all together now: hahahahahahahahahhahahahahhaha….

Well its good to know that at least our visions of a very bright near future are quite possible.
And despite getting rid of both RJ and Vince I will always 100% trust Rod Thorn.

Well that is a good sign. They had been seemingly downplaying the ability to sign superstars on the radio interviews.

They may be in a position to sign them ‘if they choose’ but the player has to choose to come here as well. Good luck with that.

I suspect they will go after Lebron/Bosh. For as much as Lebron would cost, he would bring back much more value to the franchise. The ability for Lebron to play with another superstar like Bosh is our only chance at getting him. That could seperate the Nets from some other suitors. Cleveland is still the clear favorite in keeping Lebron.

I hate that we are all negative here. Rod Thorn has down a descent job here…Lets not give up.. we are going to struggle now but it will pay off. Dont ride the wagon when it comes around jump on it now and stop being so damn negative all the time.

full transcript will posted on Nets website at 5 p.m.

Other highlights:

—Devin will be our floor leader. Normally a point guard is your leader.

—very high on Yi’s possibility. He is back in NJ with much improved strength, definition in upper body, chest and arms…wont be pushed around.

—likes the idea of having so much versatility on the wings, noting that rule changes make athletic wings all the more valuable. Said that while Alston can play only the 1, Harris and Lee can play the 1 and the 2, CDR can play the 2 and the 3, TWilliams can play the 1, 2, and 3.

—Dont be surprised to see multiple lineups throughout the year. Going to be very exciting, athletic team that will rely more on motion and fast breaks than in the past.

—Alston is going from starting PG on a Finals team to a backup on a 34 win team, but he would have been a back up in Orlando as well and he has been an effective starter and back up in this league and he is in the latter stage of his career.

—Suggested that Hayes may start, noting the terrific job he did last year on the court and in the locker room, but noted as well they are monitoring his conditioning this summer since he did not show up in the best of shape at training camp.

—Hated giving up Anderson but the only way the trade could get made with Lee required it.

More later.

What’d you expect him to say? “We don’t care about the team!” Come on! He had to say that, because it’s true – they are in position. But who would want to come to NJ? I’m a HUGE nets fan, like the rest of you, and this hurts to say, but the good old days of winning are long gone (at least in NJ – perhaps in Kansas City or Seattle).

Anyone else disy from all of the spin that Rod has been doing?

The last 3 years before the season he was saying that we are not done making moves and then went on to make no more moves. I am getting sick of this guy lying to us time and time again…

“Going to be very exciting, athletic team that will rely more on motion and fast breaks than in the past.”

I feel like I’ve heard this the past 5 years.

On “likes the idea of having so much versatility on the wings, noting that rule changes make athletic wings all the more valuable.”

It didn’t seem to work during the Kidd era when we had the best wing-duo in the game.

On “Alston is going from starting PG on a Finals team to a backup on a 34 win team, but he would have been a back up in Orlando as well”

Hmmm, would you rather be a backup on an NBA Finals bound team or a lottery bound team. Anyone who is an ex-athlete should know better than to say such non-sense.

RT should stop insulting fans with his comments. He should realize that we are more intelligent than he thinks we are.

Guys…this team was going no where with VC. So we got cap space, TEs and a very good young player. And our draft pick probably improved about 7 to 10 slots.

Sounds like a pretty good deal to me.

Surprised Thorn has “forgotten” about Keyon Dooling who was a great contributor off the bench and in relief of an injured DHarris. And this is a guy Thorn has coveted for years.

Possibly working on a trade for Dooling’s expiring contract?

If so, Id prefer trading Alston and keeping Dooling.

Is Dooling still on the team? No mention.

Did he say we are lucky to have Frank as our coach?

wow, yormark did a good job tutoring thorn on selling BS.

how are we going to keep both dooling and alston…they both have high trade value.

@ OPutney

I can see the Nets winning 28 games and Thorn coming out saying “we performed above expectations” and giving LFrank an extension. At a discount rate, of course.

They have too many guards and Dooling is probably the odd man out because he has both trade value and a contract that eats into 2010 cap space.

I can see that too Whoop.

So absolutely nothing was discussed in regards to brooklyn? I would think that goes along with “state of the team” address.

Had Vince Carter gotten traded would this call have been necessary?

Rod can feed us likes about Yi working out and becoming a dominant PF. But if his confidence doesn’t increase and he’s not tough against NBA players than its all for naught.

Pretty much everything i read was what i expected out of the call. Pretty much the same as every other press conference.

Can’t wait til next year when we hear rod “appreciated what Devin brought to the team, but the opportunity to pick up Backup X, Benchwarmer Y and injury ridden vet Z was too much to pass up”

@ Chris

I don’t think Dooling contract is a hinderance. And I don’t believe it really “eats” into 2010.

For the contribution Keyon has made he is in that Jarvis Hayes realm of being “cheap.”

Keyon made $3.3 million salary last season and is due to made $3.5 million salary for 2009-10, and his contract is only partially-guaranteed third season that will pay him peanuts.

They might be in position to sign those two maxed out players, but if no one wants to come to Jersey than who really cares. They’ll probably just end up overpaying some people if they lose out on Lebron or Dwade.

@Whoop

Do you know precisely how much of Dooling’s salary is actually guaranteed in 2010? I had thought most of his salary was guaranteed so it would be at least 3 million against the cap. I agree that this is a bargain for a player of Dooling’s capabilities. However, if they are serious about offerring 2 max contracts, they actually are still not there yet in terms of cap space. They still need to shed another 5 million or