The Dumb Zone FREE - DZ 6-27-25 PREVIEW | Mike Marshall on what it was like working for the Mavs when Luka was traded

Episode Date: June 27, 2025

Hear the entire episode by subscribing to The Dumb Zone at DumbZone.com or Patreon.com/TheDumbZoneMike "Machine" Marshall joins us to explain what it was like in the building when the Mavericks traded Luka Doncic ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Hey now, what you are about to hear is a free preview of one of this week's premium episodes of The Dumb Zone. If you would like to hear this program in full along with the full archive, ah shit. If you would like to hear this program in full with the archive of all of our past episodes, you can subscribe at DumbZone.com. I heard, I guess CEO Rick was, he'd been there 40 days. He wanted people to speak up, number one, and just like, what's next?

And I mean, I was one of the more tenured people that has skins on the wall across the board. You and Dwight Powell. Yeah, me and Dwight Powell were kind of leading the organization at one point. No, it was just, people would look for me of of like what should we do in service to the fans at this time or how to move forward. And before the Cooper flag thing it was very much like next year's a hardwood classic year

like we got to remind people why they actually care about the Mavs originally and we can't we got we got to talk as little as we can about this team that's about to take the court as possible because it's just gonna piss people off. Is that when you reach out to Mark Aguirre? We're doing that anyway but yeah yeah yeah. At some point what was the hang up there? Just him? For no I don't know I think people had left the organization that... like Keith Grant left the organization right and retired and I think he might have been the conduit to Aguair. I'm not sure. But people just

hadn't reached out to Aguair. It was cool for him. He was ballin'. His eyes out. Yeah. He's actually crying. Yeah. So does it get heated in those meetings? Because I guess let me say this. At the core of it, you can't. The root issue is not one that can be solved. Like what's done is done. So now. Because nothing like this has ever happened. Like Rick Waltz even tried to say, you know,

when we traded Montale, like, come on, there's nothing like this no not close no it's and the reason the reason you do it is somewhat PR as well because in the end like if that superstar ends up asking out okay yeah now it's off of us now the fans can still remain loyal you know LeB, we're gonna burn LeBron's jersey because he decided to leave. Hey, you wanna come back? You can't, yeah, you can't. Oh, of course, then you, of course you accept them back if... Yeah. I mean, the first couple meetings were not productive in any way. It was just people being very pissed off.

Who? What do you mean? Everybody that works for the organization on the business side, when we were getting together, we couldn't have constructive conversations because it was just a whole bunch of just sitting there going like, fuck, fuck. Okay, fuck, yeah. Every idea we had, we were like, everyone's pissed at us. And there was no ground to be made up. It was like, time is gonna have to pass.

And I can't make time pass faster for people just to like stop Yelling at everyone that worked for the Mavs as if we were responsible. Yeah, you're not a soup. I Imagine some soups could do that if he had that certain power. I think that Oh, I was gonna say stranger things the boys. It was the boys. Yeah, I don't know I've seen a season. You've heard him. You heard him right. There you go.

Did you see the one where the guy was getting yelled at because of the tweets for the basketball team he worked for, the superhero? He was a regular guy. Just like you. He turned green. He couldn't turn it off. Yeah. Yep.

Just like you. So I was going to ask you about when the sale happened and Cuban was no longer a majority governor and therefore I guess not involved in, well let me ask you, how involved after that was he? From before did you just see him way, way less like communication wise? Because I imagine his role reduced on the business side and the basketball side like together or no? No, I mean, he wasn't really hands on

with the business side consistently in my time there. Unless somebody came through with a dope idea like Mavrillo. Yeah, unless, yeah, exactly. Unless you had the one silver bullet, which is Mavrillo Bolovich. Cuban time. Yeah, I mean, he was like always on the periphery.

Like I'd see him and I'd be on emails with him every once in a while. And if I had a problem, I could definitely shoot him an email and he would be like, okay, here's what I would do. And then he would, to his credit, dude, he would follow up. Sure. Like if I like texted you about something, you might not like follow up like a month later

and be like, did that thing get resolved? Yeah. He would legitimately follow up and be like did that did that thing get fixed? Again to your point. Or do you need me to talk to other people? Cuban will email you back that day and be like I can't do it today. Yeah. Yeah and so I mean he was in and out. He wasn't. He was in to email you back but not the PR director of the man. Yeah. He wasn't like chiming in on my inbox consistently and we've sat we sat in maybe a couple meetings over the five, I guess five and a half years, right?

But on the basketball side, it's because he's on the basketball side, I assume, that entire five and a half year period and then obviously the sale happens and I know December 20th is obviously the day it's sold. There were some decisions that were still lingering going into the next season, a lot around broadcast in January or so. December 23. Yeah. Right. Yes. Yeah. Uh, January, we're trying to figure out where we're going to be

broadcasting on the next year. If this is going to be another Bally's year, if we're going to figure out, uh, WFA, if a local station's gonna take our stuff. And I know he was still involved in that, to the extent that someone mishandled something along those lines and they got run for it, and he was involved in it.

