights. In fact, he made a point to heap praise on Mayo after his worst shooting game of the season, raving about the shooting guard’s hustle, toughness and all-around performance after Mayo was 1-of-13 from the floor while playing with an injured left shoulder in the March 30 comeback win over the Chicago Bulls.

But Carlisle can’t stand a lack of effort and lackluster focus. He’s given Mayo a lot of tough love in practices and film sessions this season. Carlisle let the world hear that criticism Monday night.

Carlisle didn’t single out Mayo when he talked about the daunting experience of young Mavs who have had the “opportunity to sit at the grown-ups’ table this year and see what it’s like to have more responsibility.” It was clear, though, that Mayo was the prime example.

“Look, he’s not the only guy that stunk tonight,” Carlisle said. “I stunk, too. I’ll readily admit that, and I’ve been admitting it all year. But I’m passionate about not wanting to stink.

“That’s where I have trouble reconciling things.”

At the moment, that makes it hard to envision Mayo continuing his career in Dallas.

DALLAS -- There will be extra security measures taken at the American Airlines Center for Monday's Mavericks-Grizzlies game, a Dallas Mavericks spokesperson said.

The extra measures are a precaution in response to the bombings at the Boston Marathon that killed two people and injured dozens of others.

"It's just sickening, tragic," Mavs coach Rick Carlisle of the Boston incident. Carlisle lived on Commonwealth Avenue along the marathon route when he played for the Celtics.

NEW ORLEANS – After arriving in the NBA, Dirk Nowitzki didn’t know whether he could survive 25 games, much less score 25,000 points.

Here he is, 15 years later, one of 17 members of the league’s exclusive 25,000-point club.

“And as he showed tonight, he’s still got a lot left in the tank,” coach Rick Carlisle said after Nowitzki scored 19 points on 7-of-14 shooting in 27 minutes while surpassing a major milestone in Sunday’s win over the New Orleans Hornets.

Enough left to reach 30,000 points, something accomplished by only five men in NBA history?

“That’s tough,” Nowitzki said. “I don’t know how much time it takes for me to get (5,000 points), but I’m going to be around.”

He certainly isn’t ruling out a run at 30K. Nowitzki has verbally committed to re-signing with the Mavs for two or three more years after his contract expires in the summer of 2014.

If Nowitzki can stay relatively healthy, 30,000 points seems well within his reach. Figure he averages 1,300 points per season for the rest of his career – around 17 per game, figuring he sits out a handful of nights each year – and he can join the 30K club if he sticks around four more seasons.

“Yeah, I mean, it would sound nice, but I don’t know that would be something that would keep me going on one leg at 41 if it’s not fun anymore,” Nowitzki said. “Just to drag it around to get to (30,000), I don’t think that’s what I’m about. If it comes in the next couple of years, that would be great. If not, that’s fine, too. I play to win.”

The way Nowitzki feels now, he’s confident he can contribute to a winning team for at least the next few years. He readily admits he was questioning that midway through the season, after he missed 27 games while recovering from a preseason scope of his right knee and struggled upon his return.

But Nowitzki believes his performance since the All-Star break (18.8 ppg, 50.9 FG%, 44.6 3%) is an indication of what’s to come over the next few years. He’ll have a precautionary MRI on his left knee next week, making sure he doesn’t need to get that one scoped, too, and is already thinking about conditioning during what will literally be the longest summer of his NBA career.

The plan: Put in the work to be in peak form at the beginning of next season.

If Nowitzki can maintain that kind of hunger, why not project him to hit 30,000 points?

“A lot of being successful like this is being true to each individual day,” coach Rick Carlisle said. “I think it’s very hard to look ahead and say, yeah, this guy can play for four or five or six more years. In this league, it’s so competitive and it’s so uncertain, you’ve got to go day to day with it. That’s what Dirk has done for 15 years.

“I think that’s the reason he was able to reach this milestone. That’s the reason he was able to become one of the best ever to play this game. I think it gives him a chance to play for an extended period of time, but he’ll never look ahead.”

A few more notes from the win that finally bumped the Mavs’ back to .500:

1. Carter climbing all-time scorers’ list: Vince Carter will most likely hit a scoring milestone of his own Monday night.

Carter has 22,192 career points after scoring 16 Sunday, putting him four behind Clyde Drexler for 27th in NBA history. Carter has already surpassed Hall of Famers Hal Greer, Larry Bird and Gary Payton this season.

2. Marion’s monster night: It was overshadowed by Nowitzki’s milestone night, but Shawn Marion led the Mavs with 21 points, seven rebounds, six assists and two steals.

In a typical Mavs season, Marion would be peaking just in time for the playoffs. The 14-year veteran has been phenomenal in the last five games, averaging 20.6 points and 8.4 rebounds.

3. Stitches for Wright: Brandan Wright paid a price for his 16-point, 8-of-13 performance. He needed three stitches to close a cut on his left cheek, courtesy of an accidental elbow by New Orleans forward Al-Farouq Aminu.

Wright also caught an elbow from Aminu during a visit to New Orleans Arena last season, suffering a concussion in that case.

“I’ve got to watch out for him next time,” Wright kidded.

NEW ORLEANS – Maybe the fourth time will be the charm when it comes to breaking the Mavericks’ .500 failures.

