Shannon Sharpe makes his feelings clear about Mavericks owner Patrick Dumont's imperfect defense of Luka Doncic trade

Shannon Sharpe spoke his mind about Patrick Dumont's defense of the Luka Doncic trade. The former NFL tight end-turned-media personality criticized the Dallas Mavericks owner for his comments last month, where he spoke about having to make tough decisions for the long-term health of the franchise.

On Thursday's episode of Nightcap, hosted by Sharpe and Chad "Ochocinco" Johnson, the pair discussed Patrick Dumont's statements from mid-February which surfaced online. At a speaking engagement on Feb. 13, Dumont called the shocking move a decision for the future which Sharpe and Johnson blasted as being hypocritical.

"The problem is that he called it a long-term move and Nico Harrison said it was a trade to win now", said Sharpe.

Sharpe called out the mixed signals being sent by the Mavericks organization. The primary architect of the trade and the team's general manager, Nico Harrison, infamously said that it was a move to keep the Mavericks in the best win-now position possible.

Sharpe noted that not only was Patrick Dumont saying the opposite, but if the trade was a win-now move, it's hard to do much better than the Mavs did last season.

"You just went to the NBA Finals... that's winning now", Sharpe added.

The two both spoke about the irregularity in a team trading a player of Doncic's caliber, particularly without him having asked out.

Sharpe said, "Kareem wanted to leave, Orlando allowed Shaq to become a free agent... normally guys like Luka don't get traded unless they asked to get traded". He continued, "Guys this age, this skilled, this talented, this dominant— you're not just moving them on your own volition".

Sharpe finished his critiques by recommending that the Mavericks move forward and do their best to not remind people of the trade.

He said, "If I'm Patrick Dumont, if I'm Nico Harrison, if I'm anybody in the Mavericks organization— I am not going to talk about this. All you do is peel the scab off a wound that's still very fresh but it's starting to scab over. You just ripped the scab off and got to start this thing all over again".

Mavericks owner Patrick Dumont claims Luka Doncic trade was "tough decision" for the future

Comments from the Dallas Mavericks owner, Patrick Dumont, have surfaced from a speaker engagement he attended last month. On Feb. 13, at the Real Estate Council's Bank of Texas Speaker Series, Dumont spoke about business as well as the elephant in the room, Luka Doncic's blockbuster trade to the Lakers for Anthony Davis.

He described how long-term factors played into the decision as well as how leadership has to make difficult choices regardless of how they'll be perceived.

Dumont said, "Tough decisions are never easy and a part of leadership is looking at risk and looking at all the factors of a decision and being willing to act at that time and look to the long-term and not only think about the short-term or how it may be received immediately".

Dumont believes that last year's trade deadline served as a turning point with how to approach it this season.

He said, "For us going into the trade deadline last year, we were not competitive, if you recall, we were not a playoff-bound team and we were able to do some things to reconstruct the roster and enable the team to become very competitive, and after the trade deadline last year, we actually had the best record in basketball".

Patrick Dumont added that after the Mavericks reached the finals and lost, they searched for how they could improve and get over the hump. After noticing most teams in the stacked Western Conference continued to improve, the organization felt it needed to make a radical change to guarantee they were competitive going into the future.

Dumont said, "So we looked at our trajectory during the season and realized that we did not get better, but the teams that we competed against, some of which we beat, did get better".

He continued, "This was a decision about the future. If you look at our roster today and who we have, we feel like we position ourselves to be incredibly competitive against the best teams in the NBA”.

The controversial trade, and Patrick Dumont's statements, haven't aged well in the weeks since. Anthony Davis suffered a left adductor strain in his Mavericks debut, and both of the teams' centers are out with injuries as well. Dereck Lively hasn't played since Jan 14. due to a right ankle stress fracture and Daniel Gafford suffered an MCL sprain in mid-February.

To make matters worse, on March 3, Kyrie Irving tore his ACL in a 122-98 loss to the Kings. Given the timeline for such a devastating injury, Irving isn't expected to return until well into next season at best.

The Mavericks are currently the 10th seed with a record of 33-34, barely holding on to being in the play-in mix.