The Kidd Era (pre-microfracture)

[Johnny Kilroy]

i'm still amazed how this team gets absolutely zero credit. they owned the eastern conference for two years. It's not like they lost to scrubs in the finals....they went up against three top ten players of all time. obviously no shot against the lakers.....but weren't they up by like 12 in the 4th quarter of game 6 against the spurs? kittles was hot i think and scott sat him down way too long. i also remember the following year, where kidd's knee was finished and the nets had to shut him down just so he could make it in one piece to the playoffs. people are so quick to hype about how great that pistons team was....but the nets pretty much owned that team and still went 7 games with them in the ECF despite kidd playing on one knee. imagine if he was healthy? no one would have remembered the pistons, and even if the lakers didn't implode in the finals and the nets lost, they still would be remembered for three straight trips to the nba finals. i remember everyone knew the microfracture was coming and feared it was all over for kidd, since at the time no one really recovered from that type of surgery. he was never the same, but he became the poster child for coming back and playing at a high level for that injury. i've never seen a team like that one.....just a freak team. they had the fastest players at 1-4 in the league. run, run, run, great athletes, DEADLY on the break, elite D, mentally tough. they never won but they weren't that far off and they would have at least gotten another shot if kidd never became injured in 04. i never thought nash reached kidd's level his first few years in jersey. the impact that kidd had on every one of his teammates was remarkable. i believe it was the highest level of pg play since magic. he was robbed of MVPs because simply because no one gave a **** about the nets. would love to hear some reminiscing from old timers like enetric and jerseyjac (you may remember me as air23cary).

[AVERYbigmistake]

I agree. People love to talk about how the East was weak back then but they NEVER mention who Kidd was playing against.

It's not like he had Amar'e Stoudemire, Shawn Marion, AND Joe Johnson on his team when the Nets were making the finals... The Spurs series is also one that pisses me off to a serious degree. It was actually a fairly close series but because the Nets were swept by a DOMINANT Shaq-Kobe Lakers team everyone just assumes that they were destroyed by the Duncan-Robinson Spurs as well.

That's a series that looking back the Nets could have won were it not for a few brain farts from Byron Scott when it came to defensive assignments and substitutions.

I think what I loved most about the Kidd-Kenyon-Kittles-Keith era was the pure unselfishness that everyone played with.

[vincecarter4pres]

I think Kidd got robbed of the MVP because they weren't going to give it to a wife beater so soon after the incident.

Also, it still kills me inside to know Thorn turned down Kenyon and filler for Sheed the year he went to the Pistons. I think it might have been us in the Finals that year again if we did that trade.

Who really knows though? It's all speculation.

I loved those teams though. The connection with the fans was surreal.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nima3dmLrcw[/youtube]

[Johnny Kilroy]

i don't have a problem with what thorn did, although i do remember kmart was maybe banged up at that time as well? nothing like kidd though, who looked like his knee was being held together with super glue, and that's really all that mattered. i have no doubt that with a healthy kidd they would have no trouble beating a team they swept the previous year, sheed included. instead they lost in 7 games.

that team was just so atypical, i mean there was really no answer for what they did. how do you game plan against stopping the break when their elite defense always fed into it and from 1-4 they had the fastest players in the league? what pf was faster than kmart? what sf could beat RJ down the floor? kittles was usually hyped as the fastest end-to-end player in the game and the famous line about kidd back then was "faster with the ball than without it". they excelled at grinding it out which is why they were so good in the playoffs. kidd was magical back then, i've never seen one player do what he did in jersey.

[NjNeTs1029]

My dad and I got half season tix and tickets to all the playoff games those two years that Kidd brought them to the finals. That team was so much fun to watch. Would run all game, you were guaranteed at least one crazy alley oop pass from Kidd a night. Kenyon was also fun to watch and was good at hyping up the crowd. And Kittles could go off when he got hot. I think looking back they'll be respected more than they were at the time. They were always underrated because the East wasnt that great. But the teams we lost to in the finals were both legendary teams. Kobe and Shaq and the Twin Towers. Plus they took SA to 6 its not like they got killed.

[Shameer1016]

The whole Kidd Era was special and HE DID GET ROBBED for MVP that season. I don't like the way he left this team, but it is what it is. But I we really can't even go against the statement that the East was weak, I don't think there was any team the Nets couldn't dominate in the East, and we made a golden opportunity pass us when we loss to the Pistons, who eventually went on to be Champs. There's really no point on dwelling on something that happened a almost a decade ago

[vincecarter4pres]

Let's not discredit that Pistons team.

They were a top 3 team in the East for years before Sheed and the hands down best team in the East for 3 seasons after they traded for him including that first year.

