UPDATE: Billy King Will Be The New Nets General Manager, Not The New President
Jul 14, 2010 2010 Offseason, Billy King, Bobby Marks, Devin Kharpertian, Front Office
UPDATE: Al Iannazzone now reports that the Nets have hired Billy King to be their new General Manager, rather than hiring him as President. To quote Mikhail Prokhorov:
I am very pleased Billy King is coming on board as Nets general manager. He has all of the qualities we’ve been looking for in a candidate: professionalism, good relations with the league, players and agents, and strong communications skills. He will be an excellent fit with Head Coach Avery Johnson. Most importantly, Billy is ambitious. He wants to win. This is what I felt when I met with him and why he will be a strong addition to the Nets organization.
NBA.com states King’s experience in the original story as follows:
King’s tenure as the Sixers’ basketball boss was uneven. He was able to surround Allen Iverson with enough talent for the 76ers to make the Finals in 2001 and for Iverson to win league MVP honors that season. But Philly never reached those heights again, as King made a series of questionable financial decisions, including giving journeyman forward Kenny Thomas a $50 million contract and center Samuel Dalembert a $64 million deal. He gambled that Chris Webber and Iverson could coexist when he traded for Webber in 2005, and the team made the playoffs that season. But they didn’t get there in 2006, and by 2007, Webber’s knees had deteriorated to the point where he and the team agreed to a buyout.
After Brown’s departure for Detroit in 2003, King also went through several head coaches, including Randy Ayers, Jim O’Brien and Mo Cheeks.
But King drafted pretty well during his tenure as president, taking forward Andre Iguodala in the first round in 2004, guard Lou Williams in the second round in 2005, guard Thabo Sefolosha in the first round in 2006 and forward Thaddeus Young in the first in 2007.
Now that King has been confirmed as GM instead of President, I’m still not a big fan of this move. Even less so, actually. What do you guys think?
Possible New Jersey Nets Coaching Candidates: Mike Krzyzewski
May 17, 2010 2010 Offseason, Coaching Search, Front Office, LeBron James, Mike Krzyzewski, Mikhail Prokhorov, NetsAreScorching Series
A new series begins this week on NetsAreScorching.com where we take a look at the possible coaching candidates for the New Jersey Nets. First up will be Mike Krzyzewski, and you may not believe this, but I actually spelled his surname without looking. Seriously. Anyway, we have a good list of candidates, which I won’t spoil here, but feel free to chime in and let us know what you think about our choices. Like we could stop you anyway.
Mike Krzyzewski has never coached in the NBA, though he did lead the Redeem Team in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, helping Team USA capture its first gold medal since 2000. He was offered the Los Angeles Lakers head coaching job in 2004, but politely declined after some thought and since not accepting the Lakers job, Krzyzewski has said he was committed to Duke and USA Basketball only. However, will the promise of money, potentially coaching LeBron James, leading a winning team in the NBA in the New York market, and knowing that ownership will be as committed to winning as much as him, be enough to get Krzyzewski on NBA sidelines?
New Jersey Nets fans should hope so.
Lawrence Frank Revisited…Again
Nov 30, 2009 Front Office, Lawrence Frank
Mark already did a great job looking back at the Lawrence Frank era and looking at who could be next, but I figured I should throw something up on the subject. And by throw something up, I mean post my Lawrence Frank offseason post for the third time. I think it is pretty relevant, plus I know for a fact that we have more readers than we did when I posted it the first two times. Also, at the end, I put some of my observations from this year and compared them to years past. So if you already read this twice, you can just skip to the end.
