MAVS NEWS:

[F Gump]

As for every other point above, and again, only my opinion:
Yeah, I think Powell might still be better than Jones in this situation. He's experienced, plays hard, is well respected around the league, and in that scenario that matters this season...let's say game 4 of round 1, someone is hurt, then someone else gets into foul trouble, but you want to stay pretty big, and have to play one of those two guys. I'd honestly rather have Powell in that situation. He's been there before. 
Again, if Gafford was gone, I'd absolutely be thinking more about locking in a good, cheap 3rd guy with some type of upside, hoping to get ahead of the curve for this season and future seasons. 
But, while I like Kai Jones, I don't think he's anything special, and I probably would've forgotten him by now if we weren't discussing him so much. He can run and jump. This might be naive of me, but I feel like there will be other guys - younger guys, who can run faster and jump higher - around when I need to find one.

Got it.

It looked to me like Kai passed DP on the depth chart (starts and minutes) in Mar-Apr, not only when everyone was injured, but also when players came back. And I felt he way outplayed him as well. All of which says to me that MAVS would prefer Kai over DP.

Obviously you don't see Kai as worth having and you see DP as better, which obviously makes my idea 100% pointless when using your evaluation. We'll have to agree to disagree on current relative player values/ability as is. But if you're right, no I wouldn't want my idea happening either.

I do disagree a bunch with your roster-building idea on when you ideally should consider upgrading the 3rdS slot for C (or anything else) ... IMO the very time you should do it is WHEN you have 1stS and 2ndS well manned, rather than when you do not, because then is when you have the luxury of taking a chance on someone who you could develop, rather than needing to play it safe with a DP-type who is meh, will never be anything else, but a known quantity. Neither will play this year, so I say "invest" in the future (and maybe a better 3rdS now as well). Especially if you have a good candidate for min salary. Assuming you have an open slot or can have one at no real cost.