Nets Are Scorching

So I just read Manix's article. How is this guy a national journalist, and how does his "editor" let him get away with that kind of writing skill. His response had no flow to it.

Winning a title within 5 years should be every teams goal whether you won 12 games or 70 games. Not many teams get an opportunity at drafting Kevin Durant or Lebron type talents, and even less are successful in signing them in free agency.

That leaves trades and in house player development as the only option to build a contender. Teams like the Pistons had role players that fit, and landed Rasheed Wallace to bring everything together.

If you look at the Nets, you can see a team that does have moveable parts, probably more so than any other team. Three years for Petro? My GOD! The Humanity! He's a back up Center, and saying that Zoubek would have filled that role, is a questionable proposition given Zoubek has never played in the NBA and could get eaten alive facing NBA big men (not saying he will, just he's tremendously unproven).

The Farmar signing is for 2-3, and I honestly have no idea what's wrong with it. We needed a back up point gaurd and we got a guy who's been on championship teams, is young and athletic, and hasn't had his skill set show cased playing in the triangle.

The Outlaw signing. Time will tell. 5 years at 7 million per, is just shy of Luol Deng money. Outlaw can be that good or better, but he hasn't shown that yet in limited opportunity. Citing the Blazers for trading him away as a reason he's not a good player is absurd. They also included Steve Blake, and got back Marcus Camby.

Here is what was said about Outlaw/Camby/Blake in relation to the deal.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindblazersbeat/2010/02/outlaw_blake_traded_to_clipper.html

It was done because Oden and Pryz were out for the season and the Blazers wanted a playoff spot. They needed Camby to fill the middle. Not because they didn't like Outlaw.

Then we move on to the Clippers urgency to re-sign Outlaw. Any columnist that looks to decisions made by the Clippers management team for support in an argument, should be tied up in town square and laughed at for a full week. The Clippers also failed to re-sign Steve Blake, and that signing by the Lakers has gotten rave reviews. So clearly this is an indictment of Outlaw.

What a putz! Outlaw is a good player. Did the Nets overpay giving him 7 million over 5 years? Probably. But, the options were limited, and what does the team look like without him? We needed Outlaw/Gay/Gomes/LeBron in a seller's market. It's a tradeable contract if the right SF becomes available, and Outlaw might play up to the money given. It's not inconcievable.

So Manix, what other advice should we follow from the Clippers?

but I still think Billy King is going to be better.

haha Thorn said FU and went with a rival.what a way to stick it to Nets fans.

in the above post i meant to say 4 and 5 year deals.

we are acting like the nets gave 4 and year deals to guys in their late 20's/early 30's. the oldest free agent we signed is outlaw who is only 25 years old. all of our free agent signings are young players who have shown skill and still have room to grow. boozer is 29 years old and he got a 5 year deal. johnson is also 29 years old and he got 6 years. those are bad deals. when our free agents deals are up, they will still be in their 20's. i think that is awesome work by the nets front office.

The market for seven-footers is different than for smaller people. There are a lot fewer of them. THAT is why Darko can get what he got.

The Nets are paying Petro 6.0% of the salary cap. BFD, as Joe Biden would say. If that's your best point of your argument, you're not making much sense.

Moreover there is a fundamental disconnect between arguing that the Nets contracts are too long and admitting the Nets will have $20 million in cap room come July...which could be the most of any team.

Finally, the Farmar contract has a player option in its final year, at Farmar's insistence. He is confident he will be worth more.

I believe TWILL will be used in a trade later this season or next summer. Outlaw, who is a very good player is insurance if that does indeed happen. Other teams would want our young and coming talent...

Ryan Gomes.

Both sides have correct stances in this scenario.

Mannix is 100% corect on the length of the deals, particularly the one given to Petro. That may be the worst offseason signing in all of basketball.

MG is also correct in noting the market dictated some crazy parameters (i.e Darko, etc).

At the end of the day there is a happy medium. The Morrow deal was fantastic and should offset the awful Petro deal. Outlaw was overcompensated (in terms of years) but might get us a few quality years of service before hurting the bottom line.

