Dallas Mavericks: Draft Recap, In-Depth Look Going into Free Agency

I'm about to say something that won't resonate well with other Dallas Mavericks fans, in terms of Thursday's NBA draft:

Sooner or later, the Mavs will have to rebuild by finding talent in the draft.

Everyone has their own opinions about how the Dallas front office handled their draft, first acquiring North Carolina center Tyler Zeller at No. 17 and then shipping him off to Cleveland for the No. 24, No. 33 and No. 34 picks.

With those three picks, the Mavericks selected three quality players who could find playing time right away if they impress in training camp and the summer league.

If you're trying to figure out Dallas' best course of action this summer, sit back, relax and please bare with me. 

Breakdown of the three draft picks

Jared Cunningham from Oregon State is a 6'5" athletic combo guard who loves to get to the rim and draw contact. He averaged seven trips to the free-throw line last year for the Beavers, en route to averaging over 17 points per game.

Not many people had Cunningham listed in the first round of their mock drafts, and people were curious as to why Dallas would take a chance on a guy that hasn't been mentioned all that much.

But head coach Rick Carlisle likes him a lot, as mentioned last night to Mavs beat writer Earl K. Sneed:

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Carlisle on Cunningham: "He was a guy we liked all along. ... We felt we got him at the threshold point."

"

"— Earl K. Sneed (@EKS_MavsNBA) June 29, 2012 "

Carlisle also told Sneed that Cunningham is "similar to a (Russell) Westbrook-type in this league. That's a lot to put on a kid."

Only time will tell if the First Team All PAC-12 member will pan out like Westbrook, but if he does, expect great things from him going forward.

With the back-to-back picks in the second round, via Cleveland, Dallas picked up two guys who are known for two things: defense and toughness.

They grabbed Florida State center Bernard James at No. 33. For those who don't know, he served in the Air Force for six years and was stationed in Iraq.

As the oldest member of this draft class at 27 years old, James anchored the fifth-best defense in the country with the Seminoles.

James averaged 10 points and eight rebounds a game in his final season at Florida State, and at 6'10" and 230 pounds, he could be an early candidate for the backup center position.

Don't let the age fool you: James is a tough customer.

With the next pick, the Mavs may have found their candidate for backup small forward with Marquette forward Jae Crowder, a guy believed by some to be a late first-round pick.

The stock rose for the Big East Player of the Year in his senior year, as he averaged 17 points and almost nine rebounds a game for the Golden Eagles. Everyone knew his name in the NCAA Tournament, where he averaged almost 20 points and 12 rebounds before Marquette was ousted in the Sweet 16.

Crowder presents tough defense and is a pure ball thief, but he's capable of stepping beyond the three-point line and making long jump shots. And with his ability to play an effective inside-outside game, he could be a valuable asset for the Mavs going forward. 

So what does this mean for free agency?

Whether most people think these were good picks or not, the one reason Dallas traded Zeller for these three picks is because the Mavs wanted to fill roster space at a cheap rate. That is why this year's summer league team will be one to keep an eye out for.

We can argue all day about why the Mavs traded away the No. 55 pick to the Los Angeles Lakers for a half-million dollars, but it is what it is.

Personally, I would have gotten New Mexico forward Drew Gordon with that pick. Good news is, he will be a member of the Dallas summer league team in Las Vegas.

Depending on which players the Mavs love from the summer roster, as it currently stands, Dallas has seven players on the roster under contract, plus the three picks.

That means right now, Dallas has 10 players on its roster, and that's including the Lamar Odom and Kelenna Azubuike trades from Thursday. The current salaries for the 2012-13 season are as follows, via Hoops Hype:

Dirk Nowitzki: $20,907,128
Shawn Marion: $8,646,364
Brendan Haywood: $8,349,000
Vince Carter: $3,120,000
Rodrigue Beaubois: $2,227,332
Dominique Jones: $1,276,560
Brandan Wright: $947,907

Adding all of that together, Dallas players' salaries stand at $45,474,291.

According to Hoops World, the No. 24 overall pick of the NBA draft (Cunningham), will make $963,000 in his rookie season. Add that, and you're looking at approximately $46 million in salary.

If the Mavericks want to bring in All-Star point guard Deron Williams, the best they can do would be a four-year contract worth about $75 million.

After that, it becomes a question of who stays and who goes. 

Who gets to come back and who leaves?

This is where everything gets tricky.

Right now, the Mavericks have four notable unrestricted free agents: Jason Kidd, Jason Terry, Delonte West and Ian Mahinmi.

All four have rights to come back to Dallas. Kidd has said that he will go wherever Williams goes, so that could either be Dallas or Brooklyn. Terry has said that he wants a multi-year contract, and if he can't get that with the Mavericks, he'll go elsewhere.

So depending on where Kidd wants to go, West and Mahinmi would be the two viable options to come back. Hypothetically speaking, both would receive contracts close to, or a little more than $10 million for a few years, and Mahinmi would cost more money than West.

In terms of using the amnesty clause, the two viable candidates would be Brendan Haywood and Shawn Marion, and the general consensus has been that the Mavs should show Haywood the door.

In terms of production on the floor, there's no debate that Marion should stay. But in terms of salary, Marion should go, because he's making approximately $297,000 more than Haywood.

