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Showing posts with label Joe Tsai. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joe Tsai. Show all posts

Nets' Owner, Coach, send mixed messages on tanking plans

NBA.com


 Any organization needs full alignment and a shared vision starting at the top of the organization on down to the players. 

It should comes as no surprise that a rudderless organization for the better part of its existence is having trouble getting on the same page. 

Speaking with Brian Lewis of the New York Post, Nets owner Joe Tsai shared a few concise, but direct thoughts on the upcoming season. 


 After a 2024-25 campaign where the Nets did not truly tank and drew the eight spot in the NBA Draft Lottery, it seems that the plan is clear. 

Well, maybe to everyone but head coach, Jordi Fernandez. 


 The Nets overachieved under Fernandez last season until ill-fated injuries became just too much to overcome. 

Brooklyn is expected to be among the NBA's bottom feeders, but an interesting dynamic will play out between the culture building and compete to the last whistle Fernandez, and the star-starved owner and front office that wants that next marquee young player to land in Brooklyn. 

While Tsai is not alone by declaring his team's intention to have one eye on the NBA Draft Lottery and tank,  his comments are likely fine-worthy as it flies in the face of the competitive landscape Adam Silver is trying to create. 

Perhaps Fernandez is trying to cover for his owner, but it's also possible the young coach loves taking on an immense challenge of taking a roster bereft of top tier talent and playoff experience into league relevance. 

Even large portions of the Nets fan base will root for losses to endure short-term pain for long-term gain. What Tsai and Marks may have overlooked is that folding is not in Fernandez's DNA. 

Good luck tanking with a coach that doesn't seem to be fully onboard with the marching orders from up top. 

Tsai's minority ownership sale to Koch's start of something bigger



 All big things start small. When the New Jersey Nets were owned by YankeesNets LLC in the early 2000's, there was a New York City real estate mogul that threw his hat in the ownership ring.

His name: Bruce Ratner. He's the main impetus for the Nets moving to Brooklyn and he used the deep pockets of then minority owner Mikhail Prokhorov in 2010 to help make it happen two years later.  

Prokhorov made big championship promises and mortgaged the future to chase said dreams. Once that endeavor failed, Prokhorov accomplished his mission of moving his Russian financial assets over to the United States and sold a majority stake in the team to current owner Joe Tsai in 2017. 

Two years later, Tsai took full ownership control and now five years after that has sold a 15 percent stake in the team to Julia Koch of the notorious Koch family for a whooping $6 billion valuation.

Are we sensing a pattern here? 

Anytime the Nets have had a minority owner the last few decades, that said party ends up taking full control of the team.

Expect that with the vast family fortune that the Koch family has amassed that's it's only a matter of time before Tsai sells.

Tsai has multiple business ventures outside of the Nets that command his time and attention. There have been multiple superstars that bailed on the franchise with him at the helm.

I don't think Nets fans would be sad to see him go. Both the Tsai's and Koch's have skeletons in their closets, but the former has had a brutal ownership tenure.

The question is not if, but when there is another ownership change in Brooklyn. 



Bud's eight figure per year contract with Suns shows It was too costly for Nets



 The Brooklyn Nets are a big market team and were a free agent and trade destination going back only a couple of seasons.

Sean Marks opened up the checkbook to sign both Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant to max deals and he emptied the draft cupboard to acquire James Harden. 

Marks, at the request of both of his stars, fired multiple coaches, eating dead salary in all instances. 

Joe Tsai and the Nets hiked season ticket prices by an average of $144 per ticket in the 2022 season, even after trading away James Harden. 

Reportedly, 30 percent of season ticket holders walked away the following season. Then, both Irving and Durant skipped town. 

Barclays Center attendance figures have been rock solid, but one look around the arena and it's clear it's filled with more tourists, casual NBA fans and opposing fans, than Nets fans.

This was the same criticism the Nets faced when playing at the Meadowlands without any mass transit options and outside of New York City.

The Brooklyn Nets are facing an identity crisis and there was one proven head coach with championship experience that could have turned things around in short order. 

That man, Mike Budenholzer, was among the finalists for the Nets job along with Jordi Fernandez and Kevin Young. Ultimately, the Nets financial situation- money tied up in dead contracts and players that don't play in the case of Ben Simmons- precluded them from signing Budenholzer. 

The former Milwaukee Bucks head man received a 5-year, $50 million-plus dollar deal to try to figure out the mess in Phoenix with Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal and Devin Booker. 

Brooklyn took a shot in the dark with a heralded assistant coach with more questions than answers. 

While Budenholzer was head and shoulders above any candidate on the free agent coaching market, it became clear that Tsai was unwilling to dole out an eight figure per year payday given the mess that Brooklyn's former superstars left behind. In fact, Tsai is finalizing a minority sale to members of the Koch family for up to a 15 percent stake in the club with no clear path to majority ownership at this point.

If one thing is clear from the history of the Nets, the nomadic franchise with a rotating carousel of owners, anything is possible as far as ownership changes are concerned and relocation. 


 

Nets are a rudderless ship with no captain in sight

 



Who is the leader of the 2023-24 Brooklyn Nets?

It isn't Spencer Dinwiddie, whose minutes have been shrinking, and body language is showing signs of frustration with limited playing time. 

The same can be said for Cam Thomas, whose answers with the media are becoming shorter by the day as he gets frustrated with losses piling up and his minutes shrinking.

Jacque Vaughn is alienating veteran players and young guys alike as the locker room has been tuning out the coach that is already under siege. 

Sean Marks has not made public comments since before the season started and while owner Joe Tsai has been present a handful of times this season, he's given no clear direction for the franchise. 

All signs point to this being selling season ahead of February's trade deadline for the Nets, but with Mikal Bridges and Cam Johnson as centerpieces, a complete rebuild isn't exactly in the cards.

So, will Marks be able to pick up the pieces from this season, add draft capital, while adding impact rotation players at the same time?

It's proposition and Nets fans have shown they're not exactly the most patient type. Serious doubt has been cast on Vaughn's coaching future with the club, adding to the uncertainty to where exactly this team is headed not only this year but in the seasons to follow.

Marks was in a difficult position when he took over as general manager in 2016 and successfully built an enviable culture that had been destroyed by Brooklyn's first failed Big 3 project. 

While Marks had two superstars in Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant dropped into his lap, and a third force his way out to join Brooklyn in James Harden, none of those pieces remain, just the rubble. 

Many fans have even been clamoring for the team to relocate again and return to New Jersey since the product they're putting on the court is not up to snuff. 

There is no magic sauce or formula that Marks can cook up to fix all these problems, but the first step will be to identify a direction, whether that is retooling, rebuilding, or trying to go big game hunting after available superstars. 

The Nets are currently in NBA purgatory, not holding their own draft picks and they're an afterthought in the Eastern Conference playoff race.

Things have been bad for the Nets before and even bad since the move to Brooklyn, but this season may be a new low for a franchise that has experienced its share of them. 

 

Former Nets exec reflects on Jersey days, move to Brooklyn

 Join Nets Insider's Rick Laughland and BackSportsPage's Randy Zellea as they welcome former New Jersey Nets and Brooklyn Nets executive Fred Mangione on the show. 

Mangione served in roles ranging from Senior V.P of  Ticket Sales to Chief Marketing Officer to Chief Operating Office with the Nets. He started his career with the Nets Organization in 1999 and stayed with the team until 2017.

   

With nearly two decades of experience including: back-to-back NBA Finals runs, a record-setting 12-70 season, an NBA lockout, a move to Brooklyn and redefining the Nets brand, Mangione has seen the good, the bad and the ugly from both the business side and the basketball side of the team.

Mangione oversaw the business operations at three different arenas and spoke to the challenges of growing and maintaining a fan base with all the dizzying changes swirling around the team over the last twenty years and really throughout franchise history. 

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