Some call it the Curse of Omar the Barber, whom O.J. Mayo publicly welcomed to shave those scraggly .500 beards when the Mavs got their first shot at the break-even mark late last month. Believe what you want, but there’s no denying that the Mavs are 0-3 when they’ve had a chance to get to .500, and their performances in those games have been uglier than their facial hair.

The 39-40 Mavs have another shot to shave Sunday evening, when they’ll face the New Orleans Hornets in that franchise’s final home game before officially becoming the Pelicans.

“We’ve been chasing .500 for a long, long time,” said Dirk Nowitzki, the bearded face of the franchise and one of six Mavs participating in the pact. “Every time we’re right there, we take a big L. We have another chance Sunday and it’s a big, big game for us.”

The Mavs were 11-11 the last time they were .500, way back in mid-December when Nowitzki had yet to play a minute this season while recovering from arthroscopic knee surgery. They dipped as low as 10 games under .500 on Jan. 9, when they were 13-23 after a miserable stretch of 13 losses in 15 games. The .500 beards pact began at some point in late January.

For most of the last two and a half months, those beards have been a warm, fuzzy story. That ended March 28, when the Indiana Pacers blew out the Mavs by 25 points at the American Airlines Center and boasted about keeping Omar’s clippers from buzzing.

The Mavs’ second shot at shaving didn’t go much better. They let the Los Angeles Lakers blow them out by 20 at the Staples Center on April 2, all but ensuring that Dallas’ dozen-year playoff streak would end, which it did when they were officially eliminated eight nights later.

The third strike might have been the biggest embarrassment for the Mavs. The Phoenix Suns snapped a 10-game losing streak with an 11-point win Wednesday at the AAC, causing Shawn Marion to question his team’s effort and Vince Carter to admit the Mavs took such a terrible opponent for granted.

Well, there’s no better place to break a curse than the Big Easy. (That’s a voodoo reference, not a dig at the 27-53 Hornets. With a different kind of curse, coach Rick Carlisle warned that only an “f------ idiot” would take a Mavs win for granted the morning before the stinker against the Suns. We’ll only make that mistake once this week.)

But the Mavs at least have recent history of breaking a possible curse here. They’d lost 11 in a row at New Orleans Arena, dating the Hornets’ quick dismissal of Dallas in the 2008 first round, before winning two of their last three in this building.

If the Mavs can win Sunday evening, they can get rid of their beards and remain focused on the post-elimination goal of finishing with a winning record.

Another loss, and Omar’s invitation will rank right behind the city of Dallas’ 2006 parade plans among the Mavs’ most regretful premature celebration plans.

DALLAS – The O.J. Mayo clutch roller coaster can be one heck of a wild ride.

The Mavs survived the crazy twists and turns and highs and lows Friday night.

Start with Mayo drilling a tie-breaking 3-pointer from the right wing with 34.1 seconds remaining in regulation. If that leads holds up, Mayo is a relative hero.

Oh, but then that iffy basketball IQ owner Mark Cuban was discussing in team-wide terms popped up with less than 10 seconds on the clock. Mayo allowed Denver’s Andre Miller to strip the ball from behind, leading to an uncontested, game-tying layup by Corey Brewer with 3.9 seconds left.

Mayo had his chance to win it at the buzzer, driving down the lane for a finger roll … that rolled right off the rim.

“You’ve just got to understand that there’s still more game left,” Mayo said. “You can’t sit there and dwell on turning the ball over. Obviously, I didn’t mean to do it, but it happened, they got a layup and took the game into overtime.”

O.J. made it all good in OT.

Mayo scored the Mavs’ first two buckets of the extra frame, including a 3-pointer that gave them the lead for good with 2:40 to go. That put the finishing touches on his first 20-point performance in more than a month, prompting Dirk Nowitzki to declare that he was “proud” of Mayo.

“That’s what you look for with guys,” coach Rick Carlisle said. “Mistakes are going to happen, but who can make a mistake and then bounce right back and hit two or three shots in overtime, get a key deflection and just stay in it?

“That’s one of the things he’s learned; he’s learned about how to stick with it and how to keep going. I was really happy for him because it was a rough 10 seconds there at the end.”

A few more notes from the feisty Mavs’ win:

1. Dirk’s 25K delayed: Nowitzki scored 22 points, giving him 24,990 for his career. That left him thinking about Sunday’s win in Portland, when he scored only six points and didn’t play in the fourth quarter due to a minor ankle injury.

“Tonight would have been the night,” Nowitzki said. “Obviously, it would have been nicer to do it at home, but it is what it is. I think it’s a great milestone and eventually I’m going to get it.

“It’ll be a fun milestone to get, but more important to me is to finish the season strong, get a couple of wins and hopefully finish the season above .500.”

2. Collison’s closing touch: How confident were the Mavs when Darren Collison stepped to the line with 1.9 seconds left in overtime? Probably 100 percent.

That’s Collison’s free throw percentage in the final 30 seconds of games when the margin is within three points. He’s 15-of-15 in those situations, including 13-of-13 in the final 10 seconds under similar circumstances.

3. Brand back: Off-the-bench big man Elton Brand returned after missing the previous four games with a sore right calf. He had two points, four rebounds and two blocks in 14 minutes.