Master P Once Almost Signed With The Mavs Thanks In Part To Steve Nash

Steve “The Tour Guide” Nash Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

There was a time in the mid to late 90’s where rapper Master P and his record company, No Limit, ran hip hop. Hip hop has gone through a dramatic transformation since then but Master P was the king for several years, and like with most fanatic dictators he got to do basically whatever he wanted. Even playing in the NBA.

Master P who is known by the government as Percy Miller, had a espresso shot of time in the NBA playing in the preseason for the Toronto Raptors and this only happened because it was a life long dream (like many), to play in the NBA. Master P instructed Andy Curtin who was an agent for ‘the rapper’s sports management arm of No Limit, No Limit Sports, to get him a spot on a NBA team. Curtin made Master P’s Toronto Raptors career happen but there was another team that was interested, the Dallas Mavericks.

From Adam Figman’s incredible profile of No Limit Sports for VICE SPORTS:
 

"Curtin called Donnie Walsh, then the president of the Indiana Pacers, who was unimpressed with P’s basketball abilities but pointed out that a few franchises looking for a PR boost might be interested.“I faxed out a bunch of stuff to teams, and I get a call from Don Nelson, who was the Mavericks’ coach then,” Curtin says. Nelson presented Master P the opportunity to come try-out—this was during the 98-99 NBA lockout season, when the not-good Mavs weren’t going anywhere, anyway. Curtin later learned there were other reasons P was given a shot. “[Don’s son] Donnie Nelson told me later, Don Nelson, when he was the Knicks coach, he had a run-in with Patrick Ewing, then he had a run-in with Chris Webber when he was with the Warriors. They would say things about him, their opinion and everything, but it got to be where it was like, ‘Black guys don’t want to play for Don Nelson.’ And with free agency, that’s a big deal. So Donnie told me, if they could get Master P on the roster, it would be a target for guys to want to come and sign. Guys would say, ‘Well, this Don Nelson must not be that bad a guy.'”What’s more, Curtin was also told that then-Mavs owner Ross Perot Jr. needed funding to build a stadium in downtown Dallas, and the addition of a famous rapper to the squad’s roster was somehow seen as a way to get the votes needed to raise some public money. “[The Mavericks] wanted to build favor among the local blacks, because they were the voting block in Dallas that would get the arena downtown,” Curtin says.So, uhhh, they almost signed Master P.Just almost, though. P went through a training session in Dallas on a Friday afternoon—and was given a tour of the team’s facility by none other than a young point guard named Steve Nash—then told the group of No Limit employees he traveled with that they’d all be returning to Louisiana Friday night, because they weren’t needed back in Dallas until Monday. But that Saturday, Curtin received a call from the team asking where P was—the rapper was supposedly told he’d have to be at a practice that morning, though Curtin had no idea that was the case. Curtin rushed to get P back to Texas, but the Mavs turned him away, thus ending his future with the organization."

 
Can you imagine Steve Nash leading Master P on a tour of the Mavericks’ facility? Master P was on”MTV Cribs,” and poor Nash was stuck trying to impress him.

It is interesting to note that the Mavericks truly never made a splash in free agency with an African American player when Don Nelson was coaching the team. They definitely made several trades involving African American players and as Dirk Nowitzki got better so did the Mavs, which prompted these players never openly complained about playing for Nelson. It seems like those rumors involving Nelson and African American players were just that, rumors.

Master P and Mark Cuban together is a helluva image though.