Tim Hardaway Jr. Rejected His Dad’s Claim That Luka Doncic And Kyrie Irving Are Not Leaders

Things could be going a lot better for the Dallas Mavericks right now. Despite pulling off a gigantic trade at the deadline to acquire Kyrie Irving from the Brooklyn Nets, Dallas finds itself facing quite the uphill climb down the home stretch of the season, as the team is a half-game back of the Oklahoma City Thunder (which hold the tiebreaker between the two teams) for the 10-seed in the Western Conference with three games left to play.

The last thing the team wants right now is something that pulls attention away from what they need to do on the coach, but on Wednesday, something less than ideal popped up. Tim Hardaway — the Hall of Fame guard whose son, Tim Jr., plays for the Mavs — went onto FS1’s The Carton Show and expressed his belief that Dallas does not have a leader. To make matters worse, Hardaway specifically mentioned Irving and Luka Doncic.

“They’re missing a leader,” Hardaway said. “They’re missing a leader out there. Luka is not a leader, Kyrie is not a leader. Jalen Brunson was a leader.”

Mentioning Brunson on the heels of Doncic saying earlier in the week that the team misses him “a lot” is especially harsh. The issue is that Hardaway did not appear to run this take by his son first, and prior to Wednesday night’s game against the Sacramento Kings, the younger Hardaway told the press that he disagrees with his dad “1000%.”

Wednesday night’s game against Sacramento is the first in a three-game homestand to close the season for the Mavericks, which includes games against Chicago and San Antonio.