Nets are in a ‘similar’ situation to team he took over in 2016
Kenny Atkinson knows a thing or two about what the current Nets are going through.
In 2016, Atkinson took over as head coach of a rebuilding Brooklyn team that wasn’t far removed from the days of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Joe Johnson.
“We just started a bunch of guys, and they made a ton of mistakes, and we basically didn’t win any games,” Atkinson, now head coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers, said before facing the Nets at Barclays Center on Friday night.
“I think Joe Harris. Joe Harris was a disaster his first year. Like, ‘Can this guy play in the league?’ There were plenty of guys in that bucket. We did, however, have the luxury of being able to throw them out there. There is no better path to development than this.
The Nets went 20-62 during the 2016-17 season, but growing pains proved necessary for a young core that included Harris, Caris LeVert and Spencer Dinwiddie.
Brooklyn reached the playoffs in the third season of Atkinson’s tenure.
Atkinson believes today’s Nets, in their second season under head coach Jordi Fernández, are in a comparable situation.
In June’s NBA draft, the Nets became the first team in league history to make five first-round picks — Egor Demin, Ben Saraf, Nolan Traore, Drake Powell and Danny Wolf — and they kept all five players.
The Nets haven’t made the playoffs since 2022-23, the season they parted ways with Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant before the trade deadline.
“It seems similar here, where they’re like, ‘OK, the best way to do this is to take these guys into an NBA game and take their lumps, and they’ll learn.’ And then the second year they’ll get a little bit better, and the third year you hope to be in the playoff race,” Atkinson said. “I think that’s the road map.”
INJURY UPDATES
Powell and Wolf’s debut at the Barclays Center will have to wait.
Both missed Friday night’s home opener with sprained ankles, with Jordi Fernández describing them as day-to-day.
“We are not concerned, but on a daily basis,” Fernández said.
When asked what degree of sprains Powell and Wolf were dealing with, Fernández said, “We’re not grading. »
Wolf also missed the Nets’ season-opening loss at Charlotte with a sprained left ankle, while Powell sprained his right ankle during the fourth quarter of that game after scoring two points in seven minutes.
GAMING SCANDAL
Thursday’s arrests of Chauncey Billups, Terry Rozier and Damon Jones on gambling-related allegations were a topic of discussion during both coaches’ pregame news conferences at the Barclays Center.
“It’s obviously not the news you want to hear,” Fernández said of the scandal. “I think the NBA does a great job every year organizing the game meetings, the rules, etc., because we’re dealing with young players. I think the league has taken the appropriate steps. We support it.”
Billups, the head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers, and Rozier, a guard for the Miami Heat, were both placed on immediate leave of absence by their teams.
Jones, a former player and coach, is not currently employed by any NBA team.
“I’m just going to stay away from that and not comment on it,” Atkinson said. “That’s not my area of expertise.”
LINKED TO HOF
Mr. Whammy is headed to the Hall of Fame.
The Nets mega-fan, real name Bruce Reznick, and his late wife Judy Reznick, who died in 2023, will be added next year to the James F. Goldstein SuperFan Gallery at the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.
Mr. Whammy, 89, has been a Nets season ticket holder for nearly three decades, and his handwritten signs and taunts toward opposing free-throw shooters are a fixture at the Barclays Center.
