as much as KD and Kyrie get hated on for their situation, they did expose how dysfunctional the Nets are

[Godymas]

It seems impossible to deny at this point that the Nets are a dysfunctional organization and always have been. You can make-up as many lies about it as you would like but Kyrie was ALWAYS willing to play basketball despite his personal beliefs. Kyrie was always 100% willing to get on the floor and hoop when it came time to be serious. Yes, Kyrie did disappear for those few games randomly, but he finished out the season and played 50-40-90 basketball and almost got the Nets past the Bucks until he got injured.

If the Nets chose to keep politics out of their workplace, if they decided to not "make Kyrie an example" and instead gave him an extension, they could have 100% salvaged the situation. Instead they let their politics ride and disregarded everything that their stars wanted to "prove a point" about their ability to control their team. In some ways their behavior is no different than what corporate management does with "Return to Office" mandates. Essentially saying "we gave you the privilege's of an existence, so you will obey us". It's truly the lowest form of managerial incompetence and tyranny, forcing people to bend the knee off of some forced self belief that you yourself are responsible for the success of the incredibly talented person that chose to work for you.

Anyways, the Nets went on to prove their incompetence when they decided to trade Harden for ANOTHER PLAYER THAT REFUSED TO PLAY FOR THEIR EMPLOYER.

Do you know how hilariously stupid that has to be? You have Kyrie Irving who disappears from the game and does things you don't like and doesn't do his job and you trade the only guy that shows up to work every day in Harden for the OTHER GUY IN THE NBA THAT REFUSES TO SHOW UP TO WORK. Their choice of judgement showcased exactly how awful of an organization they truly are. They talked to Ben Simmons and probably liked his interviews and decided to go for it.

So this clearly upset their two stars which they also proceeded to trade for pennies on the dollar despite knowing that they'd given away all their picks to Houston. They then believed they had the core of a team that was capable of winning despite having literally 0 pieces remaining from their culture building exercise of the 2018-2019 season. Not even a proper head coach. They rode on with Jacques Vaughn and never even bothered to address replacing him? Once again, what is WRONG with this organization? It's like they failed to even understand what made them successful to begin with!?! They may as well have LUCKED into the culture building and fun young team they had for the 2018-2019 season. Then they thought it was a great idea to TEAR IT DOWN??? Didn't they see how Miami built their Big 3? Didn't they see how the Warriors built their superteam? Boston?? What's the common denominator on all these teams!? CULTURE! They had their FRANCHISE PLAYERS. The Nets never wanted to wait around for a FRANCHISE PLAYER.

The saddest thing is if they just extended Kyrie they would have been better off. If they traded away Harden for picks, extended Kyrie and then just diluted Simmons to nice rotation pieces they would be a BETTER TEAM than they are today. Instead they became obssessed with "proving a point" and thought they could see lightning strike twice in the same spot by trading for another franchises young talent hoping that they could eventually save their team. Guess what, THEY FAILED BECAUSE THEY HAD NO IDEA HOW THEY GOT TO THE POSITION THEY WERE IN TO BEGIN WITH.

And now what are they going to do? Trade for Donovan Mitchell? Do they really think ANYONE is going to take on Ben Simmons expiring money?

It's so ridiculous to wonder what was going through Sean Marks and FO's head at the time. I bet it was a constant repetition of "We cannot let them win" because that's probably how they view players.

[OfficialRef]

Everyone in the whole situation was terrible- Players and organization. I probably blame the FO the most but nobody here was a victim except for the fans.

[bfchs123]

I mean they tried to pair the three biggest divas in the league on the same team. To be fair it almost worked if KD had been a few inches back of the three point line.

I don't really blame them because I think 99% of teams would have done it but if you recall when the problems started - they had dug themselves out a huge hole from the Celtics trade, had a fringe but exciting young playoff team. Then gutted the roster to fit the two max contracts and it completely eroded the culture. Would have liked to see what they could have done if they hadn't done the KD/Kyrie deal, at least that was a team the fans could get behind.

They need to blow it up - get what you can for Mikal, Claxton, and maybe Cam Thomas is anyone wants him.

[Tor_Raps]

Nope.. Nets were on a great position to the point that made KD/Kyrie want to join them over a team like the Knicks in the first place.

