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Rick Welts, CEO, Dallas Mavericks Yes, this is highly unlikely ... but insiders insist he would be a perfect stopgap if Silver unexpectedly left early. The reasons are clear — no one is more experienced or a better people person. Welts worked in the league office as far back as the 1980s and learned from David Stern. He was a key to the Warriors’ rebuild, a mastermind behind the construction of Chase Center and is focused on finding a new venue for Dallas. But he’s not a lawyer, has already retired once and doesn’t covet the top job.
It is acknowledged, though, that Myers is close with new Mavericks CEO Rick Welts after their years together in Golden State and will indeed be asked for suggestions and input on next steps given the Myers/Welts friendship. Myers has rebuffed numerous overtures in recent years from NBA teams before expanding his multisport role under Josh Harris and David Blitzer.
During a fall-from-ahead loss Monday night to the Milwaukee Bucks, Harrison was actually subjected to only a few fourth-quarter strains of the Fire Nico chant that has become so commonplace in Mavsland since the spring, but league sources tell The Stein Line that a decision had essentially already been made by that point. Dumont arrived at the American Airlines Center for Monday's game far earlier than usual — nearly two hours before tipoff. Sources say he met behind closed doors pregame with both team president Rick Welts and former majority owner Mark Cuban and duly scheduled meetings for Tuesday to end Harrison's reign and also to meet with players directly to talk about the timing of the change.
During a fall-from-ahead loss Monday night to the Milwaukee Bucks, Nico Harrison was actually subjected to only a few fourth-quarter strains of the Fire Nico chant that has become so commonplace in Mavsland since the spring, but league sources tell The Stein Line that a decision had essentially already been made by that point. Dumont arrived at the American Airlines Center for Monday's game far earlier than usual — nearly two hours before tipoff. Sources say he met behind closed doors pregame with both team president Rick Welts and former majority owner Mark Cuban and duly scheduled meetings for Tuesday to end Harrison's reign and also to meet with players directly to talk about the timing of the change.
Are the Dallas Mavericks narrowing down potential sites for a new basketball-specific arena? Sort of, but Mavericks CEO Rick Welts stressed to The Dallas Morning News that a decision is far from imminent. Late Monday, Bloomberg TV, citing its interview with Welts earlier in the day, reported that the Mavericks are looking at two unspecified sites for the arena and entertainment complex. Both sites, Welts said, are within Dallas city limits. But when reached by The News, Welts said his comments to Bloomberg should not be construed to mean that potential arena sites have been narrowed to two. “What I said was we have been presented several sites by the city and we are doing a deeper dive on two of them currently to see how viable they are,” he said. “Neither may work and we may refocus on others.”
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Welts has told The News that the Mavericks are looking for a site that consists of 30-to-50 acres. Although the Mavericks say they intend to fulfill their American Airlines Center lease, which expires in the summer of 2031, Welts has set a goal of selecting a new arena site by late 2025 or early 2026. Earlier this year, real estate experts who spoke with The News offered several potential locations, including near the Dallas convention center project; the former Valley View Center site; and the current Dallas County jail.
The Dallas Mavericks hired Ethan Casson in a new role as president Tuesday, giving CEO Rick Welts someone to handle daily operations on the business side while he focuses on the franchise's plans for a new arena. Casson was most recently CEO of the Minnesota Timberwolves along with the WNBA's Lynx and the G-League's Iowa Wolves. He served in that role for nine years. The addition of Casson comes seven months after Welts came out of retirement to replace Cynt Marshall, who was hired by then-owner Mark Cuban in the wake of a sexual harassment scandal in the business office of the Mavericks.
“I don’t think there’s ever been quite a reversal of fortune in our league,” Naismith Basketball Hall of Famer Welts, who has been part of the NBA for 47 years, told the Future of Everything in-person and live-stream audience. “You know, a lot of fans who maybe had decided not to renew their tickets called back and kind of apologized to their ticket person – what they had said to them when we made that trade and asked if perhaps those seats might be available again. It’s just been incredible at every level of our business.”
In a matter of a week, the Mavericks saw their public perception zoom up to full-scale optimism, which was a huge leap from where they were, which was somewhere south of subarctic relations with their fans. The change has been easy to spot, especially for those who work in the organization. CEO Rick Welts has seen the difference just walking around the office, through the ticket-selling department and even while out in public. “Our lives today have no resemblance to the way our lives were before last week,” Welts said, referring to the NBA draft lottery in which the Mavericks got lucky and received the No. 1 pick, who will be Duke sensation Cooper Flagg. “It’s really quite extraordinary. Just walking around town. Getting high-fives from the doormen at my apartment building when they were looking away when I’d walk by before.”
Sure enough, the memory of Luka Doncic fades a bit given the new order of things. “Season ticket holders who may not have come back to us in the initial renewal (process) now all of the sudden are like: maybe I want to be in American Airlines Center next year as well,” Welts said. “The excitement around this for our fans is just unbelievable. I can’t imagine a more dramatic change in fortune than what we’ve experienced.”
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So while the prevailing wisdom might be that it’s better to be lucky than good, it doesn’t really matter how the Mavericks got to this point. They’re here. And they are ready to capitalize on their good fortune. “To look forward to, who knows, maybe the next 10 years of success for the Mavericks, it’s an unbelievably lucky thing, but I think we were due,” Welts said. “Sometimes when you have a 1.8 percent chance of something good happening to you, it happens.”
Rick Welts: I'm willing to bet you're talking to the only person who was in the room 40 years ago today. I was in charge of the draft lottery when I was at the NBA. So I've been doing conspiracy theory stories for the last 40 years. I'm happy that I was sitting down here and nowhere else.
You know what you're going to take. It's easy now, right? Rick Welts: Well, the fun starts now. Honestly, there hasn't been a lot of fun around the Mavericks for the past three months. So I think for everybody in the organization—from Patrick Damont to Nico Harrison to Coach Kidd to all of our staff—this has been a lot to carry. And to have this happen, it's unbelievable.
Ben Golliver: Mavericks CEO Rick Welts from draft lottery: "I'm the only person who was in this room and the room 40 years ago. I was in charge of the NBA draft lottery 40 years ago when Patrick Ewing won. I've been doing conspiracy theory stories ever since. This is very surreal, personally."