Aldridge: Nets Second To Rockets This Offseason

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Updated: August 5, 2013

NBA.com’s David Aldridge looks at the NBA offseason and grades out every team and how they did to improve their team and where they stand.

He gives his breakdown of how he thinks the team’s acquisitions will play out and a few tidbits on the future for each team.

Aldridge placed the Brooklyn Nets second to only the Houston Rockets for the offseason’s top award while expressing concern for the Nets with a rookie head coach in Jason Kidd.

Games aren’t won in the offseason but the Nets did better themselves and are ready to start a run at the championship come next season.

How would you Nets fans rank the offseason?

[quote_simple] NBA.com

No. 2 — BROOKLYN NETS

2012-13 RECORD: 49-33, second place, Atlantic Division; lost in first round of playoffs

ADDED: Coach Jason Kidd; G/F Alan Anderson (two years, $2 million); F Kevin Garnett, F Paul Pierce, G Jason Terry (acquired from Boston via trade); F Andrei Kirilenko (two years, $6.5 million); G Shaun Livingston (one year, $1.27 million);

LOST: F/C Kris Humphries, F Gerald Wallace, G MarShon Brooks, G Keith Bogans, F Kris Joseph (trade with Boston), G C.J. Watson (signed with Indiana)

RETAINED: F Andray Blatche (one year, $1.37 million)

THE KEY MAN: Owner Mikhail Prokhorov. The Nets’ owner continues to go all in to win at ridiculous numbers — Brooklyn’s tax bill for the upcoming season will be more than $87 million if it goes through the season without major roster changes. That tax bill is on top of a team salary that will be in excess of $102 million. Of course, the Russian tycoon is sitting on billions, and could conceivably spend this way for years. But other very rich owners have lost their taste for deficit spending if it doesn’t produce championships. If Brooklyn doesn’t overcome Miami and/or Indiana and Chicago in the next couple of years, will The Prokhorov keep the checkbook open this wide?

THE SKINNY: For all the heat and speculation the mega-trade with Boston produced, the Nets’ biggest transaction remains their gamble on Kidd, who literally took off his Knicks uniform one week and was named Brooklyn’s coach the next. He’s never spent a minute on anyone’s bench in any capacity other than as a player. Other former players have gotten that kind of shot before, from Bill Russell to Jason Kidd coaching in summer league gameDanny Ainge to Magic Johnson to Larry Bird to Mark Jackson. But few have had to come in and coach as veteran a team as Kidd will, that has such great expectations.

The respect players have for Kidd is universal, but that was while he was a fellow player. Kidd will now have to develop his coaching philosophy and style, manage his new roles as a motivator and disciplinarian (I would pay cold hard cash to be there the first time J-Kidd has to cuss out KG for missing an assignment). He has to deal with the world’s most ferocious and insatiable media market while never making another mistake in his personal life. That’s a big ask. But if he pulls it off … what a party they could have on Atlantic Avenue next season.[/quote_simple]

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