NetsDaily Off-Season Report - No. 3
Photo by G Fiume/Getty Images
We’ll be updating the Nets’ off-season weekly, with bits and pieces of information, gossip, and everything in between to help fans get ready for ... whatever. The dog days of the offseason have begun. We are two weeks removed from Brooklyn introducing their new head coach, Jordi Fernández, in a joyous event at HSS Training Center, a last-day-of-school type of feel for media, a couple players, and coaches.
We are also a week removed from Juwan Howard being revealed as Brooklyn’s final front-of-bench assistant coach behind Fernández, joining Steve Hetzel and the incumbent Jay Fernandez. Out are Kevin Ollie and Will Weaver, who would have had to accept demotions to remain in the borough.
We also noted that Brooklyn’s performance team may undergo a shake-up this offseason, according to multiple sources. And while there are no details on these potential moves yet, it is worth noting that Joe and Clara Wu Tsai’s other basketball team, the New York Liberty, made similar moves in their recent offseason, confirmed by multiple sources.
Now, however, it is time for sleeping dogs to sleep, or at least watch the remainder of the NBA playoffs in silence. News may get scarce this time of year, as the offseason fully sinks its teeth into the non-contenders of the league. Though with the Brooklyn Nets, you never know.
Draft Sleeper of the Week
While there’s been no word on the Brooklyn Nets’ draft plans since Sean Marks maintained his team could trade for a pick nearly two weeks, ago, we can assume Brooklyn has entered the final phases of constructing their big board. It has now been three weeks since the Nets played their last game of the season, a loss to the Philadelphia 76ers on April 14, and executives and scouts alike are returning to the office.
“If there’s somebody in there that, ‘wow, they’re slipping,’ can we get in there at that particular pick? That would be important for us ... for us this year, it’s gonna be more strategic,” said Marks at Jordi Fernández’s introductory press conference. “It’s about ,like, ‘Is the player available at that pick? How do we get in there?’ So, those conversations will be happening relatively soon and they’ll be happening all the way up until on the clock.”
We’ve mentioned a team like the Indiana Pacers, who own the no. 36, 49, and 50 picks, as a potential trade partner, though Marks also left the possibility of trading into the first-round open.
In any case, one player Brooklyn could keep an eye on, should he slide toward or into the second round, is Cal’s Jaylon Tyson, a 21 year old who just made All Pac-12 First Team for the California Golden Bears in his junior season. Here’s a whole bunch of his highlights courtesies of No Ceilings:
Tyson operates somewhere between wing and guard territory — despite being 6’7”, 35% of his possessions this season came as the ball-handler in a pick-and-roll setting.
He posted a fat 30% usage rate at Cal, turning it over 3.1 times a games, but his shooting splits were noting to scoff at. Reasonably efficient from all areas of the floor, he shot 59% at the rim, 42% from the mid-range, and 36% from three on a steady diet of pull-ups. In his sophomore season at Texas Tech, he shot 40% on far more catch-and-shoots.
Tyson doesn’t scream Nets prospect, given that he attended three schools during his three-year college career — not a value judgment in the portal era , but look at Brooklyn’s track record — though his positional size is intriguing.
But, once again, even though Sean Marks has made a trade affecting the Nets’ draft position in six of the eight drafts he’s overseen — including six straight, each of the six came within 48 hours of the main event. We will have a while to contemplate the possibilities.
Cleveland Cavaliers, Donovan Mitchell advance to second round
Yep, this one gets its own section. Donovan Mitchell’s contract is only guaranteed for one more season, and the rumors have been persistent and loud that he will not accept his player option with the Cleveland Cavaliers for the 2025-26 season. Thus, the trade whispers are becoming murmurs, and ESPN’s Brian Windhorst has been calling the Nets a potential destination for the New York kid since December.
And before Game 7 of Cleveland’s first round series against the Orlando Magic, Terry Pluto of Cleveland.com wrote that Mitchell was feeling “physically beat up and emotionally drained” heading into the series’ deciding game.
Cavs GM Koby Altman has reportedly been stubborn in his stance against trading Mitchell until the last possible moment, but, I mean, you can see where this might be headed, right. A tired, injured, frustrated team potentially about to lose in the first-round for the second straight year when the bar is much higher. Mitchell scoring 50 points in a Game 6 loss, followed by that report, about two tiers softer than outright calling him “unhappy,” and then, a double-digit deficit to Orlando at halftime of Game 7.
And the Cavs looked soft, particularly outside of Mitchell. If you wanted the 27-year-old to hit the trade market immediately, this would have been the perfect script to get it done. But then...
Donovan Mitchell answered the call for the Cavs in Games 6 & 7 pic.twitter.com/RSL3lYfqB8— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) May 5, 2024
The Cavaliers came roaring back behind Mitchell’s 39 points on a less-than-100% knee (a recurring problem in his career) to advance to face the Boston Celtics in the conference semis. Perhaps this doesn’t change Cleveland’s long-term outlook, or Brooklyn’s desire to trade for Mitchell, or his own desire to move back to the East Coast.
But the Cavaliers have avoided the DEFCON 1 scenario for their 2023-’24 season, by the skin of their teeth. Just something to keep an eye on.
Nic Claxton decision looms
There is no news on the Nic Claxton front. He’s not alone here; the NBA world is still generally focused on the playoffs, as we’re just one game into the second round, or in other words, a quarter of the way home.
Still, sources indicate that Brooklyn is very confident in their ability to re-sign Clax, even if the annual value on the contract approaches $25 million. But you don’t have to be an insider to read the tea leaves. There was a member of Brooklyn’s social media content team asking Jordi Fernández about Clax at his presser, not to mention Fernández’s consistent praise of the lefty big since taking the job.
There’s also the digital billboards around the Barclays Center continuing to promote Claxton’s Bero fashion line, released in partnership with the Nets (who are also promoting it on their team store’s website)...
by the way, the digital billboards around Barclays are still promoting Clax’s new fashion line pic.twitter.com/MwU1njFp0j— Lucas Kaplan (@LucasKaplan_) May 6, 2024
While re-signing Cam Johnson was a complete sure thing for Marks and his front office last season, Claxton’s situation isn’t too dissimilar.
Jordi Fernández interviews with Catalan TV station
One of Brooklyn’s new head coach’s only media appearances since his hiring came this week with TV3CAT, an international Catalan language TV channel.
Fernández did not delve too deeply into his coaching philosophy, as you’d expect, but re-iterated his excitement to coach the Canadian Senior Men’s National Team at the Olympics this summer. He also discussed the unique relationship he has with his two children being away from home for so much of the year, mentioning he finds great comfort in being home with his family and enjoying, for example, the responsibility of teaching his children Catalan.
Fernández is from Badalona, a town in the Catalan region of Spain, the furthest east in the country. Catalonia, though, is considered an autonomous community of Spain, and has a long history of independence movements that even in the past decade, have seen jailed activists, declarations of breached constitutional law, and state violence.
We have referred to Fernández as both Catalan and Spanish since his hiring, and will likely continue to do so unless he makes it clear he’d prefer otherwise. For what it’s worth, Fernández praised both the “Catalan” and “Spanish” basketball apparatuses in his introductory press conference.
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