As he nears the one-year anniversary of the sale that ended his nearly quarter-century as the majority owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Mark Cuban did not attend Dallas' stirring victory Friday night in Denver.
Nor will he be at Sunday night's game in Miami. Or Monday's in Atlanta.
There is a simple explanation, Cuban said, for his dwindling presence at road games.
"The NBA got really, really, really petty and said that I can't sit behind the bench anymore," Cuban told The Stein Line.
Cuban acknowledged that his highly visible — and undeniably loud — presence on the second row behind the Mavericks' players and coaching staff at road games for nearly 23 years was also always in violation of league rules. But the NBA apparently just put up with it and Cuban's well-chronicled, uh, frequent dialogue with referees when he was majority owner.
Now that he is a minority shareholder in the franchise, owning 27 percent of the team after agreeing to sell his majority stake to Miriam Adelson and Patrick Dumont of Las Vegas Sands Corp. last November, Cuban is restricting his attendance to Mavericks home games, where he continues to occupy the same baseline seat adjacent to the Dallas bench at the American Airlines Center that he has occupied since the building opened starting with the 2001-02 season.
Cuban also acknowledged in an interview with The Stein Line that he does not have the level of control over basketball operations that he initially anticipated when the sale agreement was struck but says he talks to Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison "all the time" and has accepted the role he has. Dumont is the Mavericks' official governor, according to the league's preferred terminology, and operates as day-to-day owner.
"It's not a whole lot different than right before I sold the team," Cuban said. "Nico was doing pretty much everything and I would give him my thoughts and my feedback — just like I do now.
Then he added: "You're right — I'm not there making day-to-day decisions. That's all Nico. That's just the way it's evolved. Honestly … is it exactly the way I expected it to be? No. But we're winning and things are going well. I'm fine with it."
After this Substack broke the news of the sale agreement, The Stein Line also first reported last December A) that there was nothing in writing in the deal to guarantee Cuban's ongoing say over basketball operations and B) revealed the specific contractual details specifying that Sands Corp. has the right, at any time it wishes within the first four years of the agreement, to buy 20% more of Cuban's stake in the Mavericks and take it down to 7%.
"I'm fine with that," Cuban said again.
Cuban, who helped popularize the local term #MFFL (Mavs Fan For Life) because he loved the team so much, was fond of saying as loud as anyone for years that he would never sell the franchise. Yet he has maintained since the transaction seemingly coalesced from nowhere and shook the entire league that he consented to the sale largely because he believed that Sands' considerable financial wherewithal and know-how in real estate had to be seized upon to ensure that the Mavericks remained one of the most competitive franchises in the league … and also because he did not want to force his three children (aged 21, 18 and 15) to succeed him as owner or create potential estate issues for the family in the future.
This January will make it 25 years since Cuban bought the Mavericks from Ross Perot Jr. for a reported sale price of $285 million just days into the year 2000. But this Thursday Nov. 28 — Thanksgiving 2024 — will mark one full year since the sale agreement was reached at a valuation that league sources have maintained exceeds $4 billion.
"It's been up and down," Cuban said of adjusting to his new place in the Mavericks' hierarchy. "I've had moments of both — times where I was like, 'OK, this is what we need to do, but I'm not the boss.' And then there have been other times where I'm like: 'I'm glad I'm not the boss.' "
He added: "The only time I feel any regret is when the NBA pisses me off. Maybe it would be different if we were losing and things weren't going well, but things are going well. It's nothing specific to the Mavs. I can't go into NBA meetings anymore and give them shyt for being petty."
Asked if he still has the license to email NBA commissioner Adam Silver with dissenting views, Cuban said: "I do quite often."
As for his level of fan passion, Cuban insisted that nothing will ever change that. Reflecting on last spring's unexpected run to the NBA Finals, Cuban said: "I was just as amped as the first two times. And it hurt just as bad [as 2006] when we lost."
Cuban turned 65 in July and, after spending much of the past several months focused on political matters, said his priorities now are "family and Cost Plus Drugs and to be there for the Mavs when they need me."
He was asked if Year 1 as a part-owner went as fast as it seems.
"The older you are," he said wistfully, "the faster it goes."
