There’s no two ways about it: the Brooklyn Nets are absolutely awful. At 0-7, they’re one of three teams in the NBA without a win. The other two teams at least have reasons to hope: the New Orleans Pelicans, 0-7, have Anthony Davis and can expect to be better once they’re not ravaged by injuries. The Philadelphia 76ers, 0-6, may not have one of the top three players in the league, but they at least have building blocks for the future in Nerlens Noel and Jahlil Okafor. They even have reinforcements waiting in the wings with Joel Embiid (provided he can ever actually set foot on the court) and Dario Saric, not to mention a bushel of high draft picks.
The Nets, however, have none of those things. Brook Lopez is nice, but he’s a player you’d want on a contending team, not one wallowing away in misery on a horrible squad. Their draft pick situation is disastrous, as they owe the Boston Celtics one in 2016, and have to swap with Boston in 2017 if Boston so chooses (which, seeing as how the Nets will likely be awful that year, they will). Realizing that their present is doomed more than their future (only slightly), Billy King is already making exploratory trade calls to salvage what he can from his current assets.
Billy King admitted he's made some exploratory calls in case #Nets keep heading down this path. Knows they may have to do something.
— Rod Boone (@rodboone) November 9, 2015
King is the one that got the Nets into this mess, so it’s only fitting that he has to get them out of it. The Nets sacrificed their future when they acquired Deron Williams, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. Williams never panned out, and KG and Pierce were both well beyond their primes. The Nets won a playoff series under their guidance, but when you consider what the team gave up for that, a series win hardly seems worth it.
The problem facing the Nets is that they don’t have much to give. Again, Lopez is good, but he won’t fetch much, especially now that he’s re-injured his foot. The one piece that could fetch them a decent pick is Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, the only player they should keep since he’s at least young and talented. Despite — and because of, really — King’s best efforts, the Nets may be stuck in the dregs of the NBA for quite some time.
