Nico Harrison’s ‘Bury Me and J Kidd’ Quote Resurfaces and Looks Even Worse Now That Both Are Out in Dallas
Nico Harrison has been out of Dallas for months. He got fired in November. He told the world he was going to lay low. And on Tuesday, his name went viral all over again because Jason Kidd just got pushed out of the Mavericks too, and a 15-month-old quote ages worse by the hour.
The Dallas Mavericks announced Tuesday that they were mutually parting ways with Kidd after five seasons. New team president Masai Ujiri will now run the head coach search. Kidd has been linked to the Orlando Magic in early speculation.
The instant connection on social media was the Harrison press conference from February 2, 2025. Harrison was sitting next to Kidd at the lectern, explaining why the Mavs had just shipped Luka Doncic to the Lakers for Anthony Davis. Trying to manage the worst trade reaction in NBA history. Trying to convince anybody listening that this was a win-now move and not the franchise nuking itself on purpose.
What he actually said: “The future 10 years from now, I don’t know. They’ll probably bury me and J by then, or we bury ourselves.”
It did not take 10 years. It took 15 months for Kidd. It took nine months for Harrison.
The whole arc is now ready for the timeline writeup. Mavs trade Luka in February 2025. Mavs fire Harrison in November 2025. Mavs hire Masai Ujiri as president of basketball operations a few weeks later. Mavs go 26-56 in the 2025-26 season. Mavs and Kidd part ways in May 2026. Ujiri now searches for the next head coach. And Harrison’s words come back to bury both men, because that is exactly what the Doncic trade did.
This is a cautionary tale about saying the quiet part out loud. Harrison probably thought he was being self-aware in that moment. He probably thought he was getting ahead of the criticism by acknowledging the risk. He even tried to control the narrative by joking about it. Front-office executives talk to media trainers about exactly this kind of pre-emptive risk-management quoting.
It backfired in real time. Harrison’s tone in that press conference was already wrong because Mavericks fans were furious and grieving the loss of a 25-year-old superstar. Treating it like a casual roundtable discussion about long-term outcomes was bad management of a crisis moment.
Kidd had to sit there next to him and try to make this make sense. Kidd was a Mavericks Hall of Famer. He led the team to the 2024 Finals. He coached Doncic harder than anyone and got accused of nothing worse than being too demanding. Five seasons of work and a 205-205 record were quietly burned down because the Doncic trade left him coaching a roster that did not fit the win-now timeline Harrison sold.
The Mavericks won the 2025 draft lottery anyway and ended up with Cooper Flagg at No. 1 overall. They just landed the No. 9 pick in this year’s lottery too. So the franchise has assets and a path forward, but only because of dumb luck, not because of any plan from Harrison.
Ujiri now has the full reset. The roster is workable. The lottery luck is real. The Harrison quote will remain pinned somewhere in Mavs Twitter for the rest of the decade, because every fanbase needs a quote to point to when an owner asks them to trust the process again.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
