With that said, it takes more than an understated makeover and an even more understated "Brooklyn" chant to revitalize a franchise. At the end of the day, it comes down to the product you put on the floor. With several acquisitions over the past couple of seasons, highlighted by Deron Williams and Joe Johnson, Mikhail Prokhorov and GM Billy King have shown that the Nets' face lift is much more than aesthetic.
Joe Johnson's trade to Brooklyn for a band of misfits lost in basketball obscurity and Deron Williams' decision stick with the Nets long-term with a five year deal gave validity to a vision of Brooklyn being New York's new mecca for highly touted free agents. While things have not exactly gone to plan quite yet, as Brooklyn prepares for a more than probable first round exit, this postseason has gone a long way to show that the true future of this franchise is the man who's been in the middle during the lows of an embarrassing 12-70 2009-10 season and this recent rise to relevance, Brook Lopez.
The ever optimistic Prokhorov has recently gone on record as saying the Nets are one more acquisition away from contention. In reality, rather than search for a new piece, Nets management should probably get to work on a new puzzle. Saturday's triple-overtime loss to the Bulls after leading by 14 with just under four minutes left reaffirms that sentiment and all but puts the nail in the coffin for interim coach PJ Carlesimo, who for a time, brought this team back from the brink of disaster after taking over for the deposed Avery Johnson.. The Nets are a gritty squad, for sure, but they've proven to be a group of mismatched skill sets that play entirely too slow to be effective in today's NBA.
Joe Johnson, after all, is nicknamed Iso-Joe for a reason. As he prefers the ball in his hands to create his own shot. Johnson has limited his game to almost exclusively jump shots, a lot of them contested, limiting his ability to get to the line. As brilliant as Johnson can look in spurts, his finesse based play has been an achillies heel in his playoff showings his entire career. If anything, Johnson's ability to get 15-22* (22 taking three overtimes) points per game given his shot selection is a testament to his skill level and few players have proven as clutch as Johnson this season, but, at least with this squad, he's playing nowhere near an all-star level and is, at best, the best of the NBA's B-list.
While the days of Deron Williams and Chris Paul being equated to each other equals at the top of the NBA's ever expanding mountain of elite point guards are long gone, Williams is still a more than formidable point guard in the league, and given the length of his deal and impressive ability, he should still be a part of this team's future going forward.
The remainder of Brooklyn's roster is a series of question marks. Reggie Evans does what he does and that's hustle and provide every intangible you could possibly imagine, Gerald Wallace, who's already not great shooting touch appears to have bounced like a bad check, has little more to do than rebound and play defense in a slower system that he still seems to be lost within. Wallace has become the recipient of a lot of drive and dishes and "Crash" just has nothing to crash into in Brooklyn; totally nuetralizing his otherwise unique ability to create contact and plays. Blatche has adapted to Brooklyn ball nicely and appears to have found a niche there, as has CJ Watson, but both are bench players. Even with both players flourishing they're not going to bring this team to the next level. Brooks appears to be the one person capable of jump starting this stagnant offense, but is such a liability on defense that he can't and won't get the run he needs to prove his worth. Once dominant rebounder, Kris Humphries game appears to have disappeared ever since his mercifully brief stint on reality television.
Amidst this cluster of unfulfilled potential is Nets center, Brook Lopez, emerging as the one constant this team has during the 2013 playoff run. While his Chicago counterpart, Joakim Noah, is at anything but 100 percent, Lopez's ability to put up about 22 points per game against a highly regarded Bulls defense is certainly praise worthy. Lopez's great touch around the rim and great range for his size is not news, necessarily, but his consistency and new found assertiveness is of note, especially as he steps up his defensive game as well with 3, 3, 7, and 4 blocks in each of the last four games respectively, it is Lopez, not Williams or Johnson ensuring that the Nets don't go quietly.
Lopez's game is not without fault. He's not nearly as skilled of a rebounder as a man of his size should be, but he's also never really had to be that presence on that team. With players like Evans and (in his time) Humphries on the team specifically to rebound, it's hard to critique Lopez too hard for something that's never been in his job description, though one would think by virtue of height alone he'd grab a couple more than six or seven a game.
The Nets' Brooklyn renovation has been successful, but clearly this is a team not content with just being relevant Nets management faces tough choices going forward, but among a team of stars struggling to find their footing, Brook Lopez's emergence as the centerpiece and rock of this team that they envisioned him to be when he was drafted in 2008 is a promising sign for Brooklyn's future and is perhaps the true beacon for free agents considering settling down.in BK and restoring the franchise to prominence atop the East.
No comments:
Post a Comment