HomeFeaturesBrooklyn Nets: Being Invisible has its Advantages

Brooklyn Nets: Being Invisible has its Advantages

It wasn’t too long ago when there was a buzz in Brooklyn. With a wardrobe upgrade, a new logo/color scheme and a sparkling arena to call home, there was an element of intrigue about the Nets for the first time in a long time. The rebranding of the team couldn’t have done better and the organization finally appeared to provide the Knicks with legitimate competition in the New York basketball landscape.
Fast forward to the present day, nearly five years later, and it’s never been clearer that the party is over, as reckless trading and spending has left the Nets in one of the worst situations in all of professional sports. Little did everyone know that it would get this bad this quick as Brooklyn went from the eighth-seed in the Eastern Conference in 2014, albeit with 38 wins, to 21 wins and the third-worst record in all of the NBA last year. To matters worse, Norman Oder of the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report blog recently reported that the Nets averaged only 11,622 fans per game last season, which was 23 percent less than the announced official attendance figure. In their first season in Brooklyn, the Nets ranked 16th overall in attendance but a steady decline dropped them to 27th a season ago.
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Per SportsBook.com, the Brooklyn over/under win total for the upcoming season has been set at 18.5, which is six fewer wins than the Philadelphia 76ers’ projected win total. ESPN recently reported the championship odds set by Westgate Las Vegas SportsBook, and it’s no surprise that the Nets are tied with the Phoenix Suns with the worst odds to win the title at 1000-1. Is this a recipe for the Nets to end up with the worst attendance out of the thirty NBA teams? To add insult, a recent trailer for the popular video game NBA 2K17 failed to include the Nets in the preview. For the record, nearly every NBA team was depicted in this two minute video. It’s one thing to be bad, but it’s another to become completely irrelevant.

So with the bleak outlook and little box office appeal heading into the 2016-17, one has to wonder how bad things could get for the Nets from an attention standpoint, both locally and nationally. Yes, Jeremy Lin may possess a large, dedicated fanbase but the power of “Linsanity” can only do so much, right? After all, New York has always been a Knicks town and it doesn’t help matters that their splashy offseason additions just made them much more interesting, even if they aren’t true title contenders.
With all that being said, could being off the grid be exactly what this team needs from a basketball operational standpoint? Brooklyn seems to have the right people in place and considering the circumstances, this could end up being a successful season (relatively speaking) for general manager Sean Marks and head coach Kenny Atkinson. The goal is to begin to build something sustainable and with so little expected and eyeballs looking elsewhere, this reboot figures to go unnoticed… and that’s a good thing.
To hear more from Jonathan Griggs about the Nets, follow him on Twitter @WeMustBeNets.


Hero (Top) Feature Image : © Joe Faraoni / ESPN Images

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