And the decision to let that person go. So, but that's pretty much the last time that I saw him involved in really anything on the business or basketball side was January 24. And it was very confusing for everybody internally. Extremely confusing. So there's never anything verbalized? No.

No, is this sale? Like, hey, this is now the structure, this is whatever. Yeah, well, they sent out the proper wording on it, like Patrick Dumont is now governor, which is, I know what that means. We talked at the time, I was like, I don't think this is what Mark is saying it is, but he's saying he's still in control. Yes, seeing him holding the trophy after they win the Western Conference was like... That should have been all you needed to know. Whoa! Yeah.

We've never seen this person. Yeah, and just like the slow divorce of like, oh, dad's living at another house, what does that mean? It was just really, really weird directionally because there were people, I mean, you know, Mark runs a unique business wherever he goes. And there were people in the MAVs who kind of existed to respond to Cuban stuff. To go like, hey, Mark wants to see this thing, let me handle that, I'll run with that and we'll move on.

And he just wasn't there anymore and it wasn't explained what his involvement was. And he would still chime in on certain things like maybe once or twice over that next like six to twelve months. It's a whole organization that was built to answer to what he wanted and now he's not there and there's not somebody in that role. Sent did a great job of like just like filling in there and going like we're gonna do this and whatever and covering for I guess a lot of the stuff that eventually would Scent did a great job of just filling in there and going, we're going to do this and whatever and covering for I guess a lot of the stuff that eventually would happen and a lot of

light that would be shined on the new ownership group. But man, it was super confusing. Just as far as light being shined on them, just as far as how disconnected they were? Yeah, and their opinions on things and their their value of employees and okay just across the board like sent runs an organization significantly different than they would probably watch it's not there anymore yeah maybe so so they bought it but it went late 23 December 20 to 23 okay so very quickly Cuban is kind of moved up you said January 24 is the last time you saw him in any significant at least on the

business side he might have been hovering around basketball stuff and I don't know where those were that tug-of-war kind of ended I know did they travel in 24 to go see Luca did we send a body because I don't think that was Cuban He was he was there. Oh, he was he was there. Yeah. Yeah, that was 20. That was 23. That was 23 Okay, that was going into the 2324 season that we went to Slovenia, no No, no, no, that's uh, that's Abu Dhabi in Madrid Preseason got it Cubans there. They were also there.

The Dumonts? Yeah. Before they had bought. OK. Yeah, they were a guest on the trip. Dumonts and Adelsons were there. Wow. Yeah.

They're big fans of the region. That's wild. I guess I didn't think about that. So was that when you were made aware of them? Uh, I mean, I know who Mary Adelson is. Like I can pick her out of any lineup because I'm just a person that knows. I knew who she was, but when you, I had no idea that she was involved in buying the Mavericks until she bought the Mavericks. No. So back then were there leading up to December like that fall where internally you guys like something's happening? There's always over the

last couple years there had been like Mark's really in the shit now like something's gonna have to happen. Some crypto thing. Yeah yeah whenever like FTX like the Tom Brady backed Giselle Tom Brady crypto thing, they were like, Mark lost the money on that. Sam Free, Bank Man, Man Free. Yeah, it was like all of that stuff. And then, you know, we had to deal with like a crypto wallet company that went belly up

and it caused like a whole bunch of like weird lawsuits and things like that. And I knew Mark was staked on that stuff at some point, and I know he was trying to launch cost plus drugs and things like that so his interests have always been kind of like it's always there's a side thing going on but you don't know like how into it like he was or how much financially he's into it and then there was just always whispers of like hey Mark might be exiting soon. But I heard that for like three years leading up to that.

So I never took it very seriously. So you didn't know until it was announced? No. No idea. So how did things change then? You said like Cuban kind of dissipated from the business side, but for you guys, how did things change? Did anything get better?

Did things get worse at all? I'm trying to remember those the first six months or so that they owned the team it was same did not matter it didn't we didn't you know them we didn't see them the only thing I guess that would that raised kind of like a red flag in the first six months or so uh... was nobody got playoff bonuses we went to the finals and we did not get playoff bonuses and how is that different from the past and i'm

that is the one on the side of the the ninety nine on the other side ninety nine out of a hundred times that it'd be a team has gone to the playoffs or finals they have gotten playoff bonuses I'd say. All people that work for the team. Yeah. Because you're working overtime now. Dude I remember one year my brother when he was working for the Saints I think he made like his salary and then he made like 80% of that again on like two playoff games.

