After publicly admitting that he told his players "losing is their best option" for the rest of the season, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban was hit with a $600,000 fine by the NBA last week.

Commissioner Adam Silver has always been against the idea of tanking and is keen to take a hard stance on it when owners and front office members discuss it openly.

Cuban accepted that he shouldn't have said it and explained that he got carried away while talking to his childhood idol Julius Erving on his podcast.

The Mavs owner prides himself on the relationship he builds with his players and being hands-on. He arguably shares the best player-owner relationship in the league with franchise legend Dirk Nowitzki after spending over a decade together in Dallas.

But even the big German was irked by Cuban's latest comments and revealed how he opposes his views on tanking.

"You don't really want a culture here that's just giving up and quitting and not playing hard," Nowitzki said after Monday's 109-103 win over the Indiana Pacers, per ESPN. "I think it just sets the wrong tone for the future.

"I think it's important for our young guys to learn how to compete and to compete all the time, play hard. You play your minutes hard. That's the only way to get better.

"That's the only way to play in this league, and whatever happens after the season, we'll just go from there. But for now, you play your minutes hard and you play to win."

The victory over the Pacers snapped a four-game losing streak for the Mavericks and was their first since Cuban's comments.

Dallas small forward Harrison Barnes, who is seen as one of the future leaders of the organisation when Nowitzki retires, also disagrees that they should be going out to lose.

"You don't want to have an acceptance of losing," Barnes told ESPN. "Obviously, the quotes about tanking and all that type of stuff, you can't avoid that.

"We've been getting asked about that since they were said, but at the end of the day as professionals, as players, you have to go out there and you have to play to win.

"Any time you don't play to win or you're just kind of going through the motions, that can become contagious. That can become a habit, and that can become your culture.

"'Oh, it's OK for us to do this. Oh, it's OK for us to not give full effort.' Then next season rolls around, and you can't flip that switch. It's still that malaise that you had from the year before."

It's clear that the team's leading figures don't share the same view as the owner and this could potentially cause some disconnect between them.

The Mavs won't make the playoffs, but the players still want to keep their pride intact.