Nets Are Scorching

Deron Williams has the game of basketball all mixed up. Playing against an elite defense should reduce a player’s productivity on offense, but according to Basketball-Reference, Williams is the third best player in the league against top-tier defensive teams (behind Derrick Rose and Dirk Nowitzki). Against lower-ranked defensive teams, Williams ranked just 19th in production.

It’s hard to explain that kind of pattern. Williams is more focused against a tough-minded defensive team (usually the best teams in the league) and decides to kick it up a notch against them. Williams also remains mostly consistent with his offensive rating against good & bad; thus, his ranking against good teams goes up, but his ranking against bad ones goes down.

Either way, Williams’s ranking adds to the idea that he’s one of the best 12 players in the league – at least.

Don't worry Kiki... if I was grading coaches based on most stylish shirt and blazer combos, you'd be #1.

I figured I’d change up the Nets Yearbook format a little bit this week and try and generate a post that’s geared more towards creating some debate for our readers. Plus, considering how the lockout is likely to last a very long time, I’m going to have vary my posts in order to give you an effective look back at least once a week! I don’t want to run out of specific seasons to talk about which very well may happen if I write about one season every week.

So today I want to talk a bit about Nets coaches, especially since last week’s entry introduced perhaps one of the worst coaches of all-time, Butch Beard. And since nothing inspires debate more than an arbitrarily ordered list, I thought I’d rank the Nets coaches from worst to best during the timeframe where I’ve been a fan (1992-93 to present). The criteria for this list are simple. There is no criteria. This is purely my opnion and my opinion alone and you’re welcome to argue with me in the comments section.

So let’s start with the worst:

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By the end of his next contract, David West will be in the twilight of his career. Knowing this, he understandably wants to join a team in win-now mode. This helps explain why he opted out of his contract into an uncertain free agent situation after blowing out his ACL during the regular season.

The two teams most interested in West’s services are the Nets and Pacers, and both appeal to West’s need to win. The young, improving Pacers made the playoffs as the eighth seed in the East last season, while the Nets have Deron Williams.

I don’t want to see David West join the team. West is not improving this late in his career; if anything, he’ll get worse after his injury. Plus, a frontcourt of West and Brook Lopez could be the worst rebounding tandem in the league.

Ben Golliver of CBS’s “Eye on Basketball” ranks NBA rosters from 30 to 1, and the Nets rank 27th. Golliver ranked the rosters based on his answer to this hypothetical question:

If you were a new NBA owner in an undisclosed location granted the ability to poach an entire roster from a current team — taking with you all of the players and their contracts, but not the coaching and management staffs — who would you take? What would your list look like?

Here’s what he says about the Nets:

Much like the Magic with Howard, the Nets have tied their fortunes to Williams, who seems particularly itchy to play for a winner. If there’s a consolation, it’s that New Jersey doesn’t have a contract like Arenas’ or Turkoglu’s on the books, but they did overpay for a bunch of marginal players last summer, and Outlaw’s deal looks worse by the day. Lopez and the team’s ability to add talent during the upcoming free agency period provides a glimmer of hope that Williams might decide to stay in town but there’s still significant risk.

I’d say this is about accurate, given the roster the Nets have. Much of the Nets’ upside is the move to Brooklyn (which isn’t accounted for in this hypothetical) and the re-signing of Deron Williams (which is a question mark). Golliver adds that the rankings are for “right now,” but that the potential for future success plays a huge part.

Some more notable rankings:

Last week, I was lucky enough to speak with Oz Davis of BallinEurope.com and I put up audio of that interview.

My goal, however, was to provide the readers of NAS with video content, which brings us to the (tentatively named) Nets Are Scorching TV.

The idea for this channel is to bring on smart guests and let them speak and educate us all on the game of basketball and/or the Nets. NASTV will hopefully grow and evolve into something bigger, but for now, this first episode is very much a pilot episode. In the future, I hope to work more production into the episodes and possibly expand the content into more than just interviews.

That’s my short little intro for what will hopefully be a longtime feature of this blog.

Now, the first episode. For our inaugural episode, we were lucky enough to be joined by Coach Anthony Macri of the Pro Training Center and Hoopsworld.com.

Coach Macri is a professional basketball trainer and has trained NBA players such as Joakim Noah and Luol Deng.

Coach Macri also does a bit of writing and his work is found on Hoopsworld.com in a weekly chat (Monday’s) and a weekly column. He can also be found on twitter, @coachmacri.

The interview is split into two parts:

Part One deals with how Coach broke into the business, as well as the process that goes into athletes working with the coaches at the Pro Training Center.

Part Two talks about what it means to be a “beast” in the NBA, specifically what Brook Lopez needs to do to get better as a player. In part two, I reference a column Coach Macri wrote about how to develop a center, which is found here.

Enjoy!

Even though the lockout is unlikely to get resolved soon, MarShon Brooks and Sundiata Gaines are still attempting to play together. According to Bounce Magazine, Brooks and Gaines will be at Rucker Park on Wednesday night to practice together.

This is well-played by the two of them. Rather than flee the country (looking at you, Deron Williams), these two are getting together to work on this side of the border. Additionally, it’s good to see a rookie take this initiative. If anything, Brooks & Gaines at least get to know each other better, which will count for something in the locker room.

Trip down memory lane.

In an interview with the Waterbury Republican-American, Jordan Williams tells Patrick Tischia he’s happy as a Net, and explains how Vince Carter influenced his number choice.

Before the draft, Williams was very confident in his chances of going to the Clippers at #37, but was then thrilled to hear Adam Silver call his name at #36 instead. He sounded hopeful when saying that he could compete for major minutes this season.

However, the main part of this interview that struck me as unusual was Williams claiming he’s a big fan of Vince Carter, choosing to wear #15 as a pro in his honor. At 6’9″ and 250 pounds, J-Will hardly evokes images of VC in his prime. Still, Carter is a big part of Nets history (like it or not), and it’s nice to see that Williams has some fond memories of the Nets past.