Grant Williams, who was traded for the second time in seven months at the February 8 trade deadline when the Dallas Mavericks shipped him to the Charlotte Hornets, snubbed Luka Doncic by wearing his former Boston Celtics teammate Jayson Tatum's shoes instead of the star Slovenian's.
According to NBA Insider Tim MacMahon, this was one of the many contributing factors to Williams' departure from Dallas.
"The fact they gave up a 2030 swap for Grant Williams and then dumped him as soon as they possibly could, which they were determined to dump him," MacMahon said (h/t RealGM). "Not just about getting P.J. Washington, they wanted to be out of the Grant Williams' business. He rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.
"He switched from Lukas to Tatums by the way... his shoe selection."
Grant Williams didn't fit well with Mavs' locker room like he did in Boston Celtics'
DallasBasketball.com's Mike Fisher and Grant Afseth reported that Williams was a poor locker-room personality fit; directly leading to the Mavs' front office making the move to swap him (and Seth Curry/draft capital) out for PJ Washington.
"A source tells DallasBasketball.com that Williams, who was acquired in the offseason in a three-team sign-and-trade involving a 2030 first-round pick swap, over the short time he was here brought with him a vocal and colorful personality that ended up not fitting well into the locker room," they wrote.
Dallas was a volatile landing spot for Williams considering the wildly disappointing ending to the 2022-23 regular season; when the team seemingly gave up and lost nine of their last 11 games to miss the NBA Play-In Tournament entirely. Couple his playful personality with Kyrie Irving's heavy presence and Luka's likely fed-up-attitude towards the Mavs' front office, and this arrangement might've been DOA from the jump.