DALLAS — Owner Mark Cuban said his Dallas Mavericks grew stagnant. Reigning MVP Dirk Nowitzki agreed.

Things changed Tuesday with the long-awaited arrival of All-Star point guard Jason Kidd in an eight-player trade with New Jersey that was discussed for weeks, scuttled once, reconfigured and finally approved by the NBA.

Now, the Mavericks get to see what became of the Kidd they took with the No. 2 pick 14 years ago, when they dreamed of winning a game here and there instead of a championship. Nowitzki gets the closest thing he's had to a running buddy since good friend Steve Nash left for Phoenix in 2004.

The Nets get a point guard 10 years younger than Kidd in Devin Harris, a functional center in DeSagana Diop and two first-round draft picks.

New Jersey also picked up swingman Maurice Ager, forward Trenton Hassell, retired forward Keith Van Horn and an extra $3 million. Dallas' other pieces were forward Malik Allen and guard Antoine Wright.

"In any business there's lulls," said Cuban, who was a Mavericks season ticker holder the last time Kidd was in Dallas. "Everybody was waiting for the postseason to start. You can't just say, 'OK, turn it on in the postseason.' I think Jason ... being that iconic All-Star will spark a lot of people."

That spark was gone in New Jersey, Nets president Rod Thorn said. He said as the Nets struggled this season, Kidd lost some of the intensity that defines him as a player, making the trade imperative.

"Over the course of time it became very evident that his heart wasn't in it," Thorn said. "The kind of player he is, if his heart's not in it then he's not the same player, and it became evident to me that his heart wasn't in it anymore. It just wasn't going to work."