A radical roster makeover in the past six months has moved the Nets into full-fledged rebuilding mode. And that suits New Jersey’s trio of rookies just fine.
With Jason Kidd, Richard Jefferson, and Marcus Williams shipped off in trades, and veteran forwards Nenad Krstic and Bostjan Nachbar signing lucrative deals to play in Russia, coach Lawrence Frank will have to play his youngsters. First-round picks Brook Lopez and Ryan Anderson and second-round choice Chris Douglas-Roberts are eager to move into the rotation.
“I think we’ll be really young and we have a lot of guys that are willing to get their feet wet and get some experience,” Lopez said yesterday at the NBA Rookie Photo Shoot at the Knicks training facility in Tarrytown.
Vince Carter becomes the elder statesman on a team that finished 34-48 last season, three games out of a playoff spot in the East. With Devin Harris and Josh Boone the only other returning players to average at least 20 minutes per game a year ago, the Nets will be fortunate to find themselves in playoff contention.
“I don’t know if it’s rebuilding, but the Nets organization as a whole is starting over,” Douglas-Roberts said. “I feel this is a great rookie class, especially for the Nets. We’re the sleeper in the East.”
Douglas-Roberts, the 40th overall pick out of Memphis, looks to provide points off the bench at the swingman position vacated by Jefferson.
“They already told me that they need a scoring guard to come right in and score right away,” he said.
Both the seven-foot Lopez (10th pick) and the six-foot-ten Anderson (21st pick) give the Nets options for a very green frontcourt, which will also feature newly acquired Chinese big man Yi Jianlian.
“It’s exciting, because we can get to [playoff] level with this group of guys,” Anderson said. “To start fresh is great, especially for a rookie like me to step into.”
Krstic officially accepted a two-year deal with Triumph of Moscow. But as long as the Nets make him a qualifying offer each year, as they did before the free agency period started ($2.7 million was the NBA qualifier), the Nets will retain his NBA rights. And he has an opt-out clause after the first year in Russia should he decide he wants the NBA again.
“We’ll see what happens but eventually I think he’ll go wherever he can get the best deal,” Rod Thorn said. “For now, this was the best deal for him.”
The Nets tried to beat the Tuesday midnight deadline and work a deal. They had concrete offers, but losing Krstic left them at 15 contracts and they did not want to take anything back in terms of players. Chicago and Memphis were definitely in the mix.
“We had a couple things that were relatively close,” Thorn said. “But it just didn’t get done. In some instances, we would have had to take back (a contract) that we didn’t want.”
– Additional reporting by Fred Kerber