Obviously we’ve been dealing with some unexpected site issues today. Thanks for your patience while we get things back up and running. We’ll be back Sunday morning.
UPDATE: Outside of a few behind-the-scenes kinks to work out, we’re essentially back up and running with a new format. Thanks again for your patience. -D.K.
Looks like the Nets are adding a socialite superstar to their ranks.
People Magazine has reported today that Kris Humphries popped the question to his billionaire socialite girlfriend, Kim Kardashian, in the most obvious decision he’s ever made in his entire life. You can read more about the details of the wedding there, including the proposal:
According to People, “Humphries was waiting in her bedroom on bended knee with four words written in red rose petals: WILL YOU MARRY ME?”
Congratulations to Humpmaster Flex (and Kim too!) from all of us at NAS.
After a 24-58 season, the New Jersey Nets will have to make some changes heading into 2012. This week, Nets are Scorching takes a closer look at some soon-to-be-available names.
2010-11 Stats: 75 G, 75 GS, 30.5 MPG, 14.5 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 2.0 APG, 1.0 BPG, 1.1 SPG, .615 FG%, .711 FT%, 123 ORtg, 20.49 PER
Why Billy King Should Be Texting Him Now: I love Nene. I love that he only take shots close to the basket. I love that he prioritizes team success over personal accomplishment. I love that he cares enough to play defense in the halfcourt. I love that Ian Eagle loves him enough to make a “foreign facial” every time Nene converts a dunk. I love that he displays some range at times when he’s uncontested. I love that he can defend an interior jumpshot but jump out to the perimeter to contest a jump hook or late jumper. It’s this versatility and commitment that allows an acquisition of Nene to be beneficial.
Don’t Risk the Fine: The problem with acquiring Nene is that the Nets already have a great player in Brook Lopez at center. Sure, Nene might be able to adjust to the power-forward slot while playing for the Nets, but it wouldn’t be fair to subject one particular player to positional restrictions. Should the Nets manage to acquire Nene to play alongside Brook Lopez, it might prove to be advantageous to the relevant organization.
And The Winner Is… Tamper: Barring the acquisition of certain inhuman centers who change the landscape of basketball altogether, it is worth it to pursue Nene next season. He only takes efficient shots, and he also draws offensive fouls and draws easy baskets at the hoop with his physical play. Acquiring Nene would allow the Nets to develop a poor man’s Duncan-Robinson frontcourt and dominate the paint with elite offense and defense on each side. Moving forward, there are so few actionable power forwards that making an investment to play Nene at the 4 and coexist with Lopez would be a worthy pursuit.
After a 24-58 season, the New Jersey Nets will have to make some changes heading into 2012. This week, Nets are Scorching takes a closer look at some soon-to-be-available names.
Name: Luc Mbah a Moute
Stats: 79 G, 26.5 MPG, 6.7 PPG, 5.3 RPG, 0.9 APG, 0.4 BPG, 0.9 SPG, .463 FG%, .000 3p%, .707 FT%, 11.51 PER
Why Billy King Should Be Texting Him Right Now: With wing players such as LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony currently residing in the Eastern Conference, it’s going to be important for the Nets to possess players on their team who can defend those like. I believe Luc Mbah a Moute (LMaM) is just that. At 6-8 LMaM is a live, athletic body to throw at the elite wings of the world. Last season LMaM ranked 58th in the league in isolation situations, holding his opponent to just over 32% shooting. LMaM also allows improves the depth of our frontline with his versatility as he is able to defend SG’s, SF’s and PF’s on most nights. He’s also a good leaper and an active offensive rebounder (2.1 pg).
Don’t Risk the Fine: For his great energy and defense he provides, LMaM is rather limited offensively. With Milwaukee, most of his offense pertained to spot up situations (35.2% of his offensive plays). With that, his range is fairly limited. In his three year career he’s attempted 28 three-pointers (seven last season). It may be unwise for the Nets to give money to another player expected to play a swing position for us who can’t shoot. (See Outlaw, Travis).