Jury is probably still out on Farmar but with Devin's injury history it's nice to have a solid backup ready to step in.

I like a B- or C+ was probably the more appropriate grade. You simply can't discount the Johan Petro and Billy King moves. Ok, cheap shot at Billy. But the Petro deal and the length of Outlaw's deal have to account for some demerit. And it wasn't an A offseason even if we didn't sign Petro and gave Outlaw 3 years. So again a C+ to B- range really is fitting of the summer grade.

@Mark--
Better options:
Terrence Williams.
Damion James.
Travis Outlaw at $5 million a year for three years.
After that, you can start to look around the league.

@ Mark G
We could have had Outlaw, at a much cheaper price. I don't think we needed to give him 5 years $35 million to get him to sign here. I don't think anyone was going to come close to our offer.

@ Mike R- I believe we did need a guy like outlaw. T will is good, but he is kind of short to play the 3. And he cannot shoot the outside shot. Outlaw is 6'9". That is a good height for a SF. And he is a very good outside shooter, and defender. Even if he eventually ends up coming off the bench, he will be a good bench player to have.

lastly in terms of player chat
it was stated that devin harris is "vastly overrated"
and that thorns free agent choices
were not supported by them.
all believed that thorn left the team in"BAD SHAPE"
INCLUDING THM STATING THAT INSIDE THE NETS ORGANIZATION QESTIONING THE CHOICE OF FAVORS OVER COUSINS!!

inside word is they dont know how good favors will be and inside are second guesing their draft pick!!

to mark g.

as i wrote earlier this week ,i had dinner with several former players and other mutual friends in nyc on tuesday!!

it was spilled out why thorn left!!

are you aware of the nets little weasel business president,brett yormack.this terd who knows as much hoops as ratner does,was undermining thorn and trying to have the russian owner replace him with calipari!!
from what was said ,if not for the problem created by wimpy yormack,thorn would still be with the nets!!

thorn was the best thing to happen to this chronically dismal team--to let a jerk like yormack get involved in the b ball end is stupid!!

i hope this answers the question of why he left when he clearly did not want to retire!!

Mark G - I guess the question is did the Nets even need Outlaw? Couldn't TWill start at the 3? Seemed like a kneejerk reaction to striking out of the big free agents. I hope I am wrong. To your question, I am not sure who else they could have signed and fit your criteria.

The money for Outlaw isn't such a big issue but the length is a bit brutal. The reason they had to do that deal, however, was because as others are saying, there were pretty much no other replacement level SFs available to plug into the starting line-up if D.James doesn't cut it. Outlaw had great leverage and we didn't, simple as that- we had to make a move and they didn't, so they got the best contract out of the Nets they could.
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As far as Thorn goes, I have a feeling he left because of the 5 year plan and the guarantees for championship contention, as well as Prokhorov's intention to put his own people into the organization. Thorn is an old-guard NBA guy, and he felt much more comfortable going to Philly under much less scrutiny to work with his buddy Ed Stefanski, who did a great job building us a mediocre team around Jason Kidd.

@ eLone- u are absolutely right. No big stars wanted to some to a 12 win team. But they were willing to go to the bulls because they have a solid core. We now have a solid core of players. And once we make the playoffs (and i believe we will), we will be in a better position to land a star player. They will want to come play for us. I love every deal we made this year. We have a good solid core of young players that are a good fit together. And we are going to make the playoffs...

In my opinion i like the travis outlaw deal. he is a 25 year old player with great athleticism, can shoot and can defend. He is about to enter the prime of his career. His deal is up when he is 30 years old. So we are going to have him for his best years. He may be only a role player. But he is a good role player. And in order to win u need good role players.

I'm going to be that guy and just ask some of the people who dislike the Outlaw deal to name a few additional SF who could have been signed, are capable of starting, and would have been more reasonable capwise.

I'm fine with Devin Harris,actually I think he's a great fit with the nets and would not be the right move to move him now. PG can win you a championship or have you forgotten about Magic Johnson. but of course one player can't do it by himself, he always needs a strong team behind him (that's why DH is going to have a good year).
On the topic of Mannix, I kind of agree with the him on the outlaw and petro,but not with the farmar deal. With the crazy deals this summer they are actually pretty good. I would also like to point out the point he made in saying that rod thorn wanted a good(slower) rebuilding and that Proky wanted a fast one.This might be one of the reasons that Rod decided not to continue.

