The Boom or Bust Brooklyn Nets
Every possible outcome feels in play for the NBA's most dramatic team.
The Brooklyn Nets enter the 2022-23 NBA season coming off perhaps the most eventful uneventful summer in the history of the NBA. Superstar and face of the franchise Kevin Durant requested a trade, demanded that the team fire head coach Steve Nash and general manager Sean Marks, then rescinded his ultimatum after owner Jo Tsai rejected it and instead took Durant out to a dinner from which both parties emerged willing to give things another try.
The Brooklyn drama played out over several incredibly slow moving weeks, and included rumors that Durant was unhappy playing with Kyrie Irving, whom the team was reportedly open to moving. The Nets now appeared poised to start the year with both Irving and Durant on the roster. The potential for future organizational waves seems high.
Irving is a notoriously mercurial personality, and Durant will have some serious fences to mend after sharing his disinterest in playing in Brooklyn and failing to execute his coup.
The Nets on-court questions are nearly as big as their potential chemistry concerns. Brooklyn will seek to integrate All-NBA guard/quasi-big Ben Simmons into its rotation after receiving him in a trade for James Harden last year.
Simmons is a 6’11” physical marvel, with the size of a modern center and the fluidity of a guard. He’s an incredible defender, a passing savant, and a total non-shooter. The Nets have the pieces to build some lineups plenty capable of masking Simmons’ offensive flaws. The potential of playing him at center with Durant as the nominal power forward is absolutely tantalizing.
Simmons has struggled with back injuries and Durant will turn 34 just before the start of the season. Asking both to play up a position for an entire year may be unwise, but Brooklyn’s best lineups will almost certainly require them to do so. Balancing the risk/reward calculus of how hard to push Simmons and Durant banging with bigs down low will be fascinating.
A five-man unit of Simmons, Durant, Joe Harris, Seth Curry, and Irving would be absolutely unstoppable offensively. Whether or not it can hold up defensively (particularly deep into the postseason) and how frequently Simmons, Durant, and Irving will be available are massive question marks.
Brooklyn could switch in better defenders in Royce O’Neale and Nic Claxton (or perhaps T.J. Warren if he is able to return to full health). The former would be a relatively seamless fit, but the latter - who is a horrendous free throw shooter and a non-threat offensively beyond layups and dunks - would create a spacing catastrophe if paired with Simmons.
The best outcome from the Nets perspective is to find a way to play Simmons and Durant as its bigs without hemorrhaging points or wearing either player down too much physically. That’s likely to prove a tight needle to thread, but its not an understatement to say that Brooklyn could contend for a championship if they pull it off.
There is real disaster potential here too, particularly from a chemistry standpoint, and the Nets may very well wind up a miserable watch for fans of the team. That only adds to the intrigue for everyone else. Brooklyn is at a pivotal moment as an organization. Almost every conceivable option is in play, from winning it all to selling off the team’s best players after an interpersonal disaster. The season can’t get here soon enough.