He was making like 32 grand. So they made like 10k per game and the Saints won. Even one round? Yeah. You would get playoff? For sure. Yeah. I've been there when we went one round.

Clippers series. And is your bonus, how much is it? Is it a percentage of your salary? Depends. Yeah, it depends what position you have. It's not like life changing, but it's, you know. 10 grand? Yeah, yeah.

Okay. Yeah, that's nice. It's pretty nice, yeah. Especially after working for two extra months. Yeah, because, you know, that, like I said, is where they're making their money. Yeah. So if you're going to work all that time extra, they have to, you know, they gotta give you a kiss. Well, I guess they don't. You aren't obligated to.

You went all the way to the finals. Yeah. Just like you're not obligated to like give Rondo a playoff check or whatever, you can, you'll realize this stuff if the situation gets weird enough. But yeah, we worked for two and a half extra months. So that has to poison the atmosphere a little bit. Yes. Yes. Yes. Was it ever addressed? It was addressed as if it was going to happen.

It was stated that it was going to happen. That's even worse. And it's way worse, because now you know they know, and it's not like, oh, shoot, I didn't know y'all do that. Yeah. And then it didn't get ultimately approved. And that was one of the first ones where I was like, huh. That's a really weird.

That's, I mean, there's very few ways you can tell an employee in a meaningful, impactful way that I care about you and you're valued and I really appreciate what you're doing. Compensation is like number one. It's number one. And if every other team does it and just about every other sport does it and we're used to it and we've worked for a guy that was very generous with his money over the years and the first chance you get to go hey I really appreciate you all. You all are doing a great job. This is meaningful.

Thanks for making us you know some number of million dollars per home game. Boy, and that's extra hurtful just because then they were told, Hey, this is what everybody does. This is how it's done. And they said, okay, we'll pay. And then they didn't. They didn't. But if you think about like the timeline, there was that whole pager attack to plan and that stuff takes money. I

Don't even know what you just said I know what he said, okay Yeah, they had look mark had other interests. So do the Adelson's I think I think just interests so do the Adelsons. I think to answer your question Dan of like when did things start changing? I guess the thing that for through the first like six to ten months or so that started standing out because there was a lot of arena stuff that was planned because there was a lot of broadcast stuff that was happening. What I slowly started to realize is they had no idea what they bought. Zero idea what they bought.

It's like a stock. In terms of financials, books, future, three to five year plan, how this works, how this functions. The broadcast part of it is probably broadcast was broadcast. And I bring that up because the broadcast part links directly to that bonus situation. They bought the team and did not realize there's going to be this gap year before Amazon jumps in where we're actually going to lose money on broadcast no matter what. And they got in and they had big plans early on and they wanted to do this and that and they realized someone tapped on the door and said um did you know we're

gonna lose tens of millions of dollars on broadcast this year just because Bali's sinking and we aren't on Amazon yet. And they did not know that. And everything changed from then. Damn. Well the good news is they were able to stay in the black. Of course, sports ownership. That's the important thing for sure. For the next couple years.

I mean, but sports ownership is, I mean, Cuban famously would say I lost money, like every year I owned the team. Like, okay. But when you do sell the team, then you kind of make it all back in a lot more. For sure. That's part of owning a team. It's a longterm investment. It's a place to like private equity is getting involved in sports ownership for a reason. Long enough timeline,

long enough timeline you're making a lot of money. But they had no appetite for a loss. That's wild. Anything you buy, right? Like we bought the Lake House a new one. We're gonna lose money renting it out every but we're gonna profit when we sell it. No one told them that. Yeah. That's the name of the game in sports. So besides having to work tons of overtime and then really not getting paid for it, did anything else like significantly change just for you, your job? Were there other people chiming in on what you should do or they kind of left you alone? No, from that point on it was not really. I mean we we were really

solid. We were at large. We had 25 people I think on my team. Like we were one of the more stable, one of the more competent engines of the organization so and I also don't have to like... They didn't know what you were doing anyways? They don't know what I'm doing anyways, they don't care, they're just like... Get ruled. Yeah, I'm just like we make four million each year off sponsored inventory, cool, everybody happy with that?

All right, see you next year. It was that kind of deal. And even four million for a team I would imagine that's kind of under the radar. That's nice. It's not, yeah, that's exactly right. Tickets is 80 to 100 million, right? Other sponsorships inside the arena, whatever you see, whatever, on the skirt of the court is, you know, that stuff's whatever, I don't know, 50 million or something,

like it's pretty low stakes, but it's also, that's the balance with doing an esports team and being in content for a sports team is like it is the thing that fans know you by. It is your most immediate connection to the fans is content and social and your presence in media, but it also doesn't make you like a ton of money, so you gotta thread this needle between like spending enough on it and doing it well,

but not getting where you're dumping eight million dollars into it every season unless you are the Lakers or Warriors and can get crazy numbers on your sponsorships. So we're thinking what was it like going into this past season then? Things are pretty good. I mean, it was good. You know, you heard, I think Luca was injured like really early, wasn't he? There was a pickup game injury in the summer. Yeah. It was pretty normal.

