The Dallas Mavericks have had one of the better off-seasons of any team in the NBA. Through trades, offer sheets, and free agent signings, they’ve managed to add basketball-reference.com’s position estimates. Nelson and Harris, on the other hand, played roughly 99.9% of their time at the point over that period. Harris seems primed to spend more time backing up Ellis at the two while Nelson and Felton split point guard duties, given the roster’s current construction and the lack of depth at shooting guard.

The results of that might be an incredibly small backcourt (Ellis is only 6’3” as well), but perhaps one of the best at distributing in the league. Two-point-guard sets are growing in popularity around the league, after teams like the Phoenix Suns and Toronto Raptors found success with them last season. Considering Ellis’ penchant for ball handling as a combo guard, the Mavericks will be in a good position to always have two capable ball handlers and distributors on the floor at all times, by trotting out any combination of Monta, Nelson, Felton, and Harris. All four of those players had an assist percentage of 24.8% or higher last season, while most teams only had one to two players that hit that percentage in their regular rotation.

Any of those backcourt combinations is likely to give up a fair bit on the defensive end, due to a lack of size, but hopefully the re-acquisition of Tyson Chandler (a former Defensive Player of the Year) can reduce that issue. Regardless, there’s something interesting going on in Dallas’ backcourt. If it works well, not only will the Mavericks be a fun team to watch, they could also be a dark-horse contender in the Western Conference next season.