What unnamed league coaches and executives think about Flagg, Ryan Nembhard, D’Angelo Russell and more.
NBA Summer League 2025 has come and gone, and most of the biggest free-agency moves have been made at this point. We basically know what the Dallas Mavericks will be for the 2025-26 season. Short of a last-ditch trade of LeBron James (and/or Daniel Gafford in our case), the pieces are largely on the board for the upcoming season league-wide.
League officials gathered in Las Vegas from July 10-20 to watch their youngsters get acclimated to a new level of competition, wow the crowds of NBA sickos and compete for each team’s last few roster spots, and the folks over at Spotrac had their recorders rolling courtside and in hotel lobbies up and down the strip.
The following quotes from a recent Spotrac article come from unnamed sources, which in some cases allow the league coaches and executives cited to offer a little more latitude in discussing what they saw on the court and their reactions to the big offseason moves of the summer. If some of these seem a little rote, they at least allow a small window into what the Mavs’ front office and other league officials think about Dallas’ offseason moves and their takeaways from individual performances in Vegas.
On Flagg, who played two games with the team in Las Vegas, one Mavericks front office executive reportedly said: “Since we selected him, he’s been everything we thought he’d be and even more. Tremendous kid on and off the court. Here’s a good story for you: He shot like crap in his first game here (Las Vegas). Second game he dominated. We had a plan to play only two games. Cooper comes to us and the coaches and asks to play a third game. We laughed and told him, ‘No. You’re good.’ And he goes, ‘I just don’t want people to think the good game was a fluke.’ All we could do was laugh, but it shows how much he wants to be great.”
Flagg’s killer instinct should fire up Mavs fans with less than three months left before the start of the season. He wants to prove it and then he wants to prove it again, even when the competition is virtually meaningless. Win for winning’s sake. He wants to put his boot firmly on the neck of whoever’s in front of him, with the line forming to the left for whoever wants some next. He’s got instant stud written all over him, and you could even see it in his poor shooting debut against the Los Angeles Lakers, when Flagg’s poise and athleticism set him apart from the rest of the competition even while throwing up bricks on a 5-of-21 night.
Flagg followed it up with an amazing 31-point performance on 21 shots against Dylan Harper and the San Antonio Spurs. He showed off a great physical presence at just 18 years old and was engaged with his teammates during his first weekend of NBA work. Yes, there are holes in his game, but at the ripe old age of 18 and equipped with the mentality the unnamed coach cited, those holes merely identify the opportunity for greatness that lies before Flagg with a long career ahead.
“It pays to be lucky, right?” one Eastern Conference GM told Spottrac. “Dallas got a generational talent when those lottery balls bounced their way. That kid is unbelievable. You knew after he played like crap in the first game out here that he was going to be great the next time out. He’s an ass-kicker. Wish we had that kind of luck.”
Photo by Garrett Ellwood/NBAE via Getty Images
Two-way signee Ryan Nembhard also impressed at NBA Summer League, scoring 21 points on 14 attempts in the team’s opener against the Lakers and dishing eight assists in 25 minutes against the Charlotte Hornets, adding weight to his (at least according to our own David Trink) claim as the steal of NBA Draft night 2025.
“We were so excited to get him as a two-way guy,” an unnamed Mavs executive told Spotrac. “He’s so damn tough. A lot like his brother (Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard) in that way. We love Miles [Kelly], too. We feel like we’re starting to get really good development out of the two-way process now.”
Check out the glowing review our other Summer League correspondent, Tyler Edsel, gave Kelly after taking down sportsbooks everywhere on his whirlwind tour through Vegas, here.
Even with the addition of Nembhard to the roster, the Mavericks were still in need of help at guard while the two-way rookie (hopefully) comes along. To that end, and aided by a little salary cap room made when the team signed Kyrie Irving to a new three-year deal, the team brought on wayward NBA soul D’Angelo Russell. Here’s what one unnamed Mavs coach said to Spotrac about that signing as Summer League wrapped up.
“We had to get a guy who could play in place of [Irving] while he’s out. But that guy also needed to play with Kyrie, too. We feel like DLo fits that perfectly. We also like that he can shift off the ball with Cooper (Flagg) handling the playmaking, too.”
I was personally not on board with Russell when the move was being floated before the move was made, but, let’s be honest, with limited cap space to work with and even more limited options available in free agency, he was probably the right choice as a one-year bridge.
How good can the team be next season, with Irving out for most of the year and depending on the oft-injured Anthony Davis and an 18-year-old for big-time scoring production? Here’s how one Mavs’ front-office member put it:
“Whenever you trade a truly great player, it’s going to hurt. We love [Davis], and we feel like we’re in a good position to have a great team moving forward. With better health this year, we’ll be near the top of the conference going into the playoffs. That’s the goal.”
“Near the top of the conference” is certainly a lofty goal, making the quote all the more maddening when you consider that the Mavericks were already at the top of the conference, having just made an NBA Finals run the season before getting rid of said “truly great player.”
NBA expansion was another hot discussion point at Summer League, apparently. It’s a “when,” not an “if” situation if the sources quoted by Spotrac are right. Here’s what a few of them had to say:
“It’s coming. That much seems clear. When? That’s the big question. My guess is that we’re at least three years away from the process starting, as far as roster-building goes,” one Western Conference front office executive said.
“I think we’re ready for expansion. I have clients who are NBA guys, but even with the third two-way spot, roster spots are still hard to come by. Adding another 36 total roster spots (Note: Assumption is two teams at 15 standard spots and three two-way spots per team) would be huge,” a longtime agent said.
“It’s been a pretty open secret that we’re going to expand. My guess is that it will be [Las Vegas] and Seattle, but that’s just a guess. They seem to be the best candidates. I have no idea how the league will rebalance the conferences. One team moving to the East makes sense, but maybe they blow it all up and relook at the entire conference structure?” an Eastern Conference GM said.
Bring back the Seattle Supersonics now, dammit.