The Nets royally screwed up by making the Harden trade when they didn't need to. They are back to being horrible with no true path back to success for a long time because of that move.

[Lalouie]

we letting kd and ki off the hook are we?

[mademan]

we letting kd and ki off the hook are we?

I think they went to 2 extremes in dealing with Kyrie. They let him do whatever he wanted and when they realized how stupid that was, they went all the way to the other end and went to war with him. Kyrie is a handful and he has a lot of blame in this, but the OP is right, the Nets ownership and FO were incompetent in dealing with stars.

[JJ_PR]

Kyrie was toxic before arriving to Dallas, I think we can all agree on that.

[Frank Dux]

It’s a players league. It’s all on KD, Kyrie and Harden. They signed there and forced the coach out so they could bring in their own guy. Got Jarrett Allen traded, made sure their washed up bestie Deandre Jordan got paid.

The Nets bent over backwards for these guys and gave them everything they wanted.

[Lalouie]

we letting kd and ki off the hook are we?

I think they went to 2 extremes in dealing with Kyrie. They let him do whatever he wanted and when they realized how stupid that was, they went all the way to the other end and went to war with him. Kyrie is a handful and he has a lot of blame in this, but the OP is right, the Nets ownership and FO were incompetent in dealing with stars.

every team in a bad situation is dysfunctional from the top down by default. bad orgs have no code. the nets are historically bad and thus do historically bad things.

They are who they are. it's in their DNA. the op is only stating the obvious made worse by three or four entitled millionaires. the op is shifting the blame

[ChipotleWest]

Kyrie got way too much hate for pointing to a book that he believed he was true about his ancestory. Even if he's wrong they shouldn't have been allowed to come at a black man like they did. Huge double standard there.

[giberish]

The Nets biggest mistake was letting KD and Kyrie take over as player/GM's.

[Homer38]

It would been a better decision for KD and Kyrie if they would sign with the Knicks back in 2019....Nobody cares about the nets in New York

[Marvin Martian]

Bad take. The Nets did not chose to bring politics into their workplace; outside interests did. Ky was a part time player because of NYC stupid vaccine mandate system. When he shared the video link, Tsai was under pressure to punish him.

The Nets essentially paid for KD's rehab. Allowed him to choose his own players and his own coach, and he responded with only one series win. And then when he got swept by BOS, he proceeded to ragequit right after he signed an extension.

The Nets failed due to bad luck and horrible leadership from KD.

[ChipotleWest]

Bad take. The Nets did not chose to bring politics into their workplace; outside interests did. Ky was a part time player because of NYC stupid vaccine mandate system. When he shared the video link, Tsai was under pressure to punish him.

The Nets essentially paid for KD's rehab. Allowed him to choose his own players and his own coach, and he responded with only one series win. And then when he got swept by BOS, he proceeded to ragequit right after he signed an extension.

The Nets failed due to bad luck and horrible leadership from KD.

Too large of a shoe or he beats the Champions, can't forget that.

Injuries were the biggest part of the bad luck.

Not saying KD is some great leader though he isn't. None of KD Kyrie Harden are leaders.

[JonFromVA]

I'm not buying any of this. Yeah, the Nets might have been able to manage the problems in to a better outcome or even avoided the volatile personalities in the first place; but they wouldn't have to if Irving, Durant, Harden, and Simmons just acted like normal good willed people who actually want to win, not insult fans, or sabotage the organization paying their paychecks.

[dc]

The Nets were in a good spot.

But Kyrie's injury in the 2021 playoffs, the foolish Harden trade and then COVID/vaccine mandate is what torpedoed them.

[Saints14]

From what I remember the Nets had a really good culture before those guys got there, which was partly why they signed

[Reeko]

I don’t think you get credit for exposing dysfunction when you are the dysfunction.

[Statlanta]

Don't bail out Durant and Irving for their corruption and drama. As pointed out the Nets were on a positive trajectory like the Lou Will-Shai Clippers or last year's Thunder with Russell/Atkinson/Allen being the team's leaders.

They shipped out Atkinson and were non-committal their entire run.

[One_and_Done]

They created the dysfunction. The Nets were a happy go lucky team first playoff group before Kyrie arrived to ruin everything.