The 2015-16 NBA Season starts soon, preseason hoops are in full swing, and playoff prognostications have begun in earnest. Since season previews can get bogged down by team-specific minutiae, and we cover every basketball team, we’re providing our readers reasons why you should care about all 30 teams in the Association.
DIME MAG’s 2015-16 NBA Season Previews
What does it to say that we’re primarily excited about this team because Jarrett Jack is manning the point and not their bought-out former all-star with glass ankles, Deron Williams? And it’s not like Jack is that much fun. He’s not scared to take long two-pointers, something that can send contemporary NBA writers into a Twitter hissy fit. So hopefully Dallas will find D-Will more appetizing. Such is the annoyance over D-Will’s stay in Brooklyn that Jack actually gets us a little fired up about Brooklyn’s chances this season.
For now, the Nets are a team with a score-first center in Brook Lopez, and a power forward whose not really a three-point shooter, and not really a grizzled defender or high-flying wing with power forward length. Thaddeus Young is many things, but attaching a genre or a niche to his game isn’t happening. He’s a starting power forward in the NBA. That we know.
Then there’s Joe Johnson. Remember him? Yeah, he’ll be the NBA’s second-highest paid player in 2015-1g. It’s the last year of a deal that paid him over $123 million over the last six years. Joe needs to take his agent out for a fancy meal at Peter Lugers. But that’s what you get when you’re smart enough to sign before the 2011 CBA capped out contracts. Joe is severely overpaid, but that doesn’t take away from his ability on the court. he’s a natural shooting guard, but he’ll be at small forward this season for the Nets. And that’s OK, too, because he was always a monstrous shooting guard.
But moving him over to the three opens up a spot for Bojan Bogdanovich. Even though his preseason left a lot of the desired, at least Bojan’s getting some run. We’ll see what he can do with the opportunity. Best to let European imports prove their talent with actions rather than anything you can glean before they actually suit up. Preseason was a small, unfulfilling taste. Lets see whether a larger portion sates Brooklyn’s hunger for a shooting guard.
And that’s the core of the group Lionel Hollins will attempt to take back to the playoffs this season. In the East, anything’s possible, but like the Hornets team we just covered, these teams are just treading water between possible lottery salvation and true title contention. Limbo is fine because at least it’s not Hell. But it’s still also a long way from Heaven.
Joe Johnson, guilty pleasure
It’s so easy to hate on Joe. Cool Joe is a nickname, but one of ironic detachment about the unruffled way he can look on the court. Like excitement and emotion are antithetical to his own personal beliefs. We always think he’s on the cusp of telling us to relax when we watch the Nets. Where is the urgency? Where is the passion? He’s the anti-Kevin Garnett, and he actually played with Kevin Garnett.
But that cold, emotionless way he can appear on the court masks what he’s really thinking, and reminds us of Hemingway’s iceberg fiction theory (e.g. Hills Like White Elephants). You see, there’s a lot that’s going on beneath the surface of Joe’s cool countenance. Never let his expressionless exterior fool you; he really does give a sh*t, even if it’s not as overt as Bill Russell’s pre-game puke, Russell Westbrook’s primordial yell or KG’s head slamming into the basket stanchion before every game.
There is grace in keeping your cool. Joe’s like the grizzled 747 pilot who gets on the radio during a hazardous bit of turbulence and keeps us all calm with an “aw shucks, it’s a might cloudy up here, folks, but we’ll be through it no time,” Chuck Yeager routine.
There is also a benefit to having a player like that on your team. But it doesn’t make Joe a leader, and if you’re a GM, you’re not doling out as much as Joe’s making unless you can get a monster on the court and someone who will inspire greatness around him. The only thing Joe usually inspires is a nap.
Except, that same somnambulance acts as at least part of why we love him; it doesn’t have to be a negative. He’s not trying to be someone he’s not. He’s not going to pander to what we, the public, feel an NBA superstar should be, or how we think he should act.
He’s not a fiery motivator. Maybe he could be, but he doesn’t have to fulfill that role. At this point, it doesn’t even really fit him. If he were griping about money or playing time or anything, that might be one thing, but he’s just doing his thing, staying in his lane. Playing hard, but leaving the game on the court and never forgetting that it’s a freaking game.
Like a really peaty Speyside single malt, Joe Johnson is tough for many to appreciate, but that’s also what makes it so satisfying when you finally do.
Decision to re-sign Thad Young and Brook Lopez
Grantland’s Zach Lowe recently ranked the Brooklyn Nets as the 28th-most watchable team in the league this season. The only reason Lionel Hollins’ team wasn’t last, of course, is due to its immensely enjoyable broadcast experience heralded by the dry wit and rare basketball acumen of Ian Eagle and Mike Fratello.
And after re-signing Brook Lopez and Thaddeus Young to contracts that cement them as their starting frontcourt, Brooklyn will be lucky to emerge from the League Pass depths – let alone consistent mediocrity.
The salaries afforded to Lopez and Young aren’t the problem. The former is worth a near max-level deal despite his obvious defensive limitations and checkered injury past; legitimate post-up hubs who double as knock-down shooters from 20-feet are very, very rare. And though Young is a more restricted player than his interior partner, he’s still valuable on both ends at approximately $12 million in a vacuum – especially as the salary cap rockets toward $110 million before 2017-18.
Pairing he and Lopez together for the long-term is the issue. Just how high is the Nets’ ceiling as long as their cogs at power forward and center lack the collective two-way dynamism to be anything more than average?
Brooklyn was 17-13 after acquiring Young at the trade deadline, and Lopez played arguably the best basketball of his career as the team made a late-season push for the playoffs. Offensively, this tandem gave the Nets more than almost anyone anticipated. Lineups featuring Young and Lopez boasted a 108.5 rating on that end of the floor, a mark that would have ranked among the league’s best over the full season. But that small sample size matters, especially because the seven-foot behemoth played at a level that’s almost certainly unsustainable.
Lopez averaged 23.7 points on 57.7 percent shooting in Brooklyn’s last 15 games, a major departure from his merely acceptable efficiency numbers of norm. If he’s not performing as a surefire All-NBA honoree, the Nets’ path to solid offensive output – or even an average, one actually – will be heavily trafficked.
Which, of course, is an even bigger problem considering the deficiencies of Young and Lopez on the other side of the ball. Their defensive rating was a dismal 105.4 last season, a humbling reality owed to their collective inability to protect the rim, Lopez’s finite pick-and-roll defense, and Young’s debilitating penchant for gambling. Experience on the same defensive string matters, obviously, and Young and Lopez haven’t had time to accrue much of it. But there’s still an inevitable limit on playing a pair of abjectly middling defenders down low that not even sublime positioning erases.
Young is a starting-caliber player, and Lopez is of an even higher quality. Individually, committing multiple years at high salaries to either player makes sense. But simultaneously? Barring drastic improvements that seem wholly unlikely for two 27-year-olds, Young and Lopez will do nothing more than ensure Brooklyn treads water – exactly what this franchise has been doing since its ballyhooed move to the borough two years ago.
