It’s hard to find something that hasn’t been said about the Brooklyn Nets this season. Their 129-109 loss to the Denver Nuggets had just about one thing worth mentioning without using a critical tone: Jeremy Lin making his first appearance in 2017.
Lin has missed most of this season with a couple of hamstring injuries. Meanwhile, what the Nets mostly did was lose and look confused while doing it. Terrible rebounding, atrocious defense, a weird third quarter collapse that keeps happening, while Kenny Atkinson seems to change his rotations a lot more than he should. Meanwhile, almost every player the Nets thought as a piece for the future has let the down. Sean Kilpatrick especially, while Caris LeVert, who had a late start to his rookie year, looks like someone they can at least hope to see get better next season.
The Nets lost their 15th in a row, 24 hours before a visit to the Golden State Warriors. Automatic loss? Anything can happen in basketball, but the likelihood of the Nets ending their losing streak in Oakland against the 48-9 Warriors (the Nets are a mirrored 9-48) is [enter your own pun here]. Lin, if you wondered, it going to play. He started against the Nuggets, and he’ll finish against the Warriors.
And as you might have guessed, this post is about Lin. He didn’t do anything too special: 15 minutes, 7 points, 5 assists. The guy has a terrific per minute stat line this season, but he has played so few games it’s not really indicative of anything. Hopefully, he can finish this season with a healthy run of 25 games, which will show just how good he can be for the Nets as their starting point guard, and maybe give Nets fans something to smile about. This season has had so few bright spots, that even a nice little run towards 20 wins (that’s been incredible optimistic considering they still haven’t won in 2017) would help them end the season on a high.
The Nets didn’t trade Brook Lopez heading into the deadline, but managed to finally get a first round pick by moving Bojan Bogdanovic. I don’t know if Lopez is a crucial part of their future, or perhaps he was too difficult to trade. If you thought the Nets entered this season with a relatively clean slate, it’ll be just as true if not more heading into next season. There weren’t a lot of things going for the Nets heading into this season besides Lin, but no one expected this kind of disaster. Maybe you truly need to hit rock bottom before getting that completely fresh start. Lin is still the guy for them at point guard going forward, but around him are nothing but question marks.