Lawrence Frank Has Lost Whatever “Magic” He Had
Nov 3, 2009 Analysis, Coaching, Front Office, Lawrence Frank, Nets vs. Bobcats, Nets vs. Magic, Nets vs. Timberwolves, Nets vs. Wizards, Opinion, Xs and Os
Going into this season, Lawrence Frank’s record record as a coach was 225-225. Exactly .500. After last night’s loss, Lawrence Frank is now 4 games under .500 for his coaching career. This season’s start has taken him from a winning coach to a losing coach, and whatever “grace period” his magical start to his coaching career bought him is now fading away. A lot of Lawrence Frank supporters (are there even any of those anymore) point to that 14-0 start as an example for what type of coach he is. Frank’s trip below .500 proves that this might not be the case. This being said, I am not delusional. I wasn’t expecting the Nets to be 4-0 right now, but with what is going on right now (we scored 7 points in a quarter against the Bobcats) you need to look at the coach for an explanation. When you do that, you find that Lawrence Frank is responsible for a whole lot of head-scratching moves in this short season:
Rotations
I don’t know if it is just me, but these rotations just seem off. I know the Nets are young, and they have been hit with a bunch of injuries, but even still. When you have a young team (and the Nets are indeed young, they have the youngest starting lineup in the NBA), it is the coaches job to put his team in positions that make being successful easier. It is like Lawrence Frank is trying to do the exact opposite.
Some examples after the jump:
NJ Nets’ Weekend Wrap-Up
May 19, 2009 2009 Draft, 2009 Offseason, Brooklyn, Front Office, Links, Prudential Center, Rod Thorn
There was actually a lot of Nets news this weekend, and I know I should have gotten to it earlier, but I was too busy shattering my ankle in 5 spots (OK, it is just a sprain, but it really really hurts :/). Here is a quick little recap and some links about the news that happened over the weekend.
- First and foremost: Rod Thorn will be representing the Nets at the draft lottery. Who knows, maybe the man who drafted MJ will have some luck rub off on the Nets?
- The Atlantic Yards project took a step in the right direction. Landowners and tenants were rebuffed by the state appellate court in a case that contested the use of eminent domain for the project. This case was was against New York State and not Ratner, but it is still a big win. The decision narrows the legal options for opponents of the project, who have successfully delayed it through the courts to a point where the entire project’s financial viability is now in question amid the broader economic crisis.
- The Nets first prospect list is in. There are a lot of the big guys that I would like to see us drafted there, but there are way too many guards there for my liking. I hope we aren’t considering a guard.
- Yi might get traded. Well, the Nets are at least considering it. In my opinion, this is too much of a knee-jerk reaction. Yi was playing well before the pinky injury, and he needs some time to heal. That being said, if he starts to struggle again, and we can move him for something valuble, I say why not.
- Boki is a free agent now. He has previously mentioned his desire to rejoin the Nets, s0 who knows what will happen. I don’t really think he “fits” with the team the way it is currently assembled, but Boki is very talented, and adding a talented player to your roster isn’t a bad thing. I guess what I am saying is that I wouldn’t understand the signing too much, but I wouldn’t be pissed about it.
- NJNets.com has started up their Draft Central. There is a lot of interesting stuff in there. My personal favorite is Gregg Polinsky’s blog.
- Bill Bradley and I are on the same page…at least on topic of where the Nets should play. I have mentioned earlier that the Nets should be playing in Newark if they can’t get the Brooklyn situation straightened out. Bradley takes it a step further. He thinks that the Nets should be playing in Newark instead of Brooklyn.
- The Nets are looking at PGs (It is in the interview towards the middle). This is baffling to me. We already have an All-Star PG, so why draft a PG when you have such a glaring whole at the PF spot? Who knows. After tonight we will know where we stand in terms of Draft Order, and hopefully we will get a better idea of who we are drafting.
Tonight, I will be live-blogging the Draft Lottery via Cover It Live. It will start around the same time of the game tomorrow, so if you want to chat about the game, or more importantly the lottery, just make your way over.
Some Nets Lottery Stuff
May 15, 2009 2009 Draft, Draft Lottery, Front Office, Jay-Z
The draft lottery is this Sunday Tuesday night, and my last post until Monday will be just some bulleted stuff about the draft lottery.
