This summer, the Brooklyn Nets transformed themselves from pretenders to contenders. However, the transformation came at a steep price. Owner Mikhail Prokhorov has the NBA’s only nine-figure team payroll, which translates to an $87 million luxury tax bill. (He can afford it. He is the NBA’s George Steinbrenner). Nets GM Billy King also mortgaged the future by trading first-round draft picks in 2014, 2016 and 2018 with the right to swap first-round picks in 2017 as part of a trade with Boston
BROOKLYN — Two significant things about today’s Brooklyn Nets news conference — what was said, and what wasn’t said. First, the latter: The word “Knicks” was not mentioned one single time. It would have been like being at a wine-tasting, and uttering the word “Thunderbird.” No bigger sign of disrespect than treating an adversary as though it does not exist. Because in the new world of the Nets, the only other team that merits mention, the only other team that is in
Unpredictable. Chaotic. Climactic. Frenetic. Turbulent. These are just several words to describe Thursday night’s NBA Draft at the Barclays Center in downtown Brooklyn. For the first time in a while, nobody had any idea what was going to happen. And from the first selection down to the humongous blockbuster trade that went down, the theater and drama of the 2013 draft more than made up for the lack of an impact player among this year’s talent pool. With very few surefire
It is not often that you are eating dumplings in Chinatown at 3 a.m. on a Friday morning and learn that Kosta Koufos has been traded, but that true story only just added to the bizzarro nature of the 2013 Draft — the craziest draft night I have ever witnessed in more than 20 years of covering them. [Read more…]
When Brooklyn Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov became the majority owner of the team, he made a promise that raised plenty of eyebrows: the Nets will win a championship in five years. It sounded like an impossible promise for a team that had been so awful ever since the departure of Jason Kidd back in the 2007-2008 season. Slowly but surely, though, Prokhorov made sure that his words would prove to be meaningful by building a new arena to help attract free
The 2013 NBA Draft is here. And, as the future of many NBA hopefuls draws nearer, the NBA front office phones ring with regularity. Many are trying to trade up or trade down in the draft. Some are trying to acquire players. Two of the latter include the Boston Celtics and the Brooklyn Nets, who have been engaged in “advanced talks” for the better part of an hour, to finalize a deal that could send Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett to Brooklyn
We’ve done just about all the coverage you can handle about the Miami Heat and San Antonio Spurs over the past few days, before watching them play a single game against each other. If you missed it, be sure to check out Chris Sheridan’s explanation on why he’s taking the Spurs in 7 in this video, Moke Hamilton’s list of five factors of the series (with staff predictions), and even President Obama’s preparations to watch the final series of the season. That said,
NEW YORK — The quiet demeanor of a champion is unmistakable. His persistence is unassuming. He fights to the end, until the battle is won. When it is, he celebrates… But for a moment. Because then, it is on to the next challenge. The Boston Celtics are champions. The New York Knicks are not, and the unmitigated hubris that the Knicks collectively exhibited heading into Wednesday night’s Game 5—and how the Celtics responded to it—proved that. And you know what? In the long run, the Knicks