{"id":176181,"date":"2025-09-23T11:32:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T11:32:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/176181\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T11:32:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T11:32:07","slug":"essasy-despite-low-expectations-the-2025-26-nets-must-lay-the-new-foundation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/176181\/","title":{"rendered":"ESSASY: Despite low expectations, the 2025-26 Nets must lay the new foundation"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Nets accomplished one primary goal in the first unofficial season of the rebuild and that was hiring Jordi Fernandez.<\/a> The verdict is in and it isn\u2019t in question. The offseason, marked as one of the most crucial during Sean Marks\u2019 tenure, remains TBD.<\/p>\n

And that TBD needs to turn into praise within the next two years.<\/p>\n

The Cam Thomas saga dragged out ad nauseam and the fans are in for another long one (we think) \u2014 ESPN projects<\/a> them to win 23 games this upcoming season \u2014which doesn\u2019t sound far fetched and it keeps expectations low. The way they like it.<\/p>\n

If Year 1 was about hiring a good coach, then Year 2 must be the season they lay the foundation.<\/p>\n

Sean Marks selected a record-high five first-round picks. The draftees, four of five who claim citizenship from different countries, are very young and predominantly guards who can play multiple positions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe scouting work that we\u2019ve done on these guys throughout not just this year but leading up to this year would lead us to believe it\u2019s a versatile class, right? They can play multiple positions. As Jordi just mentioned, multiple ball\u2011handlers,\u201d Marks said at the rookies\u2019 press conference in June.<\/p>\n

It might work. It might not. It\u2019s too early to tell but it\u2019s certainly unique.<\/p>\n

Yet, it\u2019s the reality \u2014 a seemingly long rebuild that\u2019s focused on players who won\u2019t have the egos to challenge the team-first mentality the Nets are hoping to instill. Can it revamp an organization with low expectations? Sure. Does it win championships? Only with superstars.<\/p>\n

Team-first, position-less ball under a competitor like Jordi Fernandez seems like a good bet to take, but the players, specifically the ones they drafted this season, will determine the fate of this organization in the short-term and long-term.<\/p>\n

Those are the names that need to be the cornerstones of the organization, be it in a short amount of time or in a couple of years. None are older than 21. Four play similar positions. Skepticism from the fanbase is justified \u2014 the \u201clittle brother\u201d has endured a long history of defeat and disappointment \u2014 and of the five, only one, Wolf, was taken lower than draftniks projected.<\/p>\n

February 18 will mark 10 years since Mikhail Prokhorov and the previous regime hired Sean Marks as the new general manager of the Nets. Since that day, the Nets have one playoff series win to their name \u2014 two total since moving to Brooklyn. That doesn\u2019t include the six-year drought from 2007-13.<\/p>\n

To give Marks his due: the Nets were a spiritless disaster, fittingly hired during the hours leading up to the 2017 NBA Trade Deadline.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what makes this iteration of the rebuild a little more\u2026 tedious. Nets fans expected the worst during the last one \u2014 they were a bad team with no picks, no cap space, no direction and no spirit. The \u201cempty cupboard\u201d rebuild lasted only three years when it was expected to last way longer.<\/p>\n

Perhaps, Nets fans were spoiled. This subsequently leads up to where we are today, entering the 2025-26 season with the notion that it\u2019s a clean slate, but that can be perceived as a misconception.<\/p>\n

The Nets lost 50 games two seasons back even though they were trying to win games. The Nets were a chicken running without its head, attempting to recover from the catastrophe that was Brooklyn\u2019s Big Three falling apart.<\/p>\n

The team last year had their moments, yet there weren\u2019t many players who developed and drawing the eighth pick wasn\u2019t good enough to justify yet another strenuous season.<\/p>\n

As Lucas Kaplan said after the draft: The Brooklyn Nets have left us with more questions than answers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The list of questions have only grown.<\/p>\n

Why so many guards? Did they reach at the Draft? What\u2019s going on with Drake Powell\u2019s knee injury? What\u2019s going to happen with Cam Thomas?<\/p>\n

Hopefully there will be some clarity on all fronts at Media Day.<\/p>\n

This was a summer of the homegrown Brooklyn Net. The first team to ever draft five players in the first round of a draft. But their best scoring homegrown player, perhaps in Sean Marks\u2019 tenure, got low-balled amid an extremely difficult restricted free agent market. Losing him for nothing would be disgraceful, yet it feels inevitable.<\/p>\n

As Net Income wrote in the OSR: \u201cThomas will (likely) be the fifth straight 20-point scorer to leave the Nets, joining James Harden, Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant, Mikal Bridges.\u201d<\/p>\n

They have 10 guards entering camp. Four of five draft picks are guard\/forwards. Is Thomas going to be sitting half a basketball game because the Nets are prioritizing young players? What determines success for one of these rookies if Thomas\u2019 contributions weren\u2019t enough? The CBA is going to be the same. My guess is their chase for a FIBA-version of the NBA, guys who play fast, play multi-positions, and subsequently players who make decisions quickly and efficiently.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t that every GM and coach\u2019s dream, though?<\/p>\n

Marks said it in June<\/a>: \u201cIt\u2019s 0.5-second basketball, you catch and make a decision. You don\u2019t hold the ball. It\u2019s also where the NBA is going: guys who can play multiple positions, guard multiple positions, and make it hard on the defense\u201d<\/p>\n

When fully healthy during the 2023-24 season, Cam Thomas had the ball in his hands for 4.03 average seconds per touch<\/a>, fourth-highest on the team behind Dennis Schroder, Spencer Dinwiddie, and Dennis Smith Jr. (min. 20 games played). The top of the list in the NBA included Jalen Brunson, Trae Young, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Scoring guards.<\/p>\n

We can speculate all we want but it would probably be best to trade him somewhere suitable<\/a> if there\u2019s no path forward. That\u2019s assuming someone would take him on at the deadline.<\/p>\n

And for culture. Michael Porter Jr. had quite the summer. His sour rhetoric about women and the LGBTQ+ community raised eyebrows and one would have to assume his words were a shock to the Nets, who are co-owned by a woman, Clara Wu Tsai, and the first and only team to roster and play an openly gay NBA player, Jason Collins.<\/p>\n

Will any of it matter when the ball tips off? Hopefully it doesn\u2019t get to that point, but hypocrisy is a tribute vice pays to virtue and the Nets didn\u2019t tolerate anything from the last player that caused serious controversy around the organization.<\/p>\n

Expect that to be a topic at Media Day along with a lot of other things.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, we\u2019ll get a better sense into how they\u2019re thinking and what\u2019s going on with some of the new faces around HSS Training Center. We wouldn\u2019t expect much national coverage around the team. Opposing teams\u2019 fans will probably invade Barclays Center, while anti-tank and pro-tank Nets fans attempt to justify a stance on their fandom\u2026 again.<\/p>\n

The new guys can help rewrite the script on the organization and its missed opportunities. The offseason was supposed to \u201cgo through Brooklyn.\u201d It\u2019s hard to say that confidently with only two picks to show for the salaries\/players they took back.<\/p>\n

A piece like this should sound more optimistic next year. They have cap space and draft capital to build out their team via trade and\/or free agency in 2027. That\u2019s when they\u2019re expected to strike.<\/p>\n

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