Nets Are Scorching

In addition to building their roster through free agency and trades, the Nets also have to consider bringing back some of their own guys this summer. The NAS takes a look at the team’s current crop of free agents and determines who stays and who goes.

You Got To Go: Kris Humphries had a solid season in 2010-2011, but two major terms come to mind every time I think about it. Those terms are “contract year” and “fluke rule.” While I’d love to believe that Humphries’ performance this season is a good indicator for his future success, that’s not really a solid case. Time and time again, we’ve seen players really put their noses to the grindstone when the money’s on the line, only to shrink to replacement-level production as soon as they have guaranteed money for the next several years. Bobby Simmons comes to mind. Rashard Lewis comes to mind. Gilbert Arenas comes to mind. Anyone who ever wore a Knicks uniform during Isiah Thomas’ reign comes to mind. Too many times have NBA teams been bitten in the butt by trusting players who were trying their hardest just to secure livelihood, the success of the team be damned.

Beyond just that, though, Humphries’ tunnel vision is very concerning. Once he puts the ball on the floor toward the basket, you can guarantee he will take a shot. It doesn’t matter if someone’s open. It doesn’t matter if he’s 20 feet from the basket. Once he sets his sights on taking a shot, he’s going to take a shot. Unfortunately, he’s not good enough to be able to get away with that decisiveness. Sure, the last thing you want is a player to hesitate, but good decision-making doesn’t have to manifest itself as “shoot whenever you want.” With better players on the floor in Deron Williams and Brook Lopez, Humphries needed to learn to take his shots only when truly necessary. Too many times did he brick 17-foot jumpers off the side of the rim with 10+ seconds left on the shot clock.

Moreover, there’s the question of whether he and Lopez and coexist on the floor from a rebounding perspective. I’m fairly convinced Humphries’ selfishness on the boards directly influenced Lopez’s rebounding decline, and the last thing anyone needs is another year of Lopez bashing because someones robbing his rebounds. One of them should go, and anyone who thinks that one should be Lopez should also go.

I Guess You Could Stay: During the 2010-2011 season, Humphries embodied a lot of the qualities that the Nets sorely lacked. He hustled, he gave it his all, he was tough, and he cared on defense. The effort was always there, if not always the talent. That is, in being a solid rotation player, he made up for what he lacked in natural ability with grit, effort, and toughness. And that’s always a good guy to have on your team. Meanwhile, statistically, he averaged a double-double and became a rebounding machine as the season went on. It’s not often you want to let go of someone with stats like that. Despite his occasional cluelessness, he was undoubtedly a producer.

More importantly, Humphries seems to want to play for the Nets. His playing for the Nets has gotten his name out there and scored him an engagement with Kim Kardashian. It’s always great to have players on a team that really want to be there, especially when the team is so bad that it seems farfetched that anyone at all would want to be there.

The Final Verdict: Hump’s got to go. His effort and production are enviable, but the collateral damage could prove to be too much. Lopez will continue to struggle at his side, there’s a chance he won’t come close to duplicating his numbers with a lesser sense of urgency and money lining his pockets, and he’s going to require a hefty paycheck.

Really, I’d be perfectly okay with bringing Humphries back at no more than $6 million a year. Not a dime more. That makes the risk worth it and doesn’t cripple the salary-cap situation for later acquisitions. The problem, though, is that he’s sure to get more than that. He has garnered a lot of attention around the league — both on and off the court — and now he’s a notable, if not proven, commodity around the league. Every team needs rebounding and effort, and other teams can afford a bigger deal right now. Unfortunately, the Nets aren’t one of those teams.

To improve in the future, the Nets will have to learn from the mistakes of the past. In this weekly series, Nets are Scorching writers Justin DeFeo and Devin Kharpertian take a look at how the Nets performed in different sets on both sides of the ball during the 2010-11 season.

Read more…

To improve in the future, the Nets will have to learn from the mistakes of the past. In this weekly series, Nets are Scorching writers Justin DeFeo and Devin Kharpertian take a look at how the Nets performed in different sets on both sides of the ball during the 2010-11 season.

Read more…

When doing analysis for this article, a lot of what I saw didn’t surprise me at all. I knew the Nets weren’t very good defensively, especially against teams that executed the pick & roll well. But one thing continued to pop up, play after play, until I could no longer ignore it: How ineffective Brook Lopez was at defending it.

