{"id":256374,"date":"2026-06-05T14:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T14:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/256374\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T14:14:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T14:14:08","slug":"why-the-brooklyn-nets-shouldve-traded-up-to-draft-dylan-harper-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/256374\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the Brooklyn Nets Should&#8217;ve Traded Up to Draft Dylan Harper in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"inline-text-0\" class=\"mt-[18px] md:mt-0 mb-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6s\">The Brooklyn Nets used <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/story\/_\/id\/45587689\/nets-keep-all-five-first-round-picks-select-four-guards\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">all five of their picks<\/a> in the 2025 NBA Draft, which is an NBA record.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-1\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6v\">The first of those selections was made at the No. 8 spot, which turned into Egor D\u00ebmin. The rest of the picks they made went to players at the guard position.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-2\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6y\">D\u00ebmin showed considerable signs of potential in his first season in the league, quickly quelling any concerns some may have had about his jumper. He&#8217;s also proven capable of making the right reads and handling point guard duties, though he could still be more aggressive in attacking the basket.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-3\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"71\">Though the San Antonio Spurs seemed intent on keeping the No. 2 pick, which landed them Dylan Harper, one could think that the Nets&#8217; boatload of first round picks could&#8217;ve swayed the Spurs into trading down from that spot for the rights to draft Harper. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-4\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"74\">The No. 8 pick would&#8217;ve almost certainly gone San Antonio&#8217;s way, in addition to at least one other first round pick in the same draft. The Nets could&#8217;ve also dangled first round picks in future drafts to bring in Harper.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-5\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"77\">Trading away multiple first round picks for a top two draft pick is always risky, but with how well Harper has performed in his first postseason run, hindsight tells us it would&#8217;ve been well worth it for the Nets to push some of their more valuable chips to the table to draft the Rutgers product.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-6\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"7a\">Just a couple of months after turning 20, Harper has already taken on a sizable role in the Spurs&#8217; offense. He&#8217;s also shown an adeptness at lighting it up from 3-point range and creating his shot off the dribble at all three levels.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-7\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"7d\">Defensively, Harper has been a menace, using his size and length to get under the skin of opposing players and blow up passing lanes.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-8\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"7g\">Harper has deferred to De&#8217;Aaron Fox as the lead playmaker, but Harper has proven he has the playmaking chops to be the main orchestrator of an offense. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-9\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"7j\">The beauty of everything is that Harper has been showcasing his elite potential against some of the best teams in the league, including the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-10\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1.5\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"7m\">While the Nets could still strike gold at the guard position <a href=\"https:\/\/www.si.com\/nba\/nets\/onsi\/player-comparisons-for-nets-draft-targets-with-the-no-6-pick\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">in this upcoming draft<\/a>, it&#8217;s hard not to wonder how well Harper could&#8217;ve thrived in a role where he had more opportunities to operate with the ball in his hands. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"22\" height=\"22\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.minutemediacdn.com\/platform\/google_discover_icon.svg\" class=\"shrink-0\"\/>Add us as a preferred source on Google<a aria-label=\"Follow si.com on Google News\" href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=si.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"flex h-[30px] w-[30px] shrink-0 items-center justify-center rounded-full bg-primary font-group-large text-sm font-medium text-white transition-colors hover:bg-secondary focus:bg-secondary md:w-auto md:gap-2.5 md:px-4 md:py-[5px]\">Follow<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Brooklyn Nets used all five of their picks in the 2025 NBA Draft, which is an NBA&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":256375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-256374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/256375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}