Mark Cuban didn’t just sell the Dallas Mavericks for $3.5 billion, he walked away from a league that, in his view, missed a golden opportunity to reshape global basketball.
In a recent interview, the billionaire entrepreneur and longtime Mavericks owner revealed that one of the driving forces behind his decision was NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s refusal to entertain Cuban’s proposal for a league-run international World Cup.
“I hated it,” Cuban said, referring to NBA players participating in the Olympics. “What I would tell David Stern and then Adam: in soccer, for the Olympics, it’s 21 and under… and then they own the World Cup. The World Cup’s a bigger event”.
Cuban’s frustration stemmed from what he saw as a lopsided arrangement: networks like NBC rake in billions from events like the Olympics, while NBA team owners shoulder the risk of their star players suffering injuries, without any financial return.
“We’re giving all these guys for free and taking the injury risk,” Cuban said.
His solution? Let younger players represent their countries in the Olympics and create a separate, NBA-controlled World Cup for senior stars, mirroring FIFA’s model.
“We could be almost as big as the Soccer World Cup,” Cuban argued. “I think the players would make a lot more money from it. You could support a lot of the global teams, all the different countries”.
But the NBA wasn’t interested. Cuban said the league extended its contract with FIBA without consulting him, effectively shutting the door on his idea.
“Adam wouldn’t go for it. So, that’s why I sold my team,” he concluded.
Mark Cuban says he hates NBA players participating in the Olympics and believes it should be limited to players 21 years old and younger
“We’re giving all these guys for free and taking the injury risk.”
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— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) July 12, 2025