It’s not that he’s a poor defender against the roll man. He’s not. He’s average for a center, but average is still better than 50% of his peers. Rather, it’s that when the ballhandler forces him to make a decision, he consistently freezes.

A few examples are highlighted on video below, and there are a couple of things to watch for. Firstly, instead of sliding up to cover the ballhandler on the screen or rotating over to help, Brook stays back on his heels, inviting the opponent to take an open jumpshot or drive him to the lane. Even if the guard went under the screen, Lopez would still hesitate. This resulted in a lot of open jumpers and floaters. Secondly, when the defense did drive into the lane, Lopez either continued to backpedal or froze – half-heartedly contesting at best and losing the defender completely at worst.

I don’t mean to say that I think Brook is making the wrong decision – in fact, I think he’s making the right one. If he tried to even semi-hedge, he’d immediately be frozen by quicker players. He has to backpedal to the basket, since he’s not quick enough to cut off slashing guards. He’s playing the odds. Since everyone is quicker than him, staying back is the right move. He has to hesitate.

It’s just that the problem isn’t what he’s doing. It’s the fact that he has to do it.

He’s just too slow. And there’s a good chance he won’t get faster. This type of lateral quickness and speed is less important on the block, which is where he’ll spend a majority of his time on defense, but against a lot of other looks: pick & roll ballhandlers, spot-up shooters, isolations, slashers, et al – he’s going to have a lot of trouble. Judging by his play style, he knows it.

I know we bemoan the Nets for not having another perimeter scorer that can create his own shot, but I firmly believe that Billy King’s first priority this offseason and beyond should be to get a rotation big (definitely a power forward if Humphries moves on) who makes defense his priority; someone who closes on spot-up shooters and gets in the way consistently when Deron goes over the screen.

There’s no doubt that Brook Lopez is a great scorer, and he certainly brings more to the table than he takes away. It’s also good for a player to know his absolute limitations. But if the Nets are really serious about building a “championship team,” especially in this new Heat/Bulls/Thunder/Explosiveness era that will soon be upon us, the rest of the team had better be able to defend the rim very well if their center – the anchor of a defense – is going to be a defensive liability.

The Nets’ highly publicized move to Brooklyn reached new commercial success, after the Nets scored a 30-second advertisement during Game 1 of the NBA Finals. If you missed it, none other than Nets’ superstar Deron Williams is here to show it to you. Williams proudly posted it on his Facebook page in order to remind his fans that while the team is currently not in the playoffs; great things are soon to come.

As usual, this act of publicity is welcome. The Nets have always been looked at as a laughingstock and Mikhail Prokorov seems to be doing everything in his power to change that.

In addition to building their roster through free agency and trades, the Nets also have to consider bringing back some of their own guys this summer. The NAS takes a look at the team’s current crop of free agents and determines who stays and who goes.

You Got To Go: Brandan Wright is not an impact player. Period. He’s tall and athletic, which has a certain value, but Brandan Wright’s presence doesn’t help you win a ton of games. Wright is one of those guys that looks great in a small sample size, makes you say “hey, that guy should be playing more,” then reminds you why he’s a bench player when given those minutes. He’s not an effective post player on either side of the ball. He’s not a smart defensive player, nor is he quick enough to rotate to spot-up shooters. He’s fought injuries to his groin, ankle, wrist, back, and shoulder – the latter resulting in season-crushing surgery two years ago.

Roster spots are valuable. If you want to build a real championship team, Brandan Wright is a guy you sign after you have your front nine in place. The Nets have their front two in place – one might argue just their front one. Preserving a precious roster spot for a guy like Brandan Wright before seeing what’s out there would just be a bad move by a front office that’s played great poker so far this season.

I Guess You Could Stay: Brandan Wright is still just 23 years old. His injuries have been the flukish type, suggesting a guy who’s down on his luck more than he’s actually injury-prone. He has always been a talented player, just without the requisite time on the floor to become a good one. He’s got a surefire NBA body, and given what the Nets have now at the backup big spots, he’d be an upgrade over Johan Petro.

(Two more years! Two more years!)

Given his track record, Wright’s not going to command a lot of cap space in his next contract. He’ll be heading into this next one with something to prove; if he doesn’t show a significant increase in playing time and skill level, it may be his last. That should be more than enough motivation for a guy who might finally have the “fully healthy” and “semi-veteran” superlatives attached to him for the first time in his career.