And the Winner Is…Tamper: If the price is right, I would absolutely be thrilled if the Nets were able to add a player like Mbah a Moute. However, it would need to be understood that LMaM is just once piece to a much larger puzzle. Adding Mbah a Moute alone would not make us a playoff team, but Mbah could be a valuable role player to a very good team – which is what we’re trying to become. Despite his limitations on offense, LMaM would have the luxury of playing with a point guard who can make anyones game look nice, especially an energetic and athletic player such as Mbah a Moute.
Expectations were not high for Kris Humphries when the Nets traded (of all people) Eduardo Najera for him and Shawne Williams midway through last year. He had a reputation as a selfish brute short on skill with even less of a mental grasp for the game of basketball. In unsurprising fashion, he lived up to those impossibly lofty standards for the rest of the Nets’ historically hilarious 2009-2010 campaign.
This season didn’t look to be all that great for him right off the bat, either. The Nets were fresh off a deal to acquire the at-one-point-talented Troy Murphy, who was supposed to start, and with Derrick Favors on the roster, too (though it’s unclear if he ever actually cared enough about the team to unpack his bags), it was looking like Humphries wouldn’t see much more than mop-up duty.
But there’s a lesson in this: make every effort to find a roster spot in the NBA behind Murphy. He showed up to camp sluggish and out of shape, and a back injury kept him out of games for awhile. Humphries was tabbed the man to start in his massive void.
I had my reservations about that decision for a couple reasons: (1) Look at how Brook Lopez developed his rookie season while starting almost the entire season for the incomparably incompetent Josh Boone. Wouldn’t that work for Favors, too? And (2) Humphries had yet to prove he could be good at basketball.
Certainly he didn’t get on anyone’s good side by completely emasculating Lopez on the glass, and his relentless penchant to shoot the woefully inefficient 17-foot jump shot didn’t endear him to the basketball public much either. But much like George Costanza or a catchy commercial jingle, all it took was some forced exposure to hop on the Humphries bandwagon.
If there was one thing that made Hump a really lovable player was that he actually cared. One couldn’t say that for many Nets players this season, but Humphries wanted to excel on the court every time he laced up his shoes. Sometimes that drive manifested itself well (e.g., his hunger for rebounding) and others it did not (e.g., his unwavering commitment to shoot after beginning a dribble), but at least he was invested in winning.
(How sad is it when you place players in high regard simply because they care?)
Soon enough, Humphries was the lifeblood of the team. If it didn’t come via rebounding, it came via an electrifying transition dunk or an even more ridiculous block, but he became the vagrant’s Blake Griffin for Nets fans. Of course, it’s fair to say that Humphries’ spontaneous improvement might simply have been an ancillary benefit to his developing relationship with a person who shouldn’t be famous, and of course there were plenty of jokes to that same effect.
It’s funny that Nets followers went from praying every night last summer that Humphries wouldn’t exercise his player option so that the team would have more cap space to pursue a player better than Travis Outlaw in free agency to wanting desperately to re-sign him a summer later.
While Humphries’ contributions have been most stellar and most surprising, negotiations with Humphries should be a proceed-with-caution affair on the part of the Nets’ front office. Here are two reasons why:
(1) The Fluke Rule: It’s entirely possible that Humphries’ improvement was just a one-year foray from his typical substandard production; or, more likely …
(2) The Contract-Year Phenomenon: It’s an all-too-common occurrence in the NBA for players to ratchet up their efforts in the final year of their deals to sucker a team to pay them a lot of money for a lot of years thereafter, and it’s very possible Humphries has followed in these players’ footsteps. All the Nets can hope is that he’ll follow the Zach Randolph model of signing a ridiculously lucrative contract and then going Super Saiyan on the rest of the NBA.
