The Mavericks played two regular-season games over the weekend—one against the Trail Blazers on Friday night and one against the Bucks on Sunday night—but according to reports out of Dallas, a pair of ESPN employees were denied the chance to cover either of the games. According to those reports, Mavericks owner Mark Cuban revoked the media credentials of Tim MacMahon, who covers the Mavericks and several other NBA teams for ESPN, and Marc Stein, a national NBA reporter for ESPN who is based in Dallas. Cuban hasn’t revealed why he made the decision to revoke the reporters’ credentials, but reports indicate he may be unhappy about ESPN making the decision to pull a full-time reporter off the Mavericks’ beat this NBA season.
As first reported by Mavs Moneyball, MacMahon and Stein were reportedly told they would not be allowed to attend the Mavericks’ games against Portland and Milwaukee, despite the fact that they had press credentials to Mavericks’ games for the entirety of the 2016-17 NBA season. A source told Mavs Moneyball that Cuban was upset with ESPN for scaling back its coverage of the Mavericks this season. It’s not clear if Cuban banned all ESPN writers from covering Mavericks games or just MacMahon and Stein, but he told reporter Art Garcia that MacMahon and Stein were more than welcome to attend Mavericks’ home games moving forward—if they decide to buy tickets to the games.
Cuban refused to elaborate on why he decided to pull the reporters’ credentials in the first place. He told Sports Illustrated reporter Richard Deitsch that he doesn’t plan on commenting on the situation:
And ESPN and the NBA refused to shed much light on what’s going on, either. ESPN said they are "committed" to covering the Mavericks in a statement on Sunday but didn’t mention whether or not coverage of the team has changed this season. And a spokesman for the NBA said the league is "in communication" with ESPN and Cuban regarding MacMahon and Stein’s credentials.
Meanwhile, there are a lot of Dallas area media members who are upset with Cuban cutting the ESPN reporters off and refusing to allow them to cover Mavericks’ games. Here are just a few of the reactions coming out of Dallas:
The Professional Basketball Writers Association also released this statement on Monday morning:
Stay tuned to see how all of this gets sorted out.
