It’s arduous to inform what’s extra regarding for the Nets: the selections made final summer time or the outcomes they’ve produced on the ground.
Projected to win simply 20.5 video games in 2025-26, few anticipated Brooklyn to be within the playoff dialog, and after falling to 0-6 following Sunday’s 129-105 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, there’s an opportunity the workforce might wrestle simply to fulfill that estimation.
Document apart, the Nets have been anticipated to at the least compete, with defensive-minded head coach Jordi Fernández on the helm, two confirmed scorers in Cam Thomas and Michael Porter Jr. and 5 intriguing rookies within the combine. However by means of six video games, the variety of really aggressive quarters they’ve performed might be counted on one hand.
Fernández began 5 veterans towards Philadelphia, but the Nets nonetheless surrendered 40 first-quarter factors in what grew to become a 24-point loss. Participant growth was imagined to be the group’s prime precedence, however rookies Ben Saraf and Nolan Traoré didn’t see the ground, Egor Demin performed solely quarter-hour, and Drake Powell lasted simply 4 earlier than leaving with an ankle harm.
Regardless of who’s on the ground, the vitality and edge that outlined Brooklyn final season are nonetheless lacking. At this level, it’s arduous to inform the place the issues even begin.
“It’s everything,” Fernández mentioned. “From the lack of attention to the body language, that all goes with energy… I’m asking them to play really hard and to play with purpose, and we’re not doing it… This is group is different than all the groups that I’ve worked with, and we want to create winning habits. And right now, we don’t have them. We’re very far from that.”
Fernández’s frustration was clear, however his gamers echoed the sentiment, saying the accountability in the end falls on them. Final season, Brooklyn’s protection ranked twenty third within the league with a 115.4 ranking. It wasn’t nice, but it surely wasn’t horrible both. Six video games into Yr 2 underneath the identical employees, that quantity has fallen to 128.6, the worst mark within the NBA by a mile.
“I mean, at the end of the day, he’s not the one that’s going out there and having to play defense,” Nic Claxton mentioned. “It’s on us. We got to just lock in on the schemes, lock in, look ourselves in the mirror. I mean, obviously, he’s going take it tough. It’s tough for him, too. He’s a competitor. He wants to win, and nobody wants to start out 0-6. But I feel like it’s on us, too, at the end of the day. All the players.”
The accountability theme ran all through the locker room. Terance Mann agreed that effort and execution, not schemes, are what’s going to decide whether or not issues flip round in Brooklyn this season.
“We’re going to have to or we’re going to keep losing,” Mann mentioned. “So, that’s what coach wants, if we don’t figure out how and have the willingness to do it, then it’s just going to be the same results to be honest. That’s just what it is.”