This is stupid and all backlash hype after coming off of a 12 win season.

Everything I read from any media outlet says the Nets won 12 games last year, they'll be a lottery team again this year.

Last year, we were terrible defensively, had no outside shooter, and were starting guys like Bobby Simmons, while dealing with a landslide of early season injuries while getting ourselves in a hole the first 18 games of the season.

Mannix has no vision. They call this a PG league, but PG's don't win championships. They're a key component of success, but the teams that have won championships, usually have a lot of depth around the PG, or a superstar counterpart. For that reason, I'm fine with Devin Harris, and can actually believe Derrick Favors 10 years down the road will be looked at as the best player to come out of this class.

Look at all the past conference finalists and ask yourselves what got that team to the finals.

Lakers - Derrick Fisher, or Kobe/Gasol/Odom/Bynum?

The Celtics - Rondo is great, but look at the help.

The Magic - Jameer Nelson, or Dwight Howard?

The Spurs - Parker is good, but what about that Tim Duncan guy?

The Cavs - Lebron...

The Pistons - Billups is great, but again look at the rest of the team. Billups also pulled down about 6-7 boards per game.

The Nets - Kidd, ok so I guess we're the example of how to lose in the finals with an all-time great PG. But Kidd also pulled down 8 Boards a game.

The Jazz - Stockton, ok maybe they are, but they also had Malone.

The Heat - Shaq and Wade

The Mavs - Dirk....

I think the theme is established. Name the last time a PG led his team to the championship? Aside from Kidd name a time a PG was even the best player on a Finals team?

John Wall is going to be a big time player, but he's going to need help, because PG's facilitate offense. They don't actually score the ball, and they rarely pull down boards, which is key for a championship team.

Landing Favors or Cousins was always going to be what's best for the long term future of the franchise. Sometimes bad luck, turns out in your favor.

In regards to the FA signings. People are knocking the Nets on the FA signings, saying we could have conserved cap space. So getting Boozer or Stoudemire at near max levels is keeping those teams flexible how?

The choice was D-leaguers or legit NBA talent with athleticism and upside. This was a seller's market this summer. I think the Nets managed to improve every position while putting themselves in the playoff hunt, and maintaining their flexibility.

I'm not going to listen to some beat writer who wasn't a part of any negotiations talk about how we should have offered 1-2 year deals. Outlaw has the "worst" contract of the bunch, and it's hardly a Gilbert Arenas/James Posey kind of contract.

We'll see what these dudes say when the Nets win more games than the Knicks this year and make the playoffs, then land Carmello next season, while trading up in the draft to fill out the PF time share if Favors isn't yet beast mode.

I agree with you NAS, I think Mannix isn't thinking this through. One of the primary reasons no free agents were all that interested in New Jersey is because we won TWELVE games last season.

Everyone talked about how great of a prospect the Bulls are because they proved themselves during the season to have a solid core.

The Nets have a pretty solid core right now and if they make the playoffs, have showcased themselves to be that "one big player away" from a championship contender.

people = because lol

I'm going to agree with Mannix on this one. Just people folks are giving guys like Rudy Gay $80+ million, Darko, etc doesn't mean you necessarily have to commit that much future cap space this summer. I really hope Outlaw works out because I like him and wish only the best for this team. That being said, whoever pulled the strings didn't exercise restraint. Outlaw has not shown to be anything more than a role player his entire career (despite being called Mr. Fourth Quarter). Factoring in the expiration of the current CBA, we could have signed someone of Outlaw's capabilities (whatever he has shown so far) for much less. Do the Nets have enough for a max contract next summer? Sure but it would've been better if the team was in a situation where they had an extra $6-13 million in cap space. Players like Outlaw, Farmar and Petro are not exactly rare commodities in the NBA. Preserving cap space isn't just about signing FA's. It allows you to pull off trades like the one that just happened.