No one was like yelling at people about budgets. They did bring in, the summer was a little weird. They brought in like a, this is a funny story that I don't know if I'll spend a ton of time on, but they brought in a guy who was hand-picked by ownership to be the Chief Financial and Information Officer. So CFIO. We have a CFO. We have a CTO. So he's just over these people now and he's there for a couple months and judging from what he did he was told to go find the money and fix the money. Like he's in there just slashing people's budgets like just going nuts.

How did round ball talk get off you? It's pretty low spin. Well this is after he's gone. Okay. This was during the summer. He comes in there and he's there. He's a bushwhacker. He's there, yeah. He's a bag man. He is showing up to take the money out and I will find you I will get y'all even again and he's there for maybe three months and He's gone

One day just gone and I have to believe that sent Going like this ain't working dude. Like you got to get out of here. Like I'm not standing for this and Then yeah early up pretty early on in the season, Cint let us know she was leaving, which is weird. I'd love to know her candid thoughts on working with the Daemons. Do you think it's all related? For sure.

For sure. Yeah. But she let us know, I can't remember the date exactly, she gave us like a couple, two or three months maybe, of after this date, you know, my time, well it was end of the year. So it was maybe a month into the season, she let us know she was going to retire and step away and then it instantly becomes okay, like who's, there's no one internal they're going to bring in to do that, is this this gonna be someone from the family of ownership that runs like the

the Sands company or something like that. Yeah I thought we were getting the nephew. Yeah. We have like a Kendall Roy fail son somewhere in the mix here and I thought he would take he interned for Cuban for the basketball team. So do we believe, do you believe that if Cuban never sold the team? Mm-hmm. Obviously, Luke is still there, but Sint is still there. You're still there. I don't remember if Scooter left before that, because Dirk hired him away.

Oh, no. Tomlin would have stayed, I believe. Tomlin left in 23. Well, Tomlin would have gone. Certainly the. Casey would have stayed. The, yeahlin left in 23. Well Tomlin would have gone. Certainly the. Casey would have stayed. The yeah, athletic trainer who went on to win athletic trainer of the year.

Yeah. With the Knicks. I don't think the issue was Tomlin leaving. It was that they replaced him with somebody who didn't do sports PR which Cuban would have done. You know what I mean? Yeah. Even if it were a different person.

Yeah, Tomlin left in before the 23 season, the Abu Dhabi Madrid trip, he was basically already gone, but he went, he went, he went on the trip. Cause they let him bring his wife and have a nice goodbye trip. How was Luca to deal with? Uh, it was different from the beginning to the last couple of years, I would say. Like it got more difficult, more people to run things through and more people to like get a yes out of before you could do something later in time but that's a global

superstar that's not it I'm not judging his like character anything was never upsetting no no no no he was on it he was honestly great like person to person great because even us dealing with him after having dealt with Dirk all those years, that's the thing. When you raise the bar with personal relationships with Dirk, and then all of a sudden anyone who follows Dirk, you'll say, gosh, they're not Dirk. Right. That's not fair.

That's not fair. I dealt with Dirk a lot as well. I know going in there, I was hired the month after he was drafted and So I think I was Bobby was the first person to do anything with him on camera I was the second person to do anything with him in terms of a bit Bobby interviewed him I did stuff with him at the first media day. So we've known each other for a long time And I've seen him kind of evolve where the first couple years. It's like his mom's there and she's the agent you know, and it's like very easy to get things done and he's just it's like whenever a person is reclusive or doesn't like the spotlight or whatever like I'm not mad at somebody for being

that way at all like I don't judge you if that's not your personality just cuz it's ours and we like to talk on a radio and do video and all this shit and we're comfortable with It like if someone's not I've never had a problem I know people would critique him and there's been a lot written about like doesn't like doing media hates media stuff And it's like okay And yeah, I think the bigger thing that people try to get a judge on someone's character is like Dirk would always treat everyone Top to bottom really well. That's the ideal, right? But Dan knows from his friend who works in Cleveland that when Kyrie was early in his career, he did not.

And we know, we've known enough guys who play for these teams and some of them don't. And that's kind of probably expected. Yeah, he's on the good side of that. But I do know that- 1000% of how he treats me. The small interactions, yeah. It just seems like he's got that part down. I don't care what you do after that. Oddly enough, because sometimes you say guys change

for the worse, Kyrie, I believe, has changed for the much better. Oh, he's the very rare Kyrie Beltray. He's probably got, he's grounded, you know, got a little grounding shoes.