Joe Tsai, the landlord of the Nets, issued a commentary of make stronger for the staff’s entrance administrative center and training team of workers on Twitter Monday night and added, “We will make decisions in the best interest of the Brooklyn Nets.”
The tweet gave the impression to be in line with a record from The Athletic that stated the staff’s famous person ahead, Kevin Durant, was once nonetheless insistent that the Nets meet a industry call for he made in June. Durant, one of the vital NBA’s easiest avid gamers, met with Tsai in particular person over the weekend, The Athletic reported, and conditioned his staying with the staff at the elimination of Coach Steve Nash and General Manager Sean Marks. (Durant up to now had publicly lauded Nash, who simply finished his 2nd yr because the Nets’ trainer, announcing within the spring that the trainer had treated the Nets “perfectly.”)
The Nets didn’t reply to a request for remark, and a end result for Durant’s corporate, Boardroom, declined to remark.
Tsai’s Twitter put up was once an odd escalation of a simmering feud between Durant, 33, and the Nets. Tsai has hardly weighed in on basketball issues publicly, and only one yr in the past Durant gave the impression to be fortunately married to the Nets, having agreed to a four-year contract extension with the staff he had signed with in the summertime of 2019.
But a lot of Durant’s 3 seasons with the Nets have not long gone consistent with plan and feature been marked via tumult.
Durant, whilst improving from an Achilles’ tendon damage, signed with the franchise at the side of his buddies, the famous person level guard Kyrie Irving and the veteran heart DeAndre Jordan. During the 2020-21 season, the Nets traded many in their younger avid gamers, at the side of a number of draft alternatives, to Houston for James Harden, apparently assembling one of the fearsome famous person teams in NBA historical past.
But accidents saved the 3 stars from seeing the courtroom very steadily. They performed handiest 16 video games in combination and had a dominant record of 13-3, In the 2021 playoffs, the Nets misplaced in the second one spherical to the Milwaukee Bucks, the eventual champions.
Last season, the Nets had been as soon as once more constructive that they’d reside as much as their lofty expectancies. But Irving’s refusal to get vaccinated in opposition to Covid-19 intended that he could not play in house video games till later within the season as a result of a New York City rule that was once sooner or later lifted. A pissed off Harden requested the Nets for a industry, and the Nets despatched him to the department rival Philadelphia 76ers for Ben Simmons. And as soon as once more, Durant, in addition to different avid gamers at the staff, handled accidents, forcing Nash to push newbies into sudden roles.
The Nets hit all-time low within the playoffs, the place they had been swept within the first spherical via the Boston Celtics, an embarrassing result for a staff that gave the look to be — on paper — one of the gifted groups of the last decade.
Durant’s industry request was once a bombshell that surprised many league observers. For something, the Nets had been projected to go into coaching camp with an impressive roster that come with Simmons, a three-time All-Star, and Irving, who opted into the overall yr of his contract. But a participant of Durant’s caliber has virtually by no means made a industry request like this with 4 years left on his contract.
Durant’s industry worth, in spite of his résumé, is unsure, partly as a result of how uncommon his request is and likewise as a result of Durant himself. In 3 years with the Nets, he performed 90 common season video games of a conceivable 236 as a result of accidents. He will probably be getting into his sixteenth season, a level wherein maximum avid gamers are already in steep decline. But when Durant has performed, he has most commonly seemed like he at all times has: a generational ability.
Durant’s ability makes him a tantalizing chance for a staff taking a look to position itself excessive, no longer the least of which is that once a staff trades for him, he would possibly no longer wish to keep.
