It looks like not only will Brook Lopez’s and Damion James’ feet be sharing similar fates, but now also their bank accounts. The Nets made it official today that they will not be renewing the rookie contract of Damion James, nor will they be offering an extension to Brook Lopez.
Suffering season-ending foot injuries is certainly not a good strategy to secure yourself contracts in this league and Nets G.M. Billy King admitted their feet were concerning:
“We’re not going to do anything with either one of them. The injuries played a part. That played a big part of it. And it was for the (salary cap) flexibility, too.”
Billy King – Nets G.M.
For Lopez the decision to not extend stems from a lot of different places. Obviously, his injury and subsequent surgery to his foot offers some complications to his future in the league, but the Nets are also dealing with the looming decisions that will need tending to (hopefully) this off-season in regards to Dwight Howard. And having that extra salary cap flexibility is vital. Lopez will now become a restricted free agent, which leaves the Nets the option to re-sign him, but they would like to first see how Lopez looks upon his return from injury.
In Damion James’ situation, the Nets decided to decline the option that would have paid James roughly 1.3 million dollars next season, instead he will become an unrestricted free agent. Injuries were obviously much more the concern in James’ case as it was announced yesterday that James underwent surgery on his foot, ending his season.
The news of the injury came at a bad time for James, who already suffered a season ending injury last season, but as with everything else the NBA is a business and the Nets need to make decisions for the betterment of the franchise, Travis Outlaw’s contract notwithstanding.
The Warriors would also be willing to make the trade without a guarantee from Dwight to re-sign in the off-season, effectively renting the center for the remainder of this season in hopes of wooing him to re-sign with the potential of playing in downtown San Francisco and the accompanying endorsement opportunities surrounding Silicon Valley.
So what does this mean for the Nets?
The Nets still remain on the list of teams (that also include the Mavericks and Lakers) that Dwight has indicated he would re-sign with if traded to.
But that list may be changing, or growing:
Despite Howard’s preference to go to the Brooklyn-bound Nets to play with Deron Williams, those close to Howard still believe he’s fluctuating on his future and could be sold on different scenarios. – Wojnarowski
While not a major breaking story, the idea that Howard may be warming to the idea of playing in places other than Brooklyn and alongside guards other than Deron Williams has to be troubling for the Nets front-office.
Certainly even Howard can see the writing on the wall that is the Nets roster right now and with the one major trade asset the Nets have (Brook Lopez) coming off of foot surgery, you have to believe the Nets shot at trading for the superstar center has been diminished if not missed entirely.
I’m of the opinion that as long as Dwight continues to say he would re-sign in Brooklyn the Nets remain in the hunt. I also believe that if Dwight is moved during the season, the trade would come closer to the deadline in March.
We shall see, but as long as their are stories surrounding Dwight Howard rumors, we will continue to report them.
The 2011-12 New Jersey Nets season kicks off in a little over five hours. Here’s what we do know.
The points
The Nets boast, at worst, the third-best point guard in the league in Deron Williams, and two quality backups behind him. No one will argue that Jordan Farmar and Sundiata Gaines are starters, but as your second and third point guards, they add up to a deep point guard slot.
Despite his wrist injury last season, Deron put up averages of 20 points & 10 assists for the first time in his career. He’s the catalyst of the franchise’s offense, its de facto leader, and the unofficial assistant to the assistant GM. At full health, he’s a top-10 player in the NBA.
The Nets ran a fair amount of sets with two point guards, though they’ve bolstered the wings enough to temper that possibility going forward. With Deron likely playing anywhere from 35-40 minutes each night, both Farmar and Gaines are both expendable should the Nets seek a trade or buyout.
Brook Lopez suffered a stress fracture to the fifth metatarsal of his right foot yesterday. Now, if you’re like me, the moment you heard that, all you saw was the words “fracture” and “foot,” filled in the rest as medical jargon, and began panicking. Well, after a bit of research, here’s what that jargon means, and why the panic is somewhat warranted — but not entirely. Read more…
Apologies for what was I’m sure a choppy episode of Nets Are Scorching TV, we were experiencing some technical issues that were beyond our control.
Nonetheless, Devin and I were still able to discuss our feelings on the Brook Lopez injury and how it changes things in relation to Dwight Howard, the acquisition of Mehmet Okur, our ideas for small-ball lineups and just why in the world everyone hates Kris Humphriesso much.
Today myself, Devin and Danny Savitzky were joined by Mike Mazzeo of ESPN New York and Zach Harper of Daily Dime Live fame as we all weighed in on five different questions heading into the Nets season as a part of ESPN.com’s 5-on-5 series.