Personally, I don’t think Humphries can be more than a $6-million-per-year investment for the franchise going forward. I realize what Humphries did for the team this year, stepping in to partially carry a limping team, but who knows if he can or will duplicate this year’s production? It’s kind of disheartening, but I’m not so sure all the money in his pocket next season won’t siphon the passion that made him such an asset this year.
Nevertheless, kudos on a surprising season to Kris Humphries.
After the completion of a wild New Jersey Nets season, Nets are Scorching will be looking back at the players that made it happen.
Final Stats: 59 GP, 28 GS, 16.3 MPG, 3.4 PPG, 0.7 APG, 2.1 (0.3-1.8) RPG, 0.2 SPG, 0.0BPG, 40.5 FG%, 23.8 3P%, 81.6 FT%, 4.41 PER
Stephen Graham managed to obtain a sizable role on the Nets despite negligible statistical contributions as a result of the team’s many injuries and his puzzling reputation as a defensive stopper. In fact, Graham started almost twice as many games for the Nets this past season (28) as he started in the rest of his career combined (15).
As you can see from that awful PER, Graham is completely absent on offense. He has one shot: the 18- to 20-foot jumper (pictured above), and he didn’t even make that with regularity. In fact, it was more troubling when he did make one, as it always gave him the confidence to take many, many more. As for the defense that he was supposed to be good at, it didn’t work out. Graham, time after time, found himself getting blown by when matched up with the league’s better players, and he had no appreciable effect on team defense either.
The Pink Shirt: Oddly enough, Graham played very well against the Bulls this year. In the three games against Chicago in which Graham appeared, he averaged 12.6 points on 16-of-28 shooting. One wouldn’t really expect Graham to do that against any team, let alone the defensive-minded Bulls, so let that be a feather in his cap for this season.
The Paper Bag: There’s no debate about this one. Anthony Morrow’s highlight and Graham’s lowlight came on the same day. After Morrow sent the December 1 game against the Thunder to OT by hitting a miraculous running three-pointer at the buzzer, Graham had to muck that up. At the end of the second OT period, with the Nets up 3, the Thunder inbounded to Jeff Green. Graham, trying to foul on the floor to avoid giving the Thunder the game-tying opportunity, fouled Green in the act of shooting, giving him three free throws, all of which he sunk. Westbrook then exploded in the third OT, and the Nets lost. Watch it here:
Final Thoughts: Graham is virtually guaranteed to be gone next season, and, if nothing else, he gave Nets fans some chuckles. He’ll really have to work to find a contract from here on out, as he won’t get by just on talent. He’s saved from an F because he didn’t have a contractual impact on the team.
Grade: D-
After the completion of a wild New Jersey Nets season, Nets are Scorching will be looking back at the players that made it happen.
Final Stats: 65 GP, 65 GS, 38.0 MPG, 20.1 PPG, 10.3 APG, 4.0 RPG, 1.2 SPG, 0.3 BPG, 45.8 FG%, 34.5 3P%, 85.3 FT%, 21.19 PER
After being subjected to nearly a season worth of Carmelo Anthony trade rumors, Nets fans were rewarded on February 23, when the Nets acquired one of the NBA’s top point guards, Deron Williams. Almost immediately the story turned to: “Will Williams re-sign with the Nets longterm, before his contract is up in 2012?” And while those concerns are still out there, in the short term we got to see some brilliant point guard play.
His time with the Nets was not all gravy however, as a nagging wrist injury kept Williams out of a lot of games, and hindered his shooting. Since the season has finished, Williams has had successful surgery to repair that wrist. We’ve also heard reports of Williams giving the Nets franchise his seal of approval, which are signs for optimism. Getting him to commit long term will only help in our future financial planning, and could go a long way in the recruitment of future talent.
