Nets Notes: Offseason, Johnson, Claxton, Draft

After spending the 2024/25 season retooling their roster, are the Nets ready to jump-start their rebuild by attempting to acquire a star-caliber player this summer? Speaking to reporters in an end-of-season session, general manager Sean Marks didn’t rule out the possibility, but explained that if the team targets a maximum-salary player, he would have to fit a specific criteria.

“If you’re going after max-level talent, they have [to] automatically and absolutely change the trajectory of your team,” Marks said, per Brian Lewis of The New York Post. “This can’t be like ‘Let’s go get this [guy] and lock ourselves into being a six or seven seed.’ When we go all in, you’re going in to compete at the highest level and contend.”

As Lewis notes, players like Trae Young, LaMelo Ball, Ja Morant, and Domantas Sabonis have been the subject of some trade speculation, but Giannis Antetokounmpo has long been labeled the Nets’ “Plan A,” and the Bucks superstar fits Marks’ description of what an ideal target would look like better than any of those other players.

Of course, the odds are probably against Antetokounmpo – or an equivalent talent – becoming available this summer, which means the Nets may end up building their roster more patiently. Brooklyn will enter the offseason with multiple first-round picks, including a lottery selection, and the most cap room of any NBA team.

“We need to be opportunistic,” Marks said. “In this market we’re always going to have various different free agents and opportunities thrown at us, just simply being in a top-five market in the league; that’s going to happen. We don’t want to get sped up. We’ve talked multiple times about being systematic and strategic in how we build here. We know we have 15 first-round picks in the next six, seven years.

“So, there’s a lot of draft assets at stake. There’s a lot of cap room at stake. And how we use that, it’s probably too early to determine. But there’s a variety of different pathways we can go, and it’s just about being opportunistic as to how we build and when we go all in again, so to speak. And that could be going all in with whether it’s free agents or trades, but it also could be go all in with systematically growing some homegrown talent. We’ve done that in the past and grown some guys here, developed guys here, as well as attracted top-tier talent from elsewhere.”

Here’s more on the Nets:

• The last time Brooklyn operated under the cap was in 2019 when they landed Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving in free agency. Marks believes the salary-cap and player-movement landscapes have changed in such a way during the last six years that repeating that sort of offseason is unlikely for any team, let alone the Nets. “I do think it’s important to have guys under contract that you control the contracts. You drafted them, you developed them, and they got to their second contract under your watch,” he said, according to Lewis. “It’s difficult when you’re trying to acquire max-level talent on max contracts. Those days are probably gone, of going and getting two or three max free agents. Those are gonna be more difficult to do.”
• Viewed as one of the Nets’ prime trade chips leading up to February’s deadline, Cameron Johnson ultimately stayed put. In his exit interview, the veteran forward told reporters, including Lewis, that he “definitely” plans to ask Marks about his future in Brooklyn. “I’d definitely like to know everything that’s going on,” Johnson said. “And I understand that I’m not going to be let in on every decision or have a say in every decision, but I would like to know going forward.”
• For his part, Marks said he can envision Johnson being a long-term building block for the Nets: “There was no shortage of teams calling on him. He’s a good player, and they value him, but so do we. I can’t think of a pathway or a team or an organization that Cam doesn’t fit in. There’s so many ways you can build this with Cam Johnson.”
• Nets center Nic Claxton admitted that he was nagged by back issues all season, but he doesn’t expect to go under the knife to address the issue, per Lewis. “I still need to get right. It’s still bothering me, honestly. But we got the whole offseason. I was still able to play 70 games, so that’s a blessing,” Claxton said. “I have time to lock in on it this summer. I’m going to get it right. I’ve got a plan. No surgeries or anything though.”
• The Nets, who entered the season with the lowest over/under projection of any NBA team, comfortably exceeded that projection by winning more games than expected and reducing their lottery odds in the process. So it was only fitting, Lewis writes for the Post, that the Nets lost on Sunday to the Knicks when a win would’ve improved their draft position, since Brooklyn controls New York’s first-round pick. As a result of the Knicks’ victory, that pick will be No. 26 overall — it could’ve moved as high as No. 22 if Brooklyn had won.