Called it. By hook or by crook, the Dallas Mavericks were always going to trot Cooper Flagg out as a primary playmaker. He has the skill set to legitimately man all five positions on the court in a pinch, and was tasked as a sort of free safety throughout his entire amateur career. Kyrie Irving's injury only confirmed what was already bound to happen.
But even if Kyrie was healthy and eligible to start the season, head coach Jason Kidd's curiosity would have been to strong for him to ignore. Irving really plays more like a combo scoring guard, after all, and Kidd has historically loved to experiment with turning big wings with ball skills into massive point guards. He famously tried the experiment with Giannis Antetokounmpo for a good while before Giannis became one of the most scarily well-rounded bigs in NBA history.
So what could the Giannis experiment tell us? Could it possibly foreshadow what Flagg could become five years from now? Let's take a look.
How did the Giannis point guard experiment go?
In the moment, not well.
Here's the thing about Giannis Antetokounmpo in 2013: no one knew what he was going to be. He was the youngest player in the 2013 draft class, his tape looked like it was filmed on a flip phone (and like, not one of the good ones, either), and one of the premiere scouting blogs in the world spelled his name 'Giannis Adetokoubo'. His most popular NBA player comp at the time was Nicolas Batum.
However, what was notable was that Antetokounmpo had the ball-handling and skill set to be at least a secondary playmaker in the NBA, possibly even play point guard. And after taking over head coaching duties from Larry Drew in 2014, Jason Kidd took that and ran with it.
Kidd coached four campaigns with the Milwaukee Bucks, and for the first two, Antetokounmpo started at the two guard and then officially ran point in 2015-16. And that season was, by far, the roughest in Kidd's tenure. The Bucks fell through the floor, finishing 33-49, while Giannis averaged what now sits currently as the third-least assists per game (4.3) and assist percentage (20%) of his career. In fact, the very next season, when he moved back up to the wing position, Giannis totaled almost 90 more assists.
What does this mean for Cooper Flagg, AKA Version 2.0?
Actually, largely the same. And in fact, Flagg's averages and assist percentage through the early season pales in comparison to Giannis' 2015-16 campaign. Don't get it twisted, however -- the comparison is a bit unfair given Flagg's rookie status (Giannis was in his third professional year when he ran point), and a much worse roster to pass to overall. No perimeter player on the Mavs can touch a Khris Middleton still on the come-up.
We can say that the Mavs are similarly bad to that Bucks team, however. Milwaukee was better offensively, Dallas defensively, and both meet in the middle to boast the 26th-ranked net ratings of their respective seasons.
However, the very next year, the Bucks did begin their meteoric rise to the top of the NBA. They improved by 9 games after Giannis moved back to the small forward position, did even better the following season after that, and Giannis grew two more inches and packed on another 30 pounds of muscle without losing a lot of the finesse he had as a point guard and wing. Every single one of his advanced stats shot up after that season at point guard as well — most notably his usage rate, PER, and box plus/minus.
What that tells us is that, while it's rough now for the Mavericks, especially given their expectations going into this season, Cooper Flagg is going to be just okay. In fact, given that his mental toughness is so certain as a positive trait for him, it could actually be the best that Flagg is jumping right into the deep end to kick off his NBA career. We can't expect him to become an absolute physical freak the way that Giannis did after his first few years, but Flagg is a true all-around playmaking wing, and I'd be willing to bet that his time at point guard will pay off handsomely as a point guard one day.
Whether Kidd will be there to see that happen is another story.