{"id":294198,"date":"2025-09-20T18:47:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T18:47:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/294198\/"},"modified":"2025-09-20T18:47:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T18:47:11","slug":"southwest-notes-smith-jr-jackson-jr-spurs-arena-nowitzki-flagg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/294198\/","title":{"rendered":"Southwest Notes: Smith Jr., Jackson Jr., Spurs Arena, Nowitzki, Flagg"},"content":{"rendered":"

While Dennis Smith Jr.<\/a> rejoining the Mavericks makes for a nice storyline, it\u2019s unlikely the veteran guard will make the 15-man roster out of training camp, Marc Stein of The Stein Line tweets<\/a>. Smith is signing<\/a> a one-year deal with Dallas, which made him the No. 9 pick of the 2017 draft. However, it\u2019s likely to be only a training camp contract and the Mavericks already have 14 players on fully guaranteed deals.<\/p>\n

Among Dallas\u2019 motivations for signing Smith, according to Stein, was securing his G League rights. That means Smith, who didn\u2019t play in the league last season, will likely wind up with the Texas Legends.<\/p>\n

We have more from the Southwest Division:<\/p>\n

Grizzlies big man Jaren Jackson Jr.<\/a> says he\u2019s progressing well from turf toe surgery<\/a>, though it\u2019s uncertain whether he\u2019ll be ready to play by the season opener. \u201cI\u2019m aiming for whatever my body is telling me, but I\u2019m progressing the right way,\u201d Jackson told Michael Wallace of GrindCityMedia.com<\/a>. \u201cI\u2019m feeling good. I\u2019m doing what I need to do. Every day has been a building block, so I\u2019m just trying to make it to whatever (timeframe). I think everybody is going to be happy.\u201d
\nSan Antonio\u2019s City Council will hold a key vote next week on a proposed new arena for the Spurs, according to Paul Fogerty of Spurs Talk<\/a>. The cost of the arena is projected to be $1.3-$1.5 billion with the city contributing up to $489MM.
\nMavericks legend Dirk Nowitzki<\/a> believes Cooper Flagg<\/a> will live up to his billing as a franchise-altering talent, he told Christian Clark of The Athletic<\/a>.\u00a0\u201cThe hype is real, for sure,\u201d Nowitzki said. \u201cI\u2019m not the biggest college sports watcher in general, whether that\u2019s basketball or any sport, but of course I checked out Cooper. Sky is the limit, honestly. What I saw, just the way he reads the game already at that age. (He\u2019s) barely 18, athletic, (has) skills. I heard his work ethic is through the roof. Everything I saw and heard is he\u2019s the real deal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While Dennis Smith Jr. rejoining the Mavericks makes for a nice storyline, it\u2019s unlikely the veteran guard will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120446,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3797],"tags":[7,225,17945,1105,496,6,969,474,4075,4074,534],"class_list":{"0":"post-294198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio-spurs","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cooper-flagg","10":"tag-dennis-smith-jr","11":"tag-dirk-nowitzki","12":"tag-jaren-jackson-jr","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-san-antonio","15":"tag-san-antonio-spurs","16":"tag-sanantonio","17":"tag-sanantoniospurs","18":"tag-spurs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115238118563278848","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}