They also went to back to back Finals and lost in 7 games on the road by single digits in a game that went down to the absolute wire and went to 5 ECF's in a row in total.

That team was boss.

[AVERYbigmistake]

Meh they only beat the Lakers because the Lakers were dysfunctional as hell and Karl Malone went down (if Malone didn't go down the Lakers would have whooped the Pistons Shaq-Kobe drama and all)... Kobe was chucking like there was no tomorrow in that series and Shaq let the likes of Elden Campbell take him out of the game when his team needed him most.

[Johnny Kilroy]

Let's not discredit that Pistons team.

They were a top 3 team in the East for years before Sheed and the hands down best team in the East for 3 seasons after they traded for him including that first year.

They also went to back to back Finals and lost in 7 games on the road by single digits in a game that went down to the absolute wire and went to 5 ECF's in a row in total.

That team was boss.

you want to give them credit then fine. the nets deserve just as much. after all, back to back finals in the east means **** right? new jersey owned the pistons and only lost to them in 04 in 7 GAMES because kidd couldn't run. it would have been a quick series if kidd was healthy.

[xam2k7]

I think Kidd got robbed of the MVP because they weren't going to give it to a wife beater so soon after the incident.

Also, it still kills me inside to know Thorn turned down Kenyon and filler for Sheed the year he went to the Pistons. I think it might have been us in the Finals that year again if we did that trade.

Who really knows though? It's all speculation.

I loved those teams though. The connection with the fans was surreal.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nima3dmLrcw[/youtube]

DUAL tamar slay sightings?? first one at 5:00 haha... video almost brings a tear every time. never forget being there when the stadium erupted after that RJ slam on willis

[vincecarter4pres]

Let's not discredit that Pistons team.

They were a top 3 team in the East for years before Sheed and the hands down best team in the East for 3 seasons after they traded for him including that first year.

They also went to back to back Finals and lost in 7 games on the road by single digits in a game that went down to the absolute wire and went to 5 ECF's in a row in total.

That team was boss.

you want to give them credit then fine. the nets deserve just as much. after all, back to back finals in the east means **** right? new jersey owned the pistons and only lost to them in 04 in 7 GAMES because kidd couldn't run. it would have been a quick series if kidd was healthy.

Breathe easy dude!

All I was saying was don't write the Pistons off as some second rate team that did nothing.

[Shameer1016]

I might be overlooking the Pistons actually, but what Kidd did for and with this team is remarkable and under valued among the world. Mostly Nets fans know just how great Kidd is, and there might never be a PG anytime soon to control a game the way Kidd did. He literally did everything on the floor. I better see a damn Vince Carter and Yi appreciation thread in the near future since we're talking about the previous Nets teams.

[therealbig3]

A healthy Kidd in 04 would have meant we would have been in the Finals instead of the Pistons...and we would have gotten our butts kicked by the Lakers. We just didn't have the personnel to deal with Kobe and Shaq. Who knows, a healthy Kidd could have changed the landscape of the NBA, Kobe and Shaq may have stayed together if they won in 04...

[therealbig3]

Oh and K-Mart was just a flat out beast, I loved him. Wouldn't have done that Sheed trade, like I said, it wasn't Sheed that made the difference, it was Kidd's health.

[BlueDawn]

Sadly, I didn't start watching basketball or the Nets until 04'/05'. I can just live vicariously through other fans about how special those years were lol...

[kasino]

Kidd still is considered the higher all-time than Nash
One of the most complete guards ever

[SteveNets15]

That playoff series vs the Pistons still haunts me to this day every time i think about it.Wish Kidd and Martin were healthy.

[jerseyjac]

The Kidd era, is and will be considered part of the Nets glory days...injuries in the NBA always play a role in missed opportunities and championships teams...By far, no one was faster and fiercer than us...If our game was on, we were about steamrolling, on both ends...

It was all about toughness and guts...

But as a fan of the game, the Pistons were beasts...that takes nothing away from us, only adds to the legacy of the Kidd era...who we played and how we won, and maybe even more importantly, how we lost...

[SpeedyG]

Let's not discredit that Pistons team.

They were a top 3 team in the East for years before Sheed and the hands down best team in the East for 3 seasons after they traded for him including that first year.

They also went to back to back Finals and lost in 7 games on the road by single digits in a game that went down to the absolute wire and went to 5 ECF's in a row in total.

That team was boss.

We still would have taken them with a healthy Kidd though.

[Archerbro]

during the lockout I watched some of the Kidd days with the nets.

Unreal how the lack of credit he gets at times.
So happy he got his ring, 17 years is nearly as old as me.