The Pink Shirt: All great point guards are expected to make the players around them better, and Deron Williams certainly did that. (See: Early Benefactors of Deron Williams). But when we got DWill, we knew we were also getting a player not afraid to take the big shot. In 12 games with the Nets, he didn’t have a ton of chances for big moments, however, I had to go with the back breaking three-pointer DWill hit against the Celtics capping off a five-game winning streak, which, gave us one of the great moments in Nets fans’ history. I’ll let the video speak for itself:
The Paper Bag: After beating the Celtics and riding our five-game winning streak, the Nets were set to face the Bulls and their MVP favorite point guard Derrick Rose. With a chance to make a huge statement, Deron Williams well…didn’t. He put up a clunker: 1 for 12 shooting, five points, four turnovers and an overall -12 in a Nets 84-73 loss. He also seemed to have a hard time dealing with Rose’s on ball defense.
Final Thoughts: The acquisition of Deron Williams has been a breath of fresh air to our franchise. Re-signing Deron Williams is THE absolute priority for this franchise moving forward, and all subsequent moves hinge on it.
Grade: A-
AP Photo/Julio Cortez
Well, this pretty much says it all about the significance of the tail end of the Nets season. A game that came down to the wire (one that demanded a #LeaguePassAlert from John Schuhmann, even though he had to preface it with “quick,” because not even he was expecting it) was so pointless, that the game-winning shot with a second left to play couldn’t muster anything better than No. 10 on SportsCenter’s Top 10 for the night. Usually the top spot is reserved for late-game heroics, but there was the spectacular yet underwhelming finish of Nets-Bobcats, barely clinging to the list — and I’m not even sure it belonged there.
This is my last game recap of the Nets season, and I’m pretty happy about it. They’re just so sluggish at this point in the year that no matter the thrill of their accomplishments, it’s like pulling teeth to watch the games. In fact, the Bobcats should feel bad for almost losing to this farce. I’m sure they were as shocked as I was that their opponent allowed Dante Cunningham to shoot 10-of-16 from the field. Or Boris Diaw’s 8-of-11. Or Kwame Brown’s 4-of-8. Or Dominic McGuire and Garrett Temple’s 3-of-4s. Or D.J. White’s 3-of-5, for that matter.
THE BOBCATS SHOT 57 PERCENT. IN THE HISTORY OF UNHOLY THINGS, TELL ME: IS THIS THE UNHOLIEST?
Now that I got that out of my system …
If not for Brook Lopez, the Bobcats security probably would have kicked the Nets players out of the arena for impersonating an NBA team. The scoring, not-rebounding big man was stellar once again, posting 31 points on 12-23 shooting, clinching a 20-point-per-game average on the season, regardless what happens in Wednesday’s finale.
But the greatest indicator that the Nets were impostors was the shooting of the former Lakers, Jordan Farmar and Sasha Vujacic, who scorched the nets (Ha. Get it?) for a combined 39 points on 15-of-25 shooting. In fact, Vujacic tied the game late by putting on his invisibility cloak and running to the corner for a wide-open three (before Augustin’s dagger). It’s too bad no one will remember this past lunchtime.
Stephen Graham and Travis Outlaw were themselves, in case anyone was wondering. But no one was wondering.
Brandan Wright actually got some playing time, and, golly, he kind of played well. He had 10 points and didn’t miss a shot. Maybe he should have been playing. But call me crazy for thinking a young player should get a chance to develop in a no-risk scenario.
It’s clear that Avery Johnson and the Nets are trying to make the end of this season as nondescript as possible, maybe to torture the few remaining viewers, maybe to make their reappearing act in free agency or next season all the more shocking. But it’s just so bad right now.
NetsDaily made an interesting point on Twitter today. In the event of a full-season lockout in 2011-2012, Monday’s loss will be the last game that the Nets play in the state of New Jersey. It’s deep stuff, but, hey, I don’t really care. What I want is for Wednesday to come, and for it to come quickly, so I can stop watching these terrible games and reenergize for next season, whenever that comes.
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