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Mavericks owner Cuban on potential free agents: 'Not going to get a max contract here'

Jerome Miron / Reuters

Well at least Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is being upfront about it.

On Saturday, speaking on ESPN Dallas Radio 103.3, Cuban opened up about his team's offseason plans. The team has $26 million in cap room to offer free agents.

Cuban was unequivocal in his wishes to sign a big free agent to pair with forward Dirk Nowitzki. As relayed by Tim MacMahon of ESPN Dallas:

We're going to swing for the fences. I think some of these guys are opting out just to create leverage, and they'll go back. Then there's some that really want to go to different teams. We'll try to put ourselves in position to get them.

The Mavericks are reportedly interested in a number of free agents, including Marcin Gortat, Luol Deng, Pau Gasol, LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony. So basically, every notable free agent out there.

However, incoming free-agents should temper their expectations if they're anticipating maximum deals in Dallas:

You can come up with a different range in what Dirk is going to take and realize that for a player who has been in the league 10-plus years, he's not going to get a max contract here. So coming in, he recognizes he's playing for less than max. That means there's some reason that he wants to talk to us. And if you look at the other teams, they're in similar situations as well.

A back of the envelope calculation confirms Cuban's math. A sizeable portion of their cap room will be devoted to Nowitzki which should leave less than $20 million - close to the maximum annual salary - for players like LeBron or Carmelo, for any potentially incoming free agent. 

Taking paycuts, however, would all be for a noble cause: to win a championship.

We've got to understand that most likely he's interested in winning championships and most likely he's seen over the course of time that coaching is a huge part of winning a championship.

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