The Dallas Mavericks struck gold a few years ago when the team made the trade with the Atlanta Hawks to acquire the pick in the NBA Draft, which would ultimately turn out to be superstar Luka Doncic.

Doncic is a game-changing player for an NBA franchise and someone that could be considered the best player in the league in the very near future.

However, he hasn’t proven to be a winner at this point in his young career, and Joy Taylor of Fox Sports believes he should be shouldering the blame for the team’s struggles this season and not superstar newcomer Kyrie Irving.

.@JoyTaylorTalks: The Mavs don't have a Kyrie Irving problem.

"If you want to put blame on anybody, you got to put it on Luka. This is Luka's team, he's the face of this organization." pic.twitter.com/rRvE0PY0mF

— Speak (@SpeakOnFS1) March 30, 2023

There’s no question that this season has been a failure for the Mavericks, even though they were able to make the blockbuster trade to put another superstar next to Doncic in Irving.

That said, Doncic hasn’t turned into that dependable superstar in leading the team to wins every night.

Last season, Doncic led the Mavericks to the Western Conference Finals, which was impressive considering his supporting cast and having a new head coach in Jason Kidd.

Taylor has a point that now is the time to start pointing the finger at Doncic, as he is the face of the franchise, and things appear to be getting progressively worse.

Yes, Irving doesn’t appear to be a great fit with Doncic, but the team should still be a force to be reckoned with and hasn’t been all season long with or without their new superstar point guard.

The real question moving forward is what the future holds for Doncic and whether that future will be in Dallas.

The post Joy Taylor Says 1 Person Should Be Blamed For Mavericks Failures appeared first on The Cold Wire.

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ST. LOUIS — Opening day or not, that was a lot. Nineteen runs on 34 hits. A combined 14 pitchers. A steady stream of late-game leverage. A three-hour 38-minute time of game despite the pitch clock and not including Adam Wainwright’s surprise two-plus minute take on the Star-Spangled Banner before the festivities started.

And at the end, star power versus star power. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. first stemmed a St. Louis Cardinals rally in the seventh inning with a brilliant stab of a Tommy Edman chopper before making an off-balance throw home to save a run, then fought off 102.9 m.p.h. Jordan Hicks heat for a two-run single that put the Toronto Blue Jays up 8-7 in the eighth. Then it was a Lars Nootbar walk, a Paul Goldschmidt double and a two-run Nolan Arenado double off Yimi Garcia in the bottom half that restored a 9-8 lead for the defending National League Central champs.

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Not even Ryan Helsley, the other fire-breathing dragon in the Cardinals bullpen who came up in trade discussions between these two clubs during the off-season, could lock down that lead as he walked Whit Merrifield to open the ninth, Kevin Kiermaier followed with a base hit, George Springer flared an RBI single just into shallow left and Guerrero delivered a go-ahead sac fly.

Finally, Jordan Romano, the eighth Blue Jays pitcher of the day, put a lid on the madness, locking down a bonkers 10-9 season-opening victory before a festive crowd of 47,649 at Busch Stadium.

Such was the depth of drama at the end that the rough outings for all-stars Alek Manoah and Miles Mikolas, each of whom lasted only 3.1 innings and allowed five earned runs, could be easily forgotten.

In between there was so much to take in, from Manoah finding his velocity but still taking damage, to the defensive upgrades immediately showing dividends to clever baserunning helping to make the difference in the end.

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The Lamar Jackson sweepstakes are well underway, with the consensus being that the Baltimore Ravens will be forced to trade the superstar quarterback before the 2023 NFL Draft or the start of next season.

Although Jackson hasn’t been as hot a commodity as anticipated, the versatile quarterback may have a solid trade suitor in the form of the Indianapolis Colts, who admitted recently to not ruling out the prospect of trading for him.

It appears that Colts fans are avidly supporting the potential trade to acquire Jackson and have been trying to get team legend Reggie Wayne to help Indianapolis make the push for the one-time NFL MVP.

Wayne hasn’t been too happy about fans constantly nagging him to do something about the situation and responded with this hilarious tweet.

Will y'all stop @'n me to tell the Colts to get Lamar. I have no way of making your wish come true. Hell… I'm still trying to get my kids to listen to me… Let alone a organization.

— Reggie Wayne (@ReggieWayne_17) March 30, 2023

At this point, there’s no telling where Jackson will end up or how serious the Colts brass may be about going after the superstar quarterback.

The Ravens still want Jackson in the fold for the foreseeable future, especially head coach John Harbaugh.

However, the team has been reluctant to pay Jackson’s asking price, and that appears to be the only thing the 26-year-old quarterback cares about right now.

A fully guaranteed deal is what Jackson wants, and that’s a lot to ask for in a league that doesn’t give out fully guaranteed contracts.

Along with the league’s reluctance to make fully guaranteed deals the new trend in the NFL, Jackson has had injury issues, making it much more challenging for teams to commit a lot of money and years to a mobile quarterback.

The post A Colts Legend Has A Request For Fans appeared first on The Cold Wire.

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