- Still no word on who we are sending to the draft, I think it will be Jay-Z again, but there are no sure things. According to NetsDaily, we will be sending Rod Thorn.
- I wouldn’t put it past Thorn to send Brook or VC. Some teams have sent players in the past, (I believe Kevin Durant went last year for the Thunder) and I would be interesting to see a guy like Brook there.
- The people over at DailyThunder.com go into great depth about the history of the draft lottery. It is a real interesting read, and it should give us Nets’ fans some hope!
- Ben Couch (NJnets.com writer, but you should already know that) will be reporting live from the Draft Lottery Tuesday night on twitter. You can find it right over here.
I am still undecided with what I am going to do for the Draft Lottery, I am thinking about having either a live-blog, or a live chat. Either way, when I know I will let you guys know. If you think I should do one or the other, leave some opinions in the comments.
Nets’ Draft Picks Since 1989
May 12, 2009 Draft, Front Office, Rookies
While reading through 82games.com’s draft stuff, I came across their article about the best and the worst drafting teams. I was actually surprised to see how low the Nets were in their list, as they were ranked 24th. After looking over all of our draft picks since 1989, you see why we were so low.
Obviously last year’s draft wasn’t really counted in the rankings (I say we had the best draft last year) and when we were making the Finals in the early 2000s, you can’t really expect much from the draft (plus they were working towards improving in the present, rather than looking towards the future). Even in the 90s though when we were getting top 10 picks constantly, we weren’t getting much from our players. Sure some guys went on to have solid careers, but they never really contributed with the Nets. Here is the list along with their numbers as a member of the New Jersey Nets.
- 1989 -
-1st round/12th pick – Mookie Blaylock – 194 GP/154 GS/32.9 MPG/12.9 PPG/3.3 RPG/5.9 APG
-2nd round/32nd pick - Stanley Brundy – 16 GP/0 GS/8 MPG/2.3 PPG/1.6 RPG/0.2 APG
- 1990-
-1st round/1st pick – Derrick Coleman – 348 GP/330 GS/35.8 MPG/19.9 PPG/10.6 RPG/3.1 APG
-1st round/22nd pick – Tate George – 174 GP/14 GS/11.6 MPG/4.2 PPG/1 RPG/1.9 APG
- 1991-
-1st round/2nd pick – Kenny Anderson – 303 GP/248 GS/32.9 MPG/15.4 PPG/3.4 RPG/7.8 APG
-2nd round/53rd pick – Von McDade – Never Played In The NBA
- 1992-
-2nd round/29rd pick – P.J. Brown – 240 GP/198 GS/30.7 MPG/8.4 PPG/6.4 RPG/1.6 APG
-2nd round/40th pick – Steve Rogers – Never Played In The NBA
- 1993-
-1st round/16th pick – Rex Walters – 139 GP/30 GS/13.7 MPG/5.2 PPG/1.0 RPG/1.5 APG
-2nd round/36th pick – John Best – Never Played In The NBA
- 1994-
-1st round/14th pick – Yinka Dare – 110 GP/25 GS/9.1 MPG/2.1 PPG/1.6 RPG/0.04 APG
- 1995-
-1st round/9th pick – Ed O’Bannon – 109 GP/34 GS/17.3 MPG/5.4 PPG/2.6 RPG/0.8 APG
- 1996-
