Hear that?
It’s the sound of Brooklyn Nets majority owner-turned-sole owner Mikhail Prokhorov giving the go-ahead to general manager Billy King to unload more of the team’s first-round picks.
Sorry, that was in poor taste. But the Prokhorov news is for real.
The rumor mill has churned out a lot of fluff over the months, with conflicting reports claiming he wanted to purchase all of the Nets or sell them off. On Tuesday, though, Prokhorov doubled-down on his investment.
Scott Soshnick of Bloomberg Business and Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders provided some of the details:
BREAKING: @NBA approves ownership transfer of @BrooklynNets/ @barclayscenter to Prokhorov, source says. Valuation of $1.9 billion #sportsbiz
— Scott Soshnick (@soshnick) December 16, 2015
To clarify – Mikhail Prokhorov has purchased remaining portion of the Nets & Barclays Center in a deal that values total package at $1.9B
— Steve Kyler (@stevekylerNBA) December 16, 2015
Prokhorov is now still the owner of an NBA laughingstock. The Nets are 8-20 on the season, don’t have any young talent to develop with Rondae Hollis-Jefferson on the shelf and won’t enjoy the unrestricted rights to their own first-round pick until 2019.
With the cap expected to explode in each of the next two summers, the Nets will have a window of opportunity to add some high-impact talent and avoid a wholesale rebuild—or at least survive until 2019, at which point they may need a wholesale rebuild.
In the meantime, this season will serve as reminder of how far the Nets are from where they’re supposed to be, and all the work Prokhorov’s regime must still do to even be recognized as a partial success.
