NBA Mock Draft: Mavs Trade Back to Select Duke's Dereck Lively II?

The Dallas Mavericks need some big-man help, and Duke prospect Dereck Lively II could be an answer for them in the 2023 NBA Draft. Is Lively worth reaching for with the No. 10 pick, or should the Mavs consider trading back in the first round?

Dalton Trigg | May 18, 2023

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Dallas Mavericks

With the NBA Draft just five weeks away, nobody knows what the Dallas Mavericks will do with the No. 10 overall pick … including themselves.

In what is one of the deeper draft classes we’ve seen in some time, the Mavs have an opportunity to add a top prospect with the No. 10 pick if they choose to do so. On the other hand, given that large talent pool, Dallas could take advantage and add more win-now through a potential trade.

If the Mavs do keep their pick, The Athletic has them selecting Duke center Dereck Lively II at No. 10. The mock also provided a scouting report for the 7-1 big man.

"Lively struggled to start the season, but by the end of it, there was not a more impactful defender in college basketball. He’s an elite rim protector who averaged 2.5 blocks per game this past season in 20 minutes," Sam Vecenie writes.

"He defends ball screens well and can do so in a variety of different schemes. He can hard hedge and recover, he can drop, and he can play at the level. He’s mobile and runs the court very well. Offensively, he’s extremely limited right now, but Lively has immense tools with a 7-7 wingspan that portends potential to not just be a good defender but a great one."

Although Lively fits the mold for the type of center the Mavs need next to Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, selecting him with the 10th pick in the draft would be seen as a big reach given that most other mock drafts has be him as a late first-round pick.

With that being said, we discussed the idea of the Mavs trading back in the draft to select Lively on the latest episode of the Mavs Step Back Podcast. We also talk about how we see Lively’s skillset filling a need the Mavs have had since the Tyson Chandler days. You can listen to that entire segment here:

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Published May 18, 2023

DALTON TRIGG

Dalton Trigg is the Editor-In-Chief for Dallas Basketball, as well as the Executive Editor overseeing Inside The Rockets, Inside The Spurs, All Knicks, and The Magic Insider. He is the founder and host for the Mavs Step Back Podcast, which is a proud part of the Blue Wire podcast network. Trigg graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi’s College of Business and Economic Development with a bachelor’s degree in entrepreneurship in 2016. After spending a few years with multiple Dallas Mavericks-related blogs, including SB Nation’s Mavs Moneyball, Trigg joined DallasBasketball.com as a staff writer in 2018 and never looked back. At the start of 2022, he was promoted to the EIC title he holds now. Through the years, Trigg has conducted a handful of high-profile one-on-one interviews to add to his resume — in both writing and podcasting. Some of his biggest interviews have been with Mavs owner Mark Cuban, Mavs GM Nico Harrison, now-retired legend Dirk Nowitzki and many other current/former players and team staffers. Many of those interviews and other articles by Trigg have been aggregated by other well-known sports media websites, such as Yahoo Sports, CBS Sports, Bleacher Report and others. You can find Trigg on all major social media channels, but his most prevalent platform is on Twitter. Whether it’s posting links to his DBcom work, live-tweeting Mavs games or merely giving his opinions on things going on with Dallas and the rest of the NBA, the daily content never stops rolling. For any inquiries, please email Dalton@MavsStepBack.com.