Nets GM Has His Marks All Over End Of Superstar Era

Al Bello. Getty Images.

Well, I hope Joseph Tsai and Sean Marks are proud of themselves for sticking to their guns when it came to negotiating a contract extension with superstar guard Kyrie Irving, for what they’re about to do to this franchise is unforgivable.

The Nets owner and General Manager, respectively, won their battle—Irving exercised his approximately $37 million player option for the 2022-23 season on Tuesday--but got bludgeoned in the war.

I warned that alienating Irving wouldn’t sit well with his friend Kevin Durant, one of the greatest scorers in NBA history, though I was half-wrong when I predicted he wouldn’t be one to immediately walk into Marks’ office and demand a trade.

Instead, Durant went into Tsai’s office on Thursday and did exactly that, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. Surely Irving will be headed out the door as well, for: a) The Nets organization, from all public utterances and actions, have grown tired of his act, and b): It’s a good bet that Irving has no desire to play for a mediocre, KD-less team with no shot of winning.

Three years to the day of the ‘clean sweep,” where the previously disregarded Nets inexplicably landed Durant, Irving and DeAndre Jordan in free agency and ushered in a new era where Brooklyn would become a real NBA destination, it’s about to be all over.

I’m old enough to remember the Nets selling Julius Erving, an icon whom this small Jewish kid modeled his hairstyle after as opposed to his breathtaking game, to the 76ers just as they were about to enter the NBA, so I’m not about to call this the darkest day in franchise history—but it’s really close. The Nets were set to enter the official start to the league offseason as one of the favorites for next season’s championship and now, no matter what return Marks can garner in trades, they’ll surely return to their more comfortable irrelevant status.

From an amalgam of reports, it seems like the Irving kerfuffle was Marks’ doing, with Tsai obviously signing off with approval. Marks is still living off the remarkable job he did in rebuilding the team from the depths of the post-Kevin Garnett/Paul Pierce debacle. As soon as the “culture” shifted to one that was star-driven upon their arrival, though, he has been less successful in finishing the job. Brooklyn totaled one playoff series victory in the last three seasons.

Granted, Marks isn’t to blame for the injuries to Irving and James Harden that sabotaged the team in the Milwaukee series last year, or KD’s extra-long toenail that could have eliminated the eventual champs instead of sending Game 7 into overtime, but this past season was an epic disaster, which I’ve recounted many times in this forum.

The decision to ban Irving from all team activities after he refused to take the New York City-mandated COVID-19 vaccine was a principled one, but then they relented in January to allow him to play road games. Combined with KD’s knee injury, the toll it took on Harden led him to force a trade to Philadelphia, where the best Marks could do was acquire another player with reliability issues in Ben Simmons. Overall, the roster was too small and Head Coach Steve Nash had no answers for the bigger Celtics in their four-game sweep in the first round of the playoffs.

Remember, when Marks was looking for a coach two years ago to lead a team prepping for a championship run, he wanted someone with whom he could collaborate, so he snookered Nets fans on Nash, who had never coached from the sideline at any level when he was hired, over more qualified candidates who might have wanted more independence. You have to wonder whether Nash hangs around for this.

KD, who has four more years on his max contract that was extended last offseason, reportedly wants to be dealt to Phoenix, though another dozen or so teams have probably called Marks with offers. As for Kyrie, I shudder to think what the Nets will become if Russell Westbrook is the return from the Lakers. Can you picture the spacing in a Simmons/Westbrook backcourt? Yuck.

Westbrook will at least be on an expiring contract, so it should only be one season of such an abomination. After that, Marks can go back to his comfort zone of rebuilding a decimated team. I hope he’s satisfied, because Nets fans have every right to be livid.