We all collectively did our best to not mention Dwight Howard’s name once. We all failed.
Saturday’s game against the Knicks was, to put it lightly, a bit of a mess. The teams combined for 39 turnovers, 18 missed free throws, and 23% shooting from beyond the arc. It wasn’t pretty, but it was the first taste of basketball the Nets have had since last season. From the player’s perspective, I saw a refreshing aggressiveness from Brook Lopez and Anthony Morrow, but not much else. From a coaching perspective, there’s frankly not much to take away from that game, but one unsuccessful play early in the game caught my eye:
Note: apologies for the abruptness of the beginning and microphone quality. Had technical issues with all programs. Like with 18th century agrarian business, it’s all the same principles.
So let’s pick up the play from the start. We’ve got Deron Williams handling the ball at the top of the key, Shelden Williams in almost directly in front of him, Damion James in the left corner, Brook Lopez on the opposite block, and Deron Williams has the ball and receives a screen from Shelden Williams, which opens up the left side. With the screen, Deron’s normally got the option to attack the basket or pull up with a short jumper, but Amare Stoudemire hedged far left and cut off the lane. As Amare hedges and then recovers, Shelden cuts across up top to set a screen on Landry Fields.
As this happens, Damion James cuts across the lane from the left corner to set a cross-screen on Brook Lopez’s man, Tyson Chandler. Damion doesn’t look to score here, but if his defender helped out too far on Deron or overplayed him, the entire left side is open for him to get a quick cut to the basket.
Since that’s not there, Damion continues across the lane to set the cross-screen on Chandler. The intention of this play is to curl Brook Lopez to the ball-side block, where he can work his offensive magic, but this doesn’t work for two reasons. Firstly, Carmelo Anthony slides down to where Brook tries to curl and sticks his butt out, sending him off course. That little difference means that the arc of Brook’s curl comes out further than originally intended. Secondly, this is where Tyson Chandler’s defensive presence comes into play: Chandler fights through the screen with ease and blocks off Brook’s attempt to set up before he has a chance to get there. This means that Brook instead curls all the way out to the three-point line, where he merely exchanges handoffs with Deron.
At this point, the play becomes a standard pick-and-roll, but Deron instead swings out to Anthony Morrow. Morrow forces a contested off-balance jumper, which ends up well short.
This is one of those plays that, when well executed, could end with a number of scoring opportunities. However, since it came in the first 90 seconds of preseason, it’s no surprise that it didn’t work out.
There are two main issues here. Firstly, Shelden Williams (or whoever starts at power forward for the Nets come season time) needs to make himself available when he’s got a good look at the basket. When Deron came off the screen, Amare hedged hard on the left side, leaving Shelden essentially open. But Shelden’s already setting a cross-screen for Anthony Morrow and has his back to Deron, cutting himself off from the play. Shelden shot 45% from 16-23 feet last year according to HoopData, which is a pretty good percentage, so I hope in the future he reads the defense and adjusts to look for the open shot.
Secondly, Deron’s decision-making surprised me here. After receiving the screen, he passed the ball immediately to Anthony Morrow, who was 35 feet from the basket and in no position to score. Morrow doesn’t possess the skillset to beat his defender off the dribble, and with under ten seconds on the shot clock, the result is a poor shot. I’d normally expect Deron to either slash, drawing in the defense so that Morrow can spot up more effectively, or look to Brook Lopez rolling to the basket.
There are a few other things — Brook should’ve fought harder to get to the block, and Shelden could’ve set stronger screens, but those are mostly nitpicking. Players are still getting in the flow of the offense, figuring out what works and what doesn’t. That takes time. What’s key here is the strategy, giving Deron the left side to operate in, while curling Lopez and Morrow off cross-screens for smart looks.
Given the roster now, this lineup is presumably the smartest one for opening night, though Shawne Williams may overtake James for the starting small forward spot. Of course, Andrei Kirilenko could overtake them both, depending how things shake out in the next few days, though James isn’t willing to give up his starting spot without a fight:
That’s cool, we need help. That’ll be great. If Kirilenko come in or whatever, I look forward to playing against him every day or whatever. I don’t want to just hand him that spot. I think coach is gonna make him earn it and I’m gonna make him earn it. If he comes in and plays better than me that’s cool, but at this point, I’m just coming in and focusing on whatever I have to do to help this team.
The Nets play the Knicks tomorrow at 2 P.M. Basketball, guys. Real basketball!