-1st round/8th pick – Kerry Kittles – 496 GP/455 GS/33.6 MPG/14.3 PPG/3.9 RPG/2.6 APG
- 1997-
-1st round/2nd pick (via trade) – Keith Van Horn – 314 GP/312 GS/34.7 MPG/18.2 PPG/7.6 RPG/1.8 APG
- 1998 (no picks)-
- 1999-
-2nd round/34th pick – Evan Eschmeyer – 105 GP/56 GS/16.2 MPG/3.2 PPG/4.5 RPG/0.6 APG
- 2000-
-1st round/1st pick – Kenyon Martin – 283 GP/283 GS/33.1 MPG/15.1 PPG/7.6 RPG/2.4 APG
-2nd round/36th pick – Soumaila Samake – 34 GP/0 GS/6.6 MPG/1.4 PPG/1.6 RPG/0.0 APG
- 2001-
-1st round/13th pick (via trade) Richard Jefferson- 489 GP/417 GS/35.8 MPG/17.4 PPG/5.4 RPG/3.0 APG
-1st round/18th pick (via trade) Jason Collins – 511 GP/404 GS/24.4 MPG/10.3 PPG/4.6 RPG/1.1 APG
-1st round/23rd pick (via trade) Brandon Armstrong – 108 GP/0 GS/6.5 MPG/2.2 PPG/0.6 RPG/0.2 APG
-2nd round/34th pick – Brian Scalabrine – 210 GP/23 GS/14.8 MPG/3.9 PPG/2.9 RPG/1.0 APG
- 2002-
-1st round/24th pick – Nenad Kristic – 226 GP/201 GS/27.0 MPG/11.3 PPG/5.7 RPG/1.1 APG
-2nd round/53rd pick – Tamar Slay – 58 GP/0 GS/7.6 MPG/2.5 PPG/0.97 RPG/0.48 APG
- 2003-
-1st round/22nd pick – Zoran Planinic – 148 GP/10 GS/10.7 MPG/3.8 PPG/1.3 RPG/1.1 APG
- 2004-
-2nd round/51st pick – Christian Drejer – Never Played In The NBA
- 2005-
-1st round/15th pick – Antoine Wright – 143 GP/43 GS/17.9 MPG/4.6 PPG/2.3 RPG/0.9 APG
-2nd round/43rd pick – Mile Ilic – 5 GP/0 GS/1.2 MPG/0.0 PPG/0.2 RPG/0.0 APG
- 2006-
-1st round/22nd pick – Marcus Williams -132 GP/9 GS/16.4 MPG/6.4 PPG/2 RPG/3.0 APG
-1st round/23rd pick – Josh Boone – 193 GP/60 GS/17.8 MPG/5.6 PPG/4.9 RPG/0.5 APG
-2nd round/54th pick – Hassan Adams – 61 GP/8 GS/8.1 MPG/2.9 PPG/1.3 RPG/0.2 APG
- 2007-
-1st round/17th pick – Sean Williams – 106 GP/29 GS/15.5 MPG/4.6 PPG/3.8 RPG/0.4 APG
- 2008-
-1st round/11th pick – Brook Lopez – 82 GP/75 GS/30.5 MPG/13.0 PPG/8.1 RPG/1.0 APG
-1st round/21st pick – Ryan Anderson – 66 GP/30 GS/19.9 MPG/7.4 PPG/4.7 RPG/0.8 APG
-2nd round/40th pick – Chris Douglas-Roberts – 44 GP/3 GS/13.3 MPG/4.9 PPG/1.1 RPG/1.2 APG
—
Looking back on the picks, you can see why we ended up being ranked 24th. From 1993 to 1996 our first round picks included Rex Walters, Yinka Dare, and Ed O’ Bannon. That is just horrendous. On a positive note though, we robbed Houston blind in 2001. That year we traded the draft rights of Eddie Griffin (originally our pick at #7) for Richard Jefferson, Jason Collins, and Brandon Armstrong. That is 1 borderline superstar and 2 serviceable players for one bust.
Looking at 2000 on, there aren’t a lot of great picks there either. In fact, only 5 out of 19 players drafted after 2000 are still with the team. There is a reason for this though, and that is up until last year we were picking for the future. We had plenty of talent (and were not in rebuilding mode yet), and we didn’t need guys to get in there and help right away. That changed last year, and now we are drafting with the present in mind, looking for guys that can contribute right away. We need to continue this train of thought during this year’s draft.