Depending on how much that $297,000 comes into play remains to be seen. But all signs point to Haywood being the one on his way out.

Another key component is Vince Carter's contract. As it stands, Carter's contract consists of a two-year team option that would expire after the 2013-14 season.

If the Mavs decide not to extend the option, that would shed another $3 million-plus from the books. With a logjam at the guard positions, don't be surprised to see Vinsanity on his way out.

There are so many keys to this whole thing, and it all depends on the development of the young players like Roddy Beaubois, Dominique Jones and Cunningham.

After getting rid of Haywood and VC, where does the salary and roster stand?

Haywood and Carter's combined salaries come to $11,469,000. Subtracted from the overall team salary, Dallas' salary would stand at $34,005,291, which is close to $24 million under the salary cap of $58 million.

The good news: that's a lot of money to spend, but since D-Will's price tag of $18 million-plus per year is a significant chunk of change, that alone would leave Dallas only approximately $6 million under the cap, unless they structure it in a unique way.

One option that hasn't been discussed in-depth, but is still a stab-in-the-dark option, is restructuring Dirk Nowitzki's contract. Dirk is scheduled to make over $42 million for the last two years of his contract, and if he wanted to, he could take less money to add to the cap.

Highly unlikely, but it's possible.

The good news is, the rookies and maybe a couple of standouts from the summer league could come cheap, which could bring the current roster to nine players.

Based off the pattern of the rookie wage scale, the two second-round picks could make a little over $800,000 each.

Going into free agency, if everything goes accordingly and goes the way most Mavs fans would like, the roster, based in order of salary, would be as follows:

Dirk Nowitzki: $20,907,128
Shawn Marion: $8,646,364
Rodrigue Beaubois: $2,227,332
Dominique Jones: $1,276,560
Jared Cunningham: $963,000
Brandan Wright: $947,907
Bernard James: Appx. $800,000-plus
Jae Crowder: Appx. $800,000-plus
Drew Gordon: Appx. $400,000-$500,000-plus

If Crowder's, James' and Gordon's contracts remain at base value, or somewhere approximately in that area, Dallas' salary would stand at $36,120,384, around $22 million under the cap.

They also keep the same number of players on the roster they had before Thursday, and get to work with $5 million less than what they had before.

I know, one can wish that's the way it will stay, right? 

But wait—it gets trickier from there.

If Dallas wants to re-sign Delonte West and Ian Mahinmi to deserving contracts, the contracts will have to be cheaper than they would like, at least for the first year.

The average amount that D-Will would get per year is $18.75 million over four years. There's no question that if Dallas pays him that amount in the first year, Mark Cuban and Donnie Nelson would only be working with around $3 million with 10 players on the current roster.

Now, if Dallas could structure the contract so that Williams would get approximately $15 million in year one, that would open the door for West and Mahinmi to come back, if they so choose.

If D-Will comes to Dallas and everything is structured that way, then Dallas has around $7 million to work with for West and Mahinmi, or possibly a free agent.

Then there's the possibility that D-Will stays in Brooklyn, in which case the Mavs are still $22 million under the cap.

At that rate, you still have the chance to bring in guys like Steve Nash, Goran Dragic or even Roy Hibbert, if you're willing to pay a lot of money to pry him away from Indiana.

There's been talk of bringing Nash back to Dallas, and the asking price would be more than affordable—around $20 million for two or three years. 

How does everything look in both of those scenarios?

If Deron comes to Dallas and takes $15 million in the first year of his contract, salaries would look like this for 2012-13:

Dirk Nowitzki: $20,907,128
Deron Williams: Appx. $15 million
Shawn Marion: $8,646,364
Rodrigue Beaubois: $2,227,332
Dominique Jones: $1,276,560
Jared Cunningham: $963,000
Brandan Wright: $947,907
Bernard James: Appx. $800,000-plus
Jae Crowder: Appx. $800,000-plus
Drew Gordon: Appx. $400,000-$500,000-plus

That would leave the overall team salary at approximately $51 million, $7 million under the cap. That could provide just enough to bring back West and Mahinmi for around $3 million per year each.

But what if Steve Nash comes back to Dallas for a few years at the asking price many have speculated he'd take?

Dirk Nowitzki: $20,907,128
Steve Nash: Appx. $10 million
Shawn Marion: $8,646,364
Rodrigue Beaubois: $2,227,332
Dominique Jones: $1,276,560
Jared Cunningham: $963,000
Brandan Wright: $947,907
Bernard James: Appx. $800,000-plus
Jae Crowder: Appx. $800,000-plus
Drew Gordon: Appx. $400,000-$500,000-plus

In that scenario, you have $46 million and more than enough to bring back West and Mahinmi, and maybe one more contributing piece at the right price.

Both scenarios are possible and can work. Both depend on whether or not Williams wants to return to Brooklyn. If he doesn't come to Dallas, best believe Cuban and Nelson will work hard to get Nash back to Big D. 

That's all, folks.

I hope this, in some ways, answers people's questions in terms of Dallas' team salary. I hope it helped clear up any confusion you may have had.

July 1 is right around the corner, and all our questions will be answered by then.