The Final Verdict: He should go. I like Brandan Wright a lot. I like that he has an NBA body, and that he’s better than Johan Petro. But if the Nets were picking their roster spots on the measure of “is this guy better than Johan Petro?” then I would’ve been signed years ago. Wright has already missed a full season and has difficulty creating his own shot against NBA-level defenses. That alone is enough for me to request that the Nets pass.

That said, I don’t think the window is officially closed, or should be. There’s almost always the “if the price is right” caveat in any one of these situations; if the Nets pull off some serious moves to solidify the front nine of their roster, then I’d have no problem with them bringing in a guy like Wright on a small, incentive-laden contract. He’s the perfect guy for something like that: if you’re as great as the world once believed you could be, you’ll earn your money’s worth, and be on the path to a real NBA career. If you’re not? Then your paycheck will reflect it.

Still, I think in this instance, the Nets won’t be in a position where a Brandan Wright signing would be an extraneous 11th man signing. Because of that, I think the Nets and Wright will rightfully part ways.

In addition to building their roster through free agency and trades, the Nets also have to consider bringing back some of their own guys this summer. The NAS takes a look at the team’s current crop of free agents and determines who stays and who goes.

You Got to Go: It’s worth considering, the Los Angeles Lakers, a team coming off back-to-back NBA titles, was so eager to dump Sasha Vujacic, they traded him and their first-rounder for a warm body in Joe Smith. The Machine may have made some clutch plays for the Lakers during their past title runs, but let me repeat: An organization that doesn’t have issues making money was more than willing to dump his $5 million owed AND a draft pick for some financial flexibility. And while the Lakers went on to crash and burn in the playoffs, I never once heard someone say, “Man, if they only had Sasha.”

As to his actual performance with the Nets – Vujacic was who he always was, just with a scoring average boost that comes with increased playing time. His points per 40 minutes was in line with what he had been averaging off the Lakers bench the past few seasons, while his True Shooting percentage – something that’s vital for an offensive minded player who’s only strategy is is to shoot 3s and long 2s – was the lowest it has been in 5 seasons. While he could be described as “pesky” defensively, he struggled against bigger and stronger opponents, most notably SFs who put up a PER of 17.9 while he was on the floor (league average is 15).

I Guess You Can Stay: While Sasha may shoot (and miss) too much for my liking, he at least hit some pretty huge shots this past season. That includes a game-winner against the Bulls and a game-tying three agains the Raptors during the London series towards the end of one of the OTs. He was one of the few players who was able to move without the ball on offense to try and create an open shot. As for personality, while some of his teammates in LA reportedly were happy to be rid of him, Sasha was an excellent teammate in New Jersey, bringing a lot of enthusiasm to the bench. And you can’t overlook  his championship experience, which does matter for an organization expecting to make a playoff run next season.

Final Verdict: He should go. After the trade, Sasha had a perfectly acceptable season with the Nets, but like a lot of these situations in sports, you got to know when to bid adieu with a player who might have been playing a bit over his head during the early part of his tenure with the team. As Vujacic’s role increased with mounting injuries, he became more exposed. Idealistically, the Nets will bring in a starting-caliber SG in the off-season, moving Anthony Morrow to the bench. Unless Morrow is part of a trade, paying an “energy” guy like Sasha is useless because he will likely get squeezed out of a rotation. While people will point to Mikhail Prokhorov’s deep pockets, the Nets can’t keep parsing out a few million here, a few million there for back of the bench depth and expect to retain any long-term flexibility for higher profile players, especially if there’s a hard salary cap next season. Sasha needs to latch on to an organization that has lower expectations for next year, so he can prove his second half wasn’t a fluke and he’s not the shoot-first ask questions later “Machine” he’s been labeled as throughout the NBA for years now.

Malcolm Lee of UCLA is the headlining name in the upcoming Nets workout.

Ben Couch gives us the inside scoop as to who the Nets have called for individual workouts this offseason. The list that the Nets have announced includes Malcolm Lee, Jon Leuer, Jamie Skeen, Vernon Macklin, Mychel Thompson, and Willie Reed. Given this list, I assume the Nets are looking at potential players to take with the 36^th pick.

Frankly, none of those players really stick out to me other than Lee and Leuer. Lee is a nice combo guard that can provide some scoring, while Leuer is a 6-11, non-physical center that can score. The Nets are bringing them in for a reason, but the rest of the crop doesn’t look like early second round talent to me.