Lionel Hollins Can Build a Winner with the Brooklyn Nets
After a one-year hiatus, Lionel Hollins returns to the coaching bench for the Brooklyn Nets. He takes over for the departed Jason Kidd, who was traded to the Milwaukee Bucks this offseason for two second-round draft picks.
General manager Billy King signed Hollins to a multiyear deal on July 2 that will pay him more than $4 million annually. Hollins had previously been head coach of the Memphis Grizzlies, where he went 214-201 in three different stints and 18-17 in the postseason. In his last season at the helm, he guided the Grizzlies to a Western Conference Finals berth. With a defensive-minded approach and a simplified offensive attack, Hollins puts Brooklyn in good hands moving forward.
He inherits a Nets team that went 44-38 and reached the second round of the playoffs. After a destructive start that saw Brooklyn go 10-21 and suffer the loss of All-Star center Brook Lopez, the team hunkered down while playing a brand of small ball. The team received important contributions on both sides of the ball from former Nets Shaun Livingston and Paul Pierce, as well as upstart second-year forward/center Mason Plumlee.
Now, the former Grizzlies coach, who helped put together a stellar defensive team in Memphis and created stars out of big men Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol, takes over a team that's ailing and looking for an identity.
Heading into 2014-15, Pierce and Livingston are gone, but King acquired help for the backcourt and frontcourt. Brooklyn acquired the rights to Oklahoma State guard Markel Brown and Baylor forward Cory Jefferson in the 2014 draft. The GM also orchestrated a multiteam trade that brought guard Jarrett Jack to the Nets. In an effort to improve the team's stock at small forward, King signed former 2011 draft pick Bojan Bogdanovic to a three-year deal.
How Hollins navigates the next few weeks in training camp will be very important. He has two All-Stars returning from injuries, an opening at the 3 and important pieces to integrate in the frontcourt. Oh, and let's not forget about how Kevin Garnett factors into the fold. With several players returning from injury, one could speculate that Hollins might protect his players throughout the 82-game season, but he has already made up his mind.
"If he's healthy, and producing, he's going to play," Hollins told ESPN.com's Ohm Youngmisuk regarding Garnett. "How many minutes? I don't know. But he is not going to play 15 or 16 minutes. I can guarantee you that. If he is playing and starting, he is going to be out there."
In 2013-14, Garnett was limited to only 21 minutes per game, a career low. He spent 28 games on the bench, nursing a bad back. What KG has done for the game of basketball is paramount, but his impact on the Nets last season was minimal. Hollins' choice to start Garnett not only has potential repercussions for the future Hall of Famer (such as injury) but to Plumlee's confidence.
Nets fans can trust in Hollins' reputation and work with big men. While Plumlee might still only be 24 and coming off a heck of a summer in which he played for Team USA and started 20 games through March and April, he's still green on the offensive end.
The Nets have 17 back-to-backs next season, which may convince Hollins not to start Garnett, unless it's an important matchup. With enough of a showing in the preseason, Plumlee can strengthen his case to start. If Garnett were to struggle early in games, then expect Plumlee to be the one jumping at tipoff.
Back in Memphis, Hollins helped Gasol become one of the best defensive centers in the NBA. He helped shrink Gasol's defensive rating from 108 down to 98 in 2012-13, the season in which he won the Defensive Player of the Year Award. The 60-year-old coach hardly, if ever, doubled any forward or center on the block because he had two larger-than-life big men.
The first-year coach recently reflected on his tenure and the team he built in Memphis, per ESPN New York's Mike Mazzeo. "All those guys weren’t All-Defensive (players) when I took over; we were a collective defensive team. We're going to be a collective defensive team here [Brooklyn]."
Without a doubt, Hollins will focus on defense moving forward. His teams in Memphis exemplified grit and determination in competing in the tough Western Conference, finishing fifth and first in opponents' points per game from 2011 to 2013. As with any new team, he will need to adjust to the personnel available to him.
While similar in some ways, the Nets roster is not exactly what Hollins had in Memphis. There's no one quite on the level defensively as Tony Allen, and there's no resemblance to a player like Gasol anywhere. That being said, it's going to take a team effort going forward on a nightly basis.
"I think we’re really aggressive right now defensively,” Williams said of Hollins' schemes, per Mazzeo. "It’s not a one-on-one sport. Sure, you wanna guard your man, you wanna do your job. But we have to be ready to help each other out and have each other’s back."
Hollins has been ramping up practices this year in comparison to Kidd's style. With two of the three best players defensively gone (Pierce and Livingston), a lot of pressure is going to be put on newcomer Jarrett Jack and Lopez. Jack was brought in for two reasons: to take the pressure off Williams on the defensive end by guarding the opposing point guard and to allow D-Will to play off the ball.
Additionally, Lopez is not the most nimble of defenders and is going to have a hard time against the quicker centers in the league.
Hollins may have an answer to any inefficiencies Brooklyn may possess at the start of the season.
“It’s gonna be a guard,” Hollins told Mazzeo when asked who is going to start alongside Deron Williams, Joe Johnson, Kevin Garnett and Brook Lopez.
This alludes to Johnson moving to small forward and an opening at the 2. Jack, Alan Anderson and Bogdanovic could all be in the running for the opening at shooting guard. Anderson would appear to be the early favorite simply because his contract was extended this offseason and is a defensive-minded guard. A lineup with three guards will allow Brooklyn to cover a lot more ground.
Last season, Brooklyn was middle-of-the-pack in most categories. The Nets averaged 99 points per game, good for 21st in the league, and gave up 100 points per game, which ranked 11th. The lack of an interior presence, Lopez, forced the team to shoot more jump shots.
Garnett and Williams were two of the culprits. The pair attempted more than half of their shots from 16 feet and beyond. With a healthy Lopez and a semi-healthy Garnett, the offense should change. In 2012-13, when Williams and Lopez were in the lineup for the majority of the season, the duo outscored opponents by five points per 100 possessions.
Williams' ineffectiveness last season was caused by injury but also because he missed Lopez's presence. In 2012-2013, he drew four personal fouls per game, but in 2013-14, he averaged three. Hollins' teams in Memphis were attacking teams. From 2011 to 2013, Memphis attempted roughly 70 percent of its shots in front of the three-point line.
A majority of those shots came in the paint, from Gasol and Randolph. Both big men were typically the top leading scorers on the team, outside of Rudy Gay. You can expect Hollins to run his offense through his versatile center Lopez, who has averaged 18 points, seven boards and two blocks per game in six injury-riddled seasons.
Heading into the season, Hollins faces tough decisions regarding player health and the starting lineup. His coaching pedigree should suit Brooklyn well, which was probably in need of a more disciplined coach anyway. The Nets face an uphill battle in terms of stealing the division away from Toronto and maybe even the Knicks, but a coach like Hollins will keep them in every game.
All stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference and NBA.com.
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