It appears unlikely, but something to keep an eye on.
The injury woes continue for the Dallas Mavericks. Already losing Kyrie Irving and Olivier Maxence-Prosper for the season, Dante Exum hurt his hand last night and is expected to miss the rest of the year. The team is in jeopardy of being forced to forfeit games if they do not have eight required active players, which could help the Phoenix Suns in their Play In tournament chase.
The team is incredibly thin right now. On top of the three players out for the year, major acquisition Anthony Davis is sidelined, along with PJ Washington, Dereck Lively, Daniel Gafford, and Kai Jones.
The team is down to eight healthy players: Brandon Williams, Dwight Powell, Klay Thompson, Naji Marshall, Caleb Martin, Max Christie, Spencer Dinwiddie, and Kessler Edwards. Two-way players Williams and Edwards are eligible to play six and three more games, respectively, as required by the 50-game maximum for two-way guys, and the team has no money to sign any new players.
Additionally, the team cannot call up any players from their G League affiliate, the Texas Legends.
The game to keep an eye on is their March 24th contest against the Brooklyn Nets, when Edwards would not be eligible to play if he is active to play in their next three games, and he needs to be for Dallas to play their next games.
Dallas can lie on the injury report and activate players who are injured to not forfeit, but that could cause some strife in the league for lying.
The Suns are just 1.5 games behind the Mavs for the 10 spot. Dallas’s season continues to spiral out of control since trading away Luka Dončić at the start of last month.
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