Mark Cuban doesn't expect Dirk Nowitzki to have any nice things to say about the direction of the franchise after the Mavericks have lost eight of nine games to fall eight games under .500.

So Nowitzki's comments this weekend expressing doubt about the Mavs' rebuilding/reloading plan didn't come as a surprise to Cuban.

"Dirk gets upset when we are in a tough period," Cuban replied in an email Monday morning to ESPNDallas.com. "If you only knew the things he has said to me during recent seasons about our team. I'm glad I didn't listen :)

"That's Dirk. He uses being mad for personal motivation. No one on this team should be happy with the way we are playing right now. I know I'm not. But we aren't going to change our approach. We will be opportunistic and try to get this season turned around."