Lawrence Frank Will Start Next Year As The Nets Coach
Apr 29, 2009 2009 Offseason, Front Office, Lawrence Frank, Opinion, Rod Thorn, Sucks
Rod Thorn announced Wednesday that he will keep Frank and have him return for the final year of his contract at $4.5 million. Here is what Thorn said about it:
“We are very happy to have him, and as far as we’re concerned, we’re very lucky to have him.”
But why did you take so long Rod if you were so confident?
“We wanted to look at whole operation and see where we were going and see ways we could improve it. There are ways to improve, but changing the coach, in my mind, was not one of the ways to improve it He’s a good coach. He’s done a good job here. This past year we weren’t expected to do very well but we did better than many expected us to. Our young players got better. I believe we’re on the right road.”
But what about his contract status? Lame duck coaches usually don’t work out (Except for Doc Rivers):
“He’ll handle it as he handles most things: with equanimity and class. He’s concerned with how well he can coach the team and how well he can be doing that, and any of those ancillary things he doesn’t care about.”
Well thanks for clearing all that up Rod. I am going to go right out and say it, this sucks. I mean don’t get me wrong Lawrence Frank is somewhat a decent coach (he’d have to be to last over 5 years now), but I would just have loved to see someone new coaching this team…someone who can run a play and just doesn’t go ISO for Vince when the game is on the line. I understand that you can’t run plays every possession, but coming out of timeouts and during late game possessions, plays should be run and we never seem to run any.
It just seems to me that this decision was made by the owner because they didn’t want to spend money on two coaches (If they would have fired Frank, they would have had to pay his salary as well as the new coach’s salary). Even though Ratner claims otherwise, I don’t believe him. Especially because you have the President claiming he is unsure that Frank’s voice is being heard, you have your All-Star PG agreeing with him, but you still don’t fire him. It is all about the money folks…
Who knows. Maybe Lawrence Frank will coach his ass off next year. Maybe we get the #1 pick, make the playoffs, and everyone forgets about this whole offseason “situation.” I am going to say it one more time though, if Lawrence Frank gets fired midseason and we are stuck with an interim head coach (instead of being able to hire our own this offseason), I will be pissed.
Is Lawrence Frank Staying?
Apr 28, 2009 2009 Offseason, Coaching, Front Office, Lawrence Frank, Nets In The Media, Nets vs. Knicks, Rod Thorn
A quick sidenote. Looking up “Lawrence Frank Funny” on Google Image Search is probably the funniest thing ever. I mean just look at the results.
Anyway, a source familiar with the Nets told Knicksblog.com (There is a serious problem here. How come this source is going to a Knicks blog rather than going to a Nets blog – me. Pssst… e-mail sebastian.pruiti@netsarescorching.com if you feel like sending me some inside information) has said that the Nets are planning to stay with Frank for the start of the year:
A source familiar with the Nets has informed TKB that Lawrence Frank will remain as head coach of the team to start the 2009-10 season.
Upon hearing these rumors, Thorn came out with a statement:
“There nothing going on other than I’m just thinking it through, examining all aspects.”
Bruce Ratner also talked to reporters about the topic, saying that he would have no problem paying two salaries next year if the decision to fire Frank is made.
I was very confident yesterday that Frank would be fired, but now, I don’t really know. I will say this though, Frank comes back, gets fired mid-season and we are stuck with an interim head coach, I am going to be pissed mainly because if we fire Frank right now, we can have our pick of head coaches.
Nets Are Scorching Podcast – Episode 1
Apr 27, 2009 2009 Draft, 2009 Offseason, Front Office, Lawrence Frank, Podcast
Well, it’s here. The Podcast is complete and it is ready to go. In this episode I introduce myself, I explain the podcast, then I get to the meat and potatoes. I talk about the Lawrence Frank situation, get into the draft a little bit, and then I discuss the stadium situation. You can play it here, download it, or find it on iTunes. The Nets Are Scorching Podcast – It’s like a blog post, except with sound:
