Official Caris LeVert Thread

[Mosdefinition]

When the second best player is on the worst non-tanking team in the league, it doesn't mean much.

The cap space was used to pursue RFAs, it didn't work, it's too bad.

LeVert could turn out to be real good.

I agree it doesnt mean much as far as "we will suck either way"

but it still has to be looked at as a botched trade. we traded for cap space and then wasted that cap space. thats not a positive. and "its too bad" doesnt work when you are the GM of a 500 million dollar franchise. maybe if we are playing checkers and you beat me im like "its too bad"... botching a trade when you are already WAAAAY behind has more consequences then "its too bad"

Marks has done nothing. we needed a GM who was going to be able to overcome the situation a bit. he hasnt.

OK, so Thad isn't a very good player. Trading him means having the possibility of landing young players with upside. It didn't happen. But LeVert could end up a better player. What not to like? If he is healthy and can play D it's a good trade.

Ok you say Thad isn't a good player yet a team that will compete for the best team in the east traded for him to be there starting 4

And a team that got to the conference finals tried to trade for him during the season for what was reported as more than the nets got for him when marks did trade him

[Mosdefinition]

They were beyond embarassing offers.... you can be the GM of a super undesireable situation and then offer to pay what everyone else is offering.

thats like if i came you and said id offer you exactly what you make now, only instead of what you do now you havw to cleanup feces all day. of course you say now. but if i offer you 25% more then what you make, maybe you consider it.

marks wants people to clean up feces for what they can make to play elsewhere. thats embarassing.

give me a GM who can get someone to sign despite the situation.

Well, they would still be paid to play basketball instead of cleaning up and it's still New York we are talking about. He offered good money, but the players decided to stay put, it just happens. And for many reasons. On the other hand, why do you want players on the roster who only join this team because of money they couldn't get elsewhere?

To me, embarrassing is what teams like the Lakers did. Signing 30+ and injury prone players to hefty four year deals. This approach takes you nowhere and results in being a treadmill team for years. Marks is spending the money wisely and building a proper foundation with which I'm okay with at the moment. Nothing to be enthusiastic about, but also no reason to continuously bash his skills as a GM. As far as I know, most of the experts rate the Nets offseason as pretty good despite projecting another bad season.

The Lakers don't have there pick this year so like a smart team they went out and signed nba players to put around there 3 young guys

You telling me deng couldn't help the nets that marks couldn't make a bigger offer

Brooks back up is a guy who was out of the league that's effing insane

[kamaze]

KC Retweeted
NetsDaily.com ‏@NetsDaily 2m2 minutes ago

Marks talked about Bennett playing some 5 in small ball lineup. Atkinson talked about Lin and Vasquez playing together.
1 retweet 0 likes

[jbeachboy]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

[Net Sentence]

That doesn't indicate anything.

NO ONE WANTS TO PLAY FOR THE **** ING NETS!!

YOU are the one who thinks that we had a shot at every FA and their mother would sign here. You were the one saying DURANT's name in threads leading up to free agency for months, as if that was even remotely feasible.

Look at the names you're getting upset about.

And Al Horford was never coming here. You're being either delusional or dishonest. Yeah, it would been great to sign them but oh well. Marks' failure was not being able to get a decent return on value with the Young trade. Otherwise, I'm not holding his feet to the fire because guys don't want to play here.

What, you would have preferred he gave Bazemore or Marvin Williams 94 million dollar deals?

We're not better off. But I'm not going to get mad about people who dont want to play here. The Miami and Portland RFA moves...he tried, and had Pat Riley not played himself and called Dwayne Wade's bluff, Tyler Johnson would be a Net.

No one wants to play for this **** team. Blame Billy King and Mikhail Prokhorov for being idiots over the last 4-5 years.

i understand "no one wants to play for the nets".... but isnt the point of a GM to convince guys otherwise? I mean thats basically their job in free agency as salesman. he couldnt convince those ANY of those guys, and more importantly, his pitches were beyond pathetic, with some embrassing offers that likely come back hurt him once he gets the rep of being tight with money.

i dont get praising a guy for doing nothing just because the expectations were super low. sure, maybe dont hate on him, but the guy has done literally nothing but trade away our second best player for cap space to not use the cap space.

anything but a D+ or lower grade for marks is bananaland.

