Colin Cowherd Drops Cooper Flagg Take Mavericks Fans Saw Coming

The Dallas Mavericks have a special player on their hands. Cooper Flagg has had a rookie season for the ages, and there are still a few games remaining. He's coming off as impressive a two-game stretch as you'll ever see from a rookie, putting up 51 points against the Orlando Magic on Friday, then followed that up with 45 points, 9 assists, and 8 rebounds in a win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Easter Sunday.

96 points in a two-game stretch is the most by any rookie not named Wilt Chamberlain. That's impressive company to keep, as any record in the NBA these days is the first since Chamberlain. With those performances, Colin Cowherd has set some lofty expectations for the rest of Flagg's career.

"I said he's going to be better than Jayson Tatum, not his first year, by his second, you're gonna look up and go 'He's like Jayson Tatum if Jayson Tatum was super aggressive.' And I gotta tell you, the gap between Tatum and Cooper Flagg right now is millimeters. It is tiny.

"...I think he's over-delivered. Like LeBron [James] did, like Tiger [Woods] did, like [Shohei] Otani has. None of you thought he would be this good... That's the best basketball player at 17 I think I've ever seen [during his time at Duke], he's the best teenager I've ever seen in the NBA, and we said this when he was in college, he plays real defense... This isn't a good player, it's not even a great player. I think we're looking at an all-time player. I think, barring injury, I think you're looking at a 15-time All-Star. He's that kind of player."

"He's the best teenager I've EVER seen in the NBA... I think you're looking at a 15-time All Star."@colincowherd thinks Cooper Flagg is on his way to being an all-time great pic.twitter.com/9EzPhRai8C
— Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@TheHerd) April 6, 2026

Cooper Flagg Could Be an All-Time Great

If Cowherd ends up being right, and Flagg ends up making 15 All-Star Games, he would join some rarified air. Only eight players have made at least 15 All-Stars: LeBron James (22), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (19), Kobe Bryant (18), Kevin Durant (16), Julius Erving (16), Tim Duncan (15), Kevin Garnett (15), and Shaquille O'Neal (15). That's Cowherd basically calling Flagg a future top-20 player ever, which is incredibly lofty.

Yet, it may not be that far-fetched. If the season ended today, Flagg would be one of five rookies to average at least 21 PPG, 6.5 RPG, and 4.5 RPG, joining Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Larry Bird, and Luka Doncic.

Doncic's career is still going, but he is surely on pace to go down as one of the game's greats. Jordan, Robertson, and Bird are all top 10/15 all-time, depending on where you place Robertson. That's an incredible company to keep for Flagg.

Stick with MavericksGameday for more FREE coverage of the Dallas Mavericks throughout the 2025-26 season

Follow MavericksGameday on Twitter and Austin Veazey on Twitter