Build a Nets Contender

[NyCeEvO]

I think I share the same sentiments as the rest of this board in that we were pretty happy with the moves we made at the beginning of the summer (and for most fans they'd still be happy) but now that 'a team that will go unmentioned' has officially stole the show as having the best off-season in the NBA, we're no longer content with the improvements we've made.

We've all indirectly discussed this in other threads but now I want to see it done with our full intentions on achieving this goal:

Take our current roster and use the rest of the free agency period, 2012-2013 season, and 2013 offseason to make us into a full-fledged title contender!

All cap rules apply.

Come on VC, Speedy, Jeff, JG, drejer, E and the rest of you guys ....take your talents to Brooklyn and be the GM that Mitch Kupchak could never be.

[vincecarter4pres]

Trade for Dwight.

I win!

[NyCeEvO]

^^

[llemon]

Trade for Dwight.

I win!

But do the Nets win?

[enetric]

Trade for Dwight.

I win!

Boo yah!


Or LBJ or Durant would do. Not too picky...lol.

[vincecarter4pres]

I guess I'd settle for some moderate sized 8 team trade that landed us a front court of Love and Chandler while we kept Deron, JJ and Crash.

[PetroNet]

keep the same team

assasinate marshon brooks

championship.

[N Ireland Nets]

Ok ill give it a quick shot and i suck badly at this due to my non basketball background I lose complete reality when attempting trades.

Other than Teletovic being an absolute stud we need to improve our PF position badly.

So first thing I do and only move I make during this season is sign Oden to a 2 year deal for vet min where it doesn't matter if he takes this season off or not and he will get paid. This means when he returns fully rested next season we can give him a test run and if he does well we'd own his early bird rights and match any deal offered to him. So roster for this season would be:

Williams / Watson / Taylor
Johnson / Brooks / Bogans
Wallace / Shengelia / Stackhouse
Teletovic / Hump / Evans
Lopez / Oden

Then once the season ends we trade Hump to the Bulls for Boozer & a pick saving them $20.1m off their salary.

After that move I would ring Portland and offer Lopez, Brooks & 2 1st round picks for Aldridge. If that doesn't interest them I ring them back with an offer of Lopez, Teletovic, Brooks & 2 1st round picks. If that doesn't work I'd throw in another 1st rounder to hopefully seal the deal.

Portland would have a very solid young team:

Lillard
Matthews / Brooks
Batum
Teletovic
Lopez / Leonard

With 3 1st round picks ontop of their own selections.

This would mean the Brooklyn Nets roster going forward after signing Bogdanovic through his NBA opt out and offering him the mini mle:

Williams / Watson / Taylor
Johnson / Bogdanovic
Wallace / Shengelia
Aldridge / Boozer
Oden /

Fill out the roster with smart vet moves but thats the team going forward. Obviously the team depends hugely on getting Oden fit but sure lets send him to Germany to get the old Kobe treatment and go for it. We'd need to be careful with Oden's minutes and play Aldridge quite a bit at center with Boozer at PF and sign a good vet back up center but I think Oden could return and play very well with his rest.

This is a huge longshot but outside of Teletovic, Shengelia or even Lopez turning beast mode, we're not contending for a while. So hope and pray Teletovic shows us the way!!!

[Keith Van Horn]

I like the Nets roster a lot, I just think Hump and draft picks needs to go for either:

1. Al Horford or Joakim Noah (both of these guys I think would fit so well with Lopez so I have them tied)
2. Nene
3. Josh Smith

I think securing another big is still critical too.... and I think NIN is onto something with Oden.

A roster like this could definitely become the #2 in the East.


Williams / Watson / Taylor
Johnson / Brooks / Bogans
Wallace / Toko / Stack
Horford or Noah / Teletovic / Evans
Lopez / Oden

But I don't think Noah would be had for Hump and just picks... I think either Brooks or Taylor would have to go, and hopefully it would be Taylor if the Bulls are still in need of a point guard to help fill in for Rose if he's still struggling with back injuries or his leg. I believe Brooks is going to do very well with us this season in a "6th man quick scoring help" off the bench and a really potent "pure offense" lineup with something like Williams/Brooks/Johnson/Teletovic/Lopez.

[enetric]

What are defining as contender. If its to be the best of the rest in the east....sure we can make a move here or there and get there. But if contender means...build a team that legitimately can beat a healthy Miami, OKC or LA in the playoffs? Then lets be honest. Aldridge, Josh Smith, Kevin Love or any of the other so called all stars that arent UBER stars fail to get it done.

Its a superstars league in general and in 30 years the only time a team can even give a superstar a run ofr its money is:

1- Luck...that other team has injuries or inner conflict.

2- Elite defense.

We cant control one and we dont have nearly enough of the other to qualify as an ELITE defensive team. Not that we couldnt be solid....but no way elite. Add to the fact that its superstars league...we are in the era of the UBER team. Where top 10 NBA players are joining other top 15 players. So who is left? We have one.

LBJ, Wade, Kobe, Dwight, Durant and Paul are spoken for. And I take all of these 6 before Deron personally.

Feel free to debate who the other 3 are and hell if I can figure out how the hell any of them come to us or even if any of them make a dent. Then the obvious that several of the best of the rest are PG and a couple of the bigger names are up there in years.

Rose? Westbrook? Rondo? Bosh? Aldridge? Melo? Amare? Dirk? Love?

I sure hope we have Manu and Parker among our young Euros. Even then...going to be tough to compete with the teams that have been built in this league.

You know, I wonder if Riley considered offering Bosh for Dwight. Wouldnt that have been wild?

[llemon]

keep the same team

assasinate marshon brooks

championship.

Yes, the only thing between the Nets and a Title is Marshon.

Petro, now read that back to yourself and realize how STUPID that sounds.

[therealbig3]

I think acquiring Josh Smith while somehow keeping Deron/JJ/Wallace/Lopez would make us a contender. We'd have a starting 5 that could go toe to toe with anybody's. The only starting 5s in the league that could match that would be the Heat (probably not) and the Lakers. I only mention the Heat, because when Wade is healthy, they have the two best players in the league imo.

[NyCeEvO]

The fact that Prokhorov re-iterated the idea that he's not paying to build a playoff team, but a championship team makes me feel like we're going to force something to happen, whether it hurts us in the end or not.

I'm going to give this a go in a bit, but I need to do some prep research first.

[enetric]

I agree with you NYC. Great point.

But I dont think its Proky as much as I think its Billy Isiah King. His style is to do something at all times even if its the wrong thing. Proky's money and absentee ownership style simple empowers him as I see it.

[vincecarter4pres]

It is a very good point, so then it comes down to, what can we force?

If Brook winds up looking good not great and Teletovic looks like an offensive assassin, do we wind up doing something questionable like trading Brook for Bogut?

Or are we just talking like trading whatever isn't tied down for another awful contract or trading some of our slim remaining assets for a player who doesn't fit and could become a disaster as soon as the 13-14 season like Zach Randolph, Al Jefferson or somehow even Amar'e?

What is out there to force? There will be something that's for sure lol, I mean this is the NBA and bad deals are abound, both contractually and getting ripped off in trade.

[NyCeEvO]

I agree with you NYC. Great point.

But I dont think its Proky as much as I think its Billy Isiah King. His style is to do something at all times even if its the wrong thing. Proky's money and absentee ownership style simple empowers him as I see it.

That's actually a big reason why I made this thread (and I probably should've stated that in the OP).

I thought it was pretty telling that after we made all of our signings, Proky comes out and says that. Both BK and D-Will believe that this is a playoff team, but we all know it's not a contender.

BK knows that Proky wants a contender and I wanted to see if we all could think of ways that we can become one given our somewhat precarious financial position.

I will say this though and E has hit the nail on the head when he mentioned this in the other thread.

Everyone who is writing up trades where Hump is shipped out for an expiring has it wrong. GMs live to get guys who are expiring asap. They're not looking to trade an expiring for a guy who will expire next year unless it's a big upgrade in talent.

If you want to deal Hump, you actually need to go back and look at the Arenas/Rashard Lewis deal. Both of them were massively overpaid (obviously) and therefore everyone thought they couldn't be dealt.

The Magic wanted to get rid of Lewis (like we do with Hump) but the only way to do that was to take on a player with more years and whose contract was even worse.

If we're including Hump in deals, start looking for players with 3 or more years left on their contract, not 2 years or less. No one is going to give up an attractive expiring for two overpaid years of Hump.

[NyCeEvO]

The easiest deal that gets rid of Humphries and gets us close to contender status would be a multi-team trade for Pau Gasol.

I don't see the Lakers wanting to shed salary unless they try to make a serious play for Kevin Love in 2014

[vincecarter4pres]

Gasol is a bigger pipe dream then Horford.

You don't think he was a deal breaker in the original Dwight deal? That Orlando wanted him going to a 5th team to more assets?

He expires in 2 years just like Hump, they have no motivation to trade him. Love still has 3 seasons left on his deal if were to opt out.

[jeff1624]

I honestly see no way to improve this team unless we were to use Lopez as our main asset.

[ecuhus1981]

1) Trim payroll in order to get under the luxury tax apron, get younger and more defensively sound with THIS 3-way deal, after January 15th

2a) Either S&T Dwight Howard for Varejao/Chandler/Brooks/1sts (something we cannot do unless we are under the apron), or
2b) Trade Varejao/Chandler/1sts for Al Horford

3a) Bring over Eurostash Bogdanovic

4) Sign ringchasers (Kirilenko can get the whole MLE, since we got under the apron)

Williams, Johnson, [Kirilenko], Lopez, Howard
Watson, Bogdanovic, Shengelia, Teletovic, Evans

OR

Williams, Johnson, [Kirilenko] Horford, Lopez
Watson, Brooks, Shengelia, Teletovic, Evans