Way back in Mavericks' history, back in nineteen hundred eighty-nine, a key starter entered the season in the last year of his contract. He played all of it despite not getting a new deal. Then the off-season came and he got an offer from the Lakers.

Sam Perkins signed with LA. The Mavericks got nothing for him in return. That helped accelerate their horrible '90s. It was one of the worst moves, or lack of one, that any team can make ? allowing a key player to go unsigned, only to lose him without getting anything but an empty locker in return.

Are the Mavericks about to repeat that history?

"Not a topic I'm even going to talk about," Mark Cuban e-mailed the other day. "You guys [the press] will write about the same stuff over and over again, and hopefully it will be as big a distraction as Nellie's contract was, and we win 60 games, and go to the Western Conference finals, and come within two games and an injury of the Finals."

Cuban was responding to what could become The Steve Nash Situation, which is eerily similar to what became The Sam Perkins Situation. As was with Perkins way back when, Nash is about to enter the final season of his contract.