NBA

Free agents Pierce, Livingston in flux after Kidd exits Nets

Free agency began at 12:01 Tuesday morning, and as the Nets were also beginning a coaching search, they hoped to retain three key free agents: Paul Pierce, Shaun Livingston and Alan Anderson.

The Nets were expected to reach out to all three shortly after midnight, and would like to keep them despite the insanity that’s engulfed the franchise over the past few days thanks to the departure of Jason Kidd to Milwaukee after a failed power play, as first reported by The Post.

But the Nets are likely to allow the market to set itself in relation to all three of their free agents, something general manager Billy King hinted at when he met with the media prior to the draft last week.

“July 1 is when everybody can start making offers and you get a feel for where the market is going to be,” King said. “Right now, you can speculate and have ideas of who may pay and what they may do but you don’t know what somebody may do in the draft, make a trade… once you start, then guys end up getting paid and if they leave, then we go to Plan B.

Shaun Livingston and Jason Kidd may reunite in Milwaukee.AP

“Players leave and the organization has to be bigger than one player. So if you can build an organization, which we are trying to do, we’d like all of our guys back and be able to retain them. But you got to have an organization that can sustain losing one or two guys if you are trying to build for the long haul.”

Beyond the obvious complications of losing your coach in the hours before free agency began, Kidd’s agent, Jeff Schwartz, also represents both Pierce and Livingston. The Nets can offer Pierce more money than any other team, but he could draw interest from the Clippers, where former Celtics coach Doc Rivers runs the show, among others.

Livingston, ironically, could be a fit in Milwaukee playing for Kidd, and is expected to draw interest from several teams. The Nets, on the other hand, can only offer Livingston the mini mid-level exception, which is three years and roughly $10 million.


By spending over $190 million on their roster last season, it stands to reason the Nets were going to lose money. But following up on The Post’s report last week the Nets had lost about $50 million, Grantland reported that the basketball team alone is projected to have lost $144 million, though that figure does not include benefits the Nets receive from owning Barclays Center, one of the busiest arenas in the country.

“Nets ownership has said from Day One that the main goal was putting together a championship caliber team, and that no effort would be spared to this end,” Irina Pavlova, president of Onexim Sports and Entertainment, said in a statement. “So, it should come as no surprise to anyone that significant investments have been made in the roster and in upgrading basketball operations on all fronts. We are certain that the team will become profitable in time, as planned.”

The Nets will enter free agency with 10 players under contract for about $88 million, after spending over $100 million on player salaries alone in 2013-14.