Dallas Mavericks legend Dirk Nowitzki is among the list of prominent first-time nominees for the 2023 Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame class.
The Mavericks selected Nowitzki with the No.9 overall pick of the 1998 NBA Draft, and he wound up playing his entire 20-year career in Dallas before retiring after the 2018-19 season.
Nowitzki was teammates from 2008-12 with current Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd, who was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2021. Both had instrumental roles in the Mavericks’ 2011 run to an NBA championship win.
“He’s a champion on and off the floor, and Dallas adopted him as their son,” Kidd said. “He means a lot to the city of Dallas, he means a lot to the Dallas Mavericks, but he means a lot to the game globally. When you talk about the European basketball players being able to come over and have success, Dirk’s a part of that process.”
“It was a great run in ’11,” Kidd continued. “(Nowitzki) loved the stage; he loved the moment. We all knew where the ball was going, and he delivered.”
Nowitzki was a 14-time All-Star and is considered a sure-fire lock to be selected as a Hall of Famer on his first nomination. Nowitzki posted career averages of 20.7 points and 7.5 rebounds per game.
“It will be an unbelievable moment, really,” Nowitzki said. “I mean, to top everything that has happened here the last couple [of] years and words and accolades that have come my way, that will be the ultimate … to be enshrined, hopefully, with the greatest in our game ever.”
The German basketball legend is among more than 50 nominees for the 2023 class.
Other notable first-time nominees include San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, Tony Parker, Pau Gasol, and Dwyane Wade.
Popovich was the biggest surprise on the list, given that he has rejected overtures in recent years from the Naismith Memorial to list him as a candidate. Popovich, NBA’s all-time winningest coach, has coached San Antonio to five NBA titles, four of them with Parker as the team’s point guard.
The other two legs of the Spurs’ Big 3 from that championship era — Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili — are already Hall of Famers.
Joining Nowitzki as nominees are former Dallas teammates Shawn Marion and Michael Finley, who currently serves as the Mavericks’ vice president of basketball operations.
Also nominated is Dick Motta, the first head coach in Mavericks’ history. He was hired to lead Dallas during the Mavs’ 1980 inaugural season and stayed as the coach through 1987. He returned for a second stint as Dallas coach from 1994-1996.
The women’s veterans direct-elect committee will consider 12 nominees, including the 1976 U.S. Olympic women’s team and the 1982 Cheyney University women’s basketball team that became the first from a historically black college or university to play for an NCAA title.
The international direct-elect committee will also consider 12 candidates; the contributor direct-elect committee will consider 26 candidates. The veteran’s direct-elect committee will review 44 candidates — including former NBA All-Star and longtime NBA coach Paul Silas, who died earlier this month.
The 2023 Hall of Fame class will be announced at the NCAA Final Four in Houston on April 1. Those elected will be enshrined over the weekend of August 11-12 in Connecticut and at the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame’s home in Springfield, Massachusetts.