He warned us before free agency it would be hard to get free agents to come here... With the team's reputation and not having draft picks what he's doing; signing a bunch of projects and hoping one or more of them work out; is a start. I applaud him for at least having a game plan that makes sense.

Yeah it's called a built in excuse. I called it then and I was right. Im not throwing a pity party for Marks. He needs to produce if he has an executive position. Locking up all his cap space into 2 restricted free agents is just as irresponsible as King trading our draft picks in the Boston trade. It was an "all your eggs in one basket" approach and he missed out on the rest of the good free agents because of it. You dont get credit for having a gameplan. I dont want to hear about the pie in the sky, I want to see the slice on my plate.

Can't knock him for the Thad trade before the paint dries we haven't even seen what this team might look like in the future. He's stuck between a rock an a hard place what did people expect him to build with a capped out roster? He had to move a contract for flexibility.

It's not his fault we're still paying Deron Williams and had to waive Joe Johnson (should've traded him sooner) nor is it that we only have ONE 1st round draft pick the next 3 years and it's a swap with a playoff team. Curse out Billy King and ownership they dragged this franchise through the mud.

What does any of that have to do with not being able to leverage 55mil, which includes DWill's dead money, into a couple of NBA starters. Im not even asking for high level guys, just proven NBA starters. The future starts now and we are going to be unwatchable this year. Everything Marks did could have been done while also keeping Thad. You dont think the Hornets would have taken Bogs over Bellinelli with the 22nd pick? They tried to get Bogs last year so you know they had interest. He didnt even have to do that because no site had LeVert listed as a 1st rounder. Marks jumped the gun on the pick just like he jumped the gun on the trade.

[kamaze]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

About Anthony Bennet

NetsDaily.com Retweeted
Bryan Fonseca ‏@BryanFonsecaNY 7h7 hours ago

"He's a guy, we've got to build up in confidence -- I think because he's been torn down a little but -- we've got to build him up again."
1 retweet 5 likes

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

[Net Sentence]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

About Anthony Bennet

NetsDaily.com Retweeted
Bryan Fonseca ‏@BryanFonsecaNY 7h7 hours ago

"He's a guy, we've got to build up in confidence -- I think because he's been torn down a little but -- we've got to build him up again."
1 retweet 5 likes

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

[kamaze]

i understand "no one wants to play for the nets".... but isnt the point of a GM to convince guys otherwise? I mean thats basically their job in free agency as salesman. he couldnt convince those ANY of those guys, and more importantly, his pitches were beyond pathetic, with some embrassing offers that likely come back hurt him once he gets the rep of being tight with money.

i dont get praising a guy for doing nothing just because the expectations were super low. sure, maybe dont hate on him, but the guy has done literally nothing but trade away our second best player for cap space to not use the cap space.

anything but a D+ or lower grade for marks is bananaland.

He warned us before free agency it would be hard to get free agents to come here... With the team's reputation and not having draft picks what he's doing; signing a bunch of projects and hoping one or more of them work out; is a start. I applaud him for at least having a game plan that makes sense.

Yeah it's called a built in excuse. I called it then and I was right. Im not throwing a pity party for Marks. He needs to produce if he has an executive position. Locking up all his cap space into 2 restricted free agents is just as irresponsible as King trading our draft picks in the Boston trade. It was an "all your eggs in one basket" approach and he missed out on the rest of the good free agents because of it. You dont get credit for having a gameplan. I dont want to hear about the pie in the sky, I want to see the slice on my plate.

Can't knock him for the Thad trade before the paint dries we haven't even seen what this team might look like in the future. He's stuck between a rock an a hard place what did people expect him to build with a capped out roster? He had to move a contract for flexibility.

It's not his fault we're still paying Deron Williams and had to waive Joe Johnson (should've traded him sooner) nor is it that we only have ONE 1st round draft pick the next 3 years and it's a swap with a playoff team. Curse out Billy King and ownership they dragged this franchise through the mud.

What does any of that have to do with not being able to leverage 55mil, which includes DWill's dead money, into a couple of NBA starters. Im not even asking for high level guys, just proven NBA starters. The future starts now and we are going to be unwatchable this year. Everything Marks did could have been done while also keeping Thad. You dont think the Hornets would have taken Bogs over Bellinelli with the 22nd pick? They tried to get Bogs last year so you know they had interest. He didnt even have to do that because no site had LeVert listed as a 1st rounder. Marks jumped the gun on the pick just like he jumped the gun on the trade.

So don't watch..I think you expected too much he did what he could and he's not done yet.

"I don’t know that we’re ever done. We’re going to look and see what else is out there. we’re going to continue to scout and scour and see what other teams are doing, what other leagues around the world are doing, how the olympics are going. We’re going to have three guys down there, I’ll be going to be with them. But we’ll just see. We’ll keep all our options alive"

[DeRoma]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

About Anthony Bennet

NetsDaily.com Retweeted
Bryan Fonseca ‏@BryanFonsecaNY 7h7 hours ago

"He's a guy, we've got to build up in confidence -- I think because he's been torn down a little but -- we've got to build him up again."
1 retweet 5 likes

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

How can you say that his desire or ambition is low when it's been known that he made a lifestyle change on building his body.

[jbeachboy]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

About Anthony Bennet

NetsDaily.com Retweeted
Bryan Fonseca ‏@BryanFonsecaNY 7h7 hours ago

"He's a guy, we've got to build up in confidence -- I think because he's been torn down a little but -- we've got to build him up again."
1 retweet 5 likes

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

he said he has been drinking water the past year and is doing 2 a days, but is struggling with flights candy, is that airplane candy, said he is lowering it.! i love your optimism for anthony bennett, a guy we signed for 2 years being cut in training camp! lol

[Mosdefinition]

scola, bennett, and even booker may play center at times.

About Anthony Bennet

NetsDaily.com Retweeted
Bryan Fonseca ‏@BryanFonsecaNY 7h7 hours ago

"He's a guy, we've got to build up in confidence -- I think because he's been torn down a little but -- we've got to build him up again."
1 retweet 5 likes

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

I'd rather they brought Thomas Robinson back over him

That was a 1980s-90s nj nets move trying to make a reclamation project out of a high drafted stiff

[Net Sentence]

About Anthony Bennet

I'm keeping my expectations looooooooow on/Bennet but yeah they want players to play more than one position.

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

How can you say that his desire or ambition is low when it's been known that he made a lifestyle change on building his body.

How many "best shape of his life" articles do you see in the offseason. He is Jamarcus Russell to me.

[kamaze]

He's got a point there being in shape in the off season doesn't mean anything it's time to show and prove.

[DeRoma]

I wouldnt be surprised to see Bennett cut in camp. Guy has no desire. No ambition. I hate his signing.

How can you say that his desire or ambition is low when it's been known that he made a lifestyle change on building his body.

How many "best shape of his life" article do you see in the offseason. He is Jamarcus Russell to me.

Doesn't matter you are saying this guy has no drive to play in the NBA but there he is doing the actions to put himself in the best position to succeed in the NBA. The Nets aren't asking him to be the the number 1 draft pick he was projected to be. We are just asking him to have a role in our team. Which is a good enough signing for a guy who has a number 1 draft pick talent. It was a good gamble and signing no matter how you want to pan it out. He is a bench player in the projected line-up, he has an opportunity to grow in the team, he has great upside to be a much better player the Nets expected him to be.

[Net Sentence]

How can you say that his desire or ambition is low when it's been known that he made a lifestyle change on building his body.

How many "best shape of his life" article do you see in the offseason. He is Jamarcus Russell to me.

Doesn't matter you are saying this guy has no drive to play in the NBA but there he is doing the actions to put himself in the best position to succeed in the NBA. The Nets aren't asking him to be the the number 1 draft pick he was projected to be. We are just asking him to have a role in our team. Which is a good enough signing for a guy who has a number 1 draft pick talent. It was a good gamble and signing no matter how you want to pan it out. He is a bench player in the projected line-up, he has an opportunity to grow in the team, he has great upside to be a much better player the Nets expected him to be.

