Cooper Flagg is not going to get the chance to play with both Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving for some time, but he is trying to prepare himself for it by turning to a somewhat surprising hobby.
NBA 2k digital marketing director Ronnie Singh said Flagg has been using the NBA 2K franchise to start learning how he might fit in with the Dallas Mavericks’ team dynamics.
“I’ve been talking to Cooper Flagg a lot the last couple of weeks, and he’s already trying to shape up how he’s going to fit into that team by playing the NBA2K26 game with him, integrated with Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis,” Singh told Alder Almo of Heavy Sports. “He might not get to play with Kyrie for a minute, so it’s kind of cool that he gets to simulate that, see how the off-the-ball movement is.”
NBA 2K26, the latest edition of the game, just came out this week. It is not necessarily a perfect representation of how things will look when Flagg, Davis, and Irving are all on the floor together, but it is as close as Flagg is likely to get right now. Irving will miss most, if not all of the upcoming season as he continues his recovery from the torn ACL he suffered in March.
The “NBA2K” series is serious business for a lot of NBA players. Presumably, Flagg has yet to make any complaints about his official rating.
Expectations are high for Flagg, the No. 1 pick in this year’s NBA Draft. He will have to take into account that coach Jason Kidd might have some unorthodox ideas on how to use him if he wants to properly simulate what the team might look like, though.
