Even after 20 years in the NBA, Chris Paul has yet to lift the Larry O’Brien Trophy in his career.
The 2025-26 NBA season marks the beginning of a new era for the Dallas Mavericks. It’s the time they play a full season without Luka Donsic in court.
As far as their roster is concerned, Mavs has an incredible trio of Anthony Davis, Kyrie Irving and Klay Thompson. On top of that, they are expected to select Duke’s Cooper Flag for the No. 1 overall pick in the 2025 NBA Draft.
However, due to an ACL injury, Irving is expected to miss out on most of the upcoming season. This leads to a major gap in the position of the starting point guard. Luckily, Mavs was able to fill in the blank by signing 20-year veteran Chris Paul.
Twenty years later, Paul played for seven different NBA franchises. He wore several caps during his impressive career.
However, CP3 is in its best when he plays the role of a bed general along with the other stars. Poles can become point guards as Ad, Thompson, Flag and others can form impressive attack units.
Certainly, Paul is already 40 years old, but he showed incredible toughness in the 2024-25 season. He played 82 games for the San Antonio Spurs.
Assuming that Mavs’ core remains healthy, Paul is a general on the floor significantly increases your chances of winning the 2026 NBA Championship Trophy. If everything goes well, the CP3 Championship drought will also end.
In the above scenario, you use Paul as your primary ball handler, but what about when Kylie returns from an injury? Irving needs the ball in his hands to play at his best.
Now, this is what I most believed about young Irving, but the 2016 NBA champions have improved this flaw in his game. In fact, he played as a shooting guard through a stint with the Mavericks.
Additionally, he has already proven that he can play with players who need the ball in hand when the 9x NBA All-Star arrives with Don Sic in the 2024 NBA Finals.
Despite sharing the court with Luka, Irving still averaged 22.1 points, 3.7 rebounds and 5.1 assists during the 2024 playoffs.