Was he not in the NBA already? He is suppose to keep himself in shape. It reminds me of the chris rock skit.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0B_ekSrsEk[/youtube]

[MrDollarBills]

Wake me up when Marks makes a good move. All this praise for a guy who is throwing away this year because he cant close.
- Couldn't close Sergio Rodriguez
- Couldn't close on the trade for Calderon
- Couldn't close on Jared Dudley
- Couldn't close on Marvin Williams
- Couldn't close on Jamal Crawford
- Couldn't close on Kent Bazemore
- Couldn't close on Al Horford

Don't try to spin it that we are better off without any of these guys. These were all guys Marks targeted and failed on. I didn't even include the 3 RFA he wiffed on in Crabbe, TJ and Powell. Marks is awful at his job.

That doesn't indicate anything.

NO ONE WANTS TO PLAY FOR THE **** ING NETS!!

YOU are the one who thinks that we had a shot at every FA and their mother would sign here. You were the one saying DURANT's name in threads leading up to free agency for months, as if that was even remotely feasible.

Look at the names you're getting upset about.

And Al Horford was never coming here. You're being either delusional or dishonest. Yeah, it would been great to sign them but oh well. Marks' failure was not being able to get a decent return on value with the Young trade. Otherwise, I'm not holding his feet to the fire because guys don't want to play here.

What, you would have preferred he gave Bazemore or Marvin Williams 94 million dollar deals?

We're not better off. But I'm not going to get mad about people who dont want to play here. The Miami and Portland RFA moves...he tried, and had Pat Riley not played himself and called Dwayne Wade's bluff, Tyler Johnson would be a Net.

No one wants to play for this **** team. Blame Billy King and Mikhail Prokhorov for being idiots over the last 4-5 years.

i understand "no one wants to play for the nets".... but isnt the point of a GM to convince guys otherwise? I mean thats basically their job in free agency as salesman. he couldnt convince those ANY of those guys, and more importantly, his pitches were beyond pathetic, with some embrassing offers that likely come back hurt him once he gets the rep of being tight with money.

i dont get praising a guy for doing nothing just because the expectations were super low. sure, maybe dont hate on him, but the guy has done literally nothing but trade away our second best player for cap space to not use the cap space.

anything but a D+ or lower grade for marks is bananaland.

Who is praising him? I'm merely stating that you and NS are pretty irrational with your take on this. i kicked Marks' back in for the Young trade because it was a horrible return on value unless LeVert becomes the steal of the draft.

I mean you guys believed the Nets could land meetings with Durant and Lebron months ago. You raged about Thad being resigned a year ago because you believed it hindered us from being able to offer two max deals (to Durant and Lebron of all people) and I and others kept saying, if the team stinks no one will want to sign here. I told you last season when the Knicks were left holding the bag because they were rebuked by all the other FAs that the same thing would happen to the Nets and it did.

It has nothing to do with embarrassing offers, or weak pitches. You weren't privy to any negotiations. Also, Williams and Bazemore had more than us courting them and they still stayed home. Offering C tier players 70+ mil isn't being tight with money. Doing poison pill contracts or offering 74 mil for allen crabbe isn't a sign of being tight with money. at first i was nervous but then i saw what was put out there my fears about being tight with money were alleviated. Unless you want to sit here and justify why the Nets should have offered those two guys 85-95 mil total, I am not going to blame the GM because we're an undesirable destination right now.

You were ecstatic when the Thad trade was made. Then all of a sudden reality hits and you can't deal with it. I told you months ago and I was proved right. You guys were in denial about how much the money mattered and the appeal of the Nets to free agents. That's not Marks' fault, its your fault for not being remotely realistic.

[MrDollarBills]

i understand "no one wants to play for the nets".... but isnt the point of a GM to convince guys otherwise? I mean thats basically their job in free agency as salesman. he couldnt convince those ANY of those guys, and more importantly, his pitches were beyond pathetic, with some embrassing offers that likely come back hurt him once he gets the rep of being tight with money.

Pathetic pitches? There is zero information about his pitches or did you actually attend his free agency meetings?
Embarrassing offers? Well, agents of Tyler Johnson and Allen Crabbe disagree. I guess the other player's agents as well when their clients eventually took less money to stay on their team.

They were beyond embarassing offers.... you can be the GM of a super undesireable situation and then offer to pay what everyone else is offering.

thats like if i came you and said id offer you exactly what you make now, only instead of what you do now you havw to cleanup feces all day. of course you say now. but if i offer you 25% more then what you make, maybe you consider it.

marks wants people to clean up feces for what they can make to play elsewhere. thats embarassing.

give me a GM who can get someone to sign despite the situation.

Like WHO?

NAME FOR THE GM OF ANY TEAM THAT HAS GOTTEN TALENT TO SIGN AFTER A BOTTOM 3 SEASON

Go on. and don't mention Lebron to Cleveland either.

[ChokeFasncists]

OK, so Thad isn't a very good player. Trading him means having the possibility of landing young players with upside. It didn't happen. But LeVert could end up a better player. What not to like? If he is healthy and can play D it's a good trade.

i was all for the thad trade... lvoed it... but i assumed marks wouldnt waste the cap room on F tier scrubs like hamilton and booker. but he did. making the trade a monumental failure as that money was needed to upgrade the wings. only he got no wings.

Well, one takes risk, it doesn't necessarily pan out. He targeted TJ and Crabbe, was not far from getting them. He obviously doesn't want to just add some players, otherwise he would have gone after Harkless, Waitors, Lance and Leonard. We still don't know how the wings on the roster are gonna do. Who knows?

Levert is irrelevant. trade was about the cap space. he is a minor throw in and a longshot to be mroe then a role player

How can you be so sure?

Can a case be made that the Spurs were merely trying to get cap space by unloading George Hill on the Pacers?

I think he has lottery talent, but dropped cuz of his injuries. Since his surgery was actually done by the Nets specialist, that means we have inside knowledge, according to the specialist, he foot should be fine if they take it slow.

“Thaddeus is a heck of a player, he’s been a starter in this league,” Atkinson said. “But I think our mindset was we’re looking down the line a little bit, looking into the future, we really wanted to get into the draft, we wanted to get a young piece that we thought could help us going forward. … It was difficult giving up a guy that started in this league, there’s no doubt about it, but I think we’re looking down the line.”

http://blogs.northjersey.com/nets-nation/nets-explain-why-they-traded-for-caris-levert-1.1627324

You're saying he's lying or something?

[ChokeFasncists]

I agree it doesnt mean much as far as "we will suck either way"

but it still has to be looked at as a botched trade. we traded for cap space and then wasted that cap space. thats not a positive. and "its too bad" doesnt work when you are the GM of a 500 million dollar franchise. maybe if we are playing checkers and you beat me im like "its too bad"... botching a trade when you are already WAAAAY behind has more consequences then "its too bad"

Marks has done nothing. we needed a GM who was going to be able to overcome the situation a bit. he hasnt.

OK, so Thad isn't a very good player. Trading him means having the possibility of landing young players with upside. It didn't happen. But LeVert could end up a better player. What not to like? If he is healthy and can play D it's a good trade.

Ok you say Thad isn't a good player yet a team that will compete for the best team in the east traded for him to be there starting 4

And a team that got to the conference finals tried to trade for him during the season for what was reported as more than the nets got for him when marks did trade him

Oh no, I think he's a good player, just not a VERY good player. He's definitely a capable starter, just not a 2nd best player on a very good team.

[ChokeFasncists]

He didnt even have to do that because no site had LeVert listed as a 1st rounder. Marks jumped the gun on the pick.

GMs work under the radar a lot. Sites aren't completely reliable. One doesn't know if another GM wants him. He himself thinks he deserves to be drafted around there.

And only then will the Nets know for sure if it was worth their gamble to trade away a proven starter to move up the draft board and snag LeVert, who was projected as a second round pick on most boards, in the first round.

“You never know, it’s kind of speculation,” Atkinson said. “I don’t know what other teams were thinking. I know where we had him on our board. It was high. I know a lot of teams say [it], but we got our guy. That was a guy we were targeting and we’re thrilled to have him.”

http://blogs.northjersey.com/nets-nation/nets-explain-why-they-traded-for-caris-levert-1.1627324