Brooklyn Nets in Precarious Position as Season Fades Away
The 21-31 Brooklyn Nets seemed to be back on track. Then, they reverted.
The Nets started off February with a three-game win streak. Even Lionel Hollins started to talk about a change in performance from his team.
“It’s very humbling when your team starts to get it,” Hollins said on Feb. 4 in the midst of a mini three-game winning streak, via Gregory Hrinya of Examiner.com.
But it didn't last long. The Nets started playing, once again, like the Nets.
Inconsistent defense, lack of shooting, stagnant offense: The symptoms were all there. The three-game stretch seemed more like an aberration than a sign of changing times, and the Nets dropped their ensuing trio of games heading into All-Star Weekend.
Brooklyn had one of the league's easiest schedules to start the season. Of course, that's changed of late. The Nets' 3-12 January record wasn't much of a coincidence. That slate was tough, and it'll continue into the rest of 2015.
If the Nets find themselves in a tight race entering the final month of the regular season, it could be difficult for them to earn a playoff spot. Seven of their nine April games come against teams who are currently playoff-bound. That puts them in somewhat of a precarious position, already sitting in the Eastern Conference's No. 9, even if they are only one game behind both the No. 7 and 8 seed.
Look, the Nets may be treading 10 under mediocre, but the East is sinking somewhere to the deepest part of the Oh My Gosh, I Can't Watch This Anymore Ocean. (Yes, that's a real body of water. Your education failed you.)
It's said time and time again, but the Nets have to make the playoffs. Really. They need to do it. The only thing that'd be worse than missing the postseason would be losing out on their own draft pick for the next five years.
Wait.
Oh, horse feathers! That already happened!
So, let's just refresh what the Nets' draft future looks like in the upcoming years.
Brooklyn's 2015 first-rounder is as good as gone since the Atlanta Hawks have the right to swap if the Nets end up with the more desirable pick. Just for the heck of it: If Atlanta lost every single one of its games for the rest of the season, the Nets would still have to go 23-7 to finish with a better record than the Hawks, who have already clinched a record above .500.
It doesn't end there. There's a reason this has been chronicled before.
2016's pick goes to the Boston Celtics unprotected as part of the deal which brought Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett to the Big Apple. The team's selection in 2017 could go either way, as the Celtics have the right to swap with Brooklyn again because of the Pierce/KG trade. But wait, there's more.
The Nets also send 2018's first-round selection to Boston. Again unprotected.
Tanking this year doesn't do anything for the Nets, since they've all but lost their own pick already—instead selecting in what will inevitably be late in the first round.
Pulling a Philadelphia 76ers, breaking it down for the future, does nothing too. Brooklyn can't own its own first-rounder until 2017, and it's possible it won't select with its own pick until 2019.
2019, when Hillary Rodham Clinton will be in the midst of her third year in office. When Justin Bieber will be years removed from college age. When Alex Rodriguez will be coming back from another steroid-related suspension. Oh, what a time it will be.
The Nets need to compete now, and even if they've been a disappointment by most standards, that's actually what they're doing. Let's take an optimist's argument for a second.
Brooklyn is basically doing what it's supposed to do. It's playing slow, boring basketball, finding a little success during the easier parts of its schedule and staying in the race for an Eastern Conference playoff spot.
It would've been reasonable to expect in the preseason that the Nets would win 45 games or even a little more, but after seeing this team play, does it really feel like it's performing below its level of ability? In the paraphrased words of all-time linguist and former Arizona Cardinals coach Dennis Green: The Nets are who we thought they were.
So what if the optimist's view has a pinch of pessimism along with a dose of sky is falling? The Nets tend to incite such emotions. But still, they have a chance to play into May, and that's not the optimist talking. It's the realist.
Only a game up on the Nets, the Miami Heat could be in trouble without Dwyane Wade for a long stretch. Miami is only 7-10 when the 11-time All-Star is out of the lineup. And on top of that, the Heat and the No. 8 seed Charlotte Hornets are 22-30.
Clearly, Charlotte has been playing better of late, but are we really going to trust that teams this bad can hold onto one-game leads without question? That seems a bit silly.
In the end, the bottom of the Eastern Conference playoff race is probably going to come down to whomever makes the fewest mistakes, not necessarily who plays the best—because no one actually plays well.
The Eastern Conference just kind of exists. The Nets' hopes can remain alive for a little longer because of the staleness which has overcome that group of 15 teams for years. Brooklyn can't have it any other way.
Fred Katz averaged almost one point per game in fifth grade but maintains that his per-36-minute numbers were astonishing. Find more of his work on ESPN's TrueHoop Network at ClipperBlog.com. Follow him on Twitter at @FredKatz.
Unless otherwise noted, all statistics are current as of Feb. 15 and are courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com.
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