The Brooklyn Nets aren’t about to cry over a little 0-7 start to the 2015-16 season.
General manager Billy King will, however, listen to various trade proposals.
The Nets are enduring some seriously turbulent times to start the year. They’re significantly less talented on paper than they were last season, and the absence of Deron Williams, a decent playmaker who could direct the offense better than Jarrett Jack even on his worst days, is hurting.
All in all, it looks like the Nets are headed nowhere fast. And while King isn’t yet ready to hit the panic button, he is prepared to make changes and has already entertained the idea of shifting course in some way.
Per Newsday‘s Rod Boone:
“When you are struggling, it’s easy to panic and just say, ‘We are going to go ahead and start over again. We are worried Boston is going to get a No. 1 pick or a No. 2 pick, so we are going to spend money so they don’t, just so we make the playoffs.’ ”
Still, King said he has been calling around, checking out the landscape in case the rough waters the Nets are navigating become even more treacherous. His preference is to avoid tapping into any of the $40 million in salary-cap space they tabbed for next offseason and doing something that could keep them from being active on the free-agent market.
However, should the Nets’ play keep going in the wrong direction, “changes will be necessary,” King said. “That’s the nature of sports. You can’t just keep going down the same path. The goal is not to do that. But we’re exploring, and if we continue this way, obviously we’ll have to explore to try to change things up.”
Good luck with that.
The Nets have little in the way of trade assets, and that might be putting it kindly. Joe Johnson has some value as a reserve off-ball shooter, but he’s being paid like a superstar, making him immovable even in the last year his deal. Brook Lopez and Thaddeus Young will generate some outside intrigue, but they’re the Nets’ two best players and can only be dealt if the team is prepared to blow stuff up.
And there’s little value in blowing anything up in Brooklyn. The Nets don’t own the rights free and clear to their own first-round pick until 2019, so it’s not as if they can tank. Their best bet is conserving flexibility and hoping the cap space they’re projected to have next summer will culminate in a multitude of impact signings.
Either way, the Nets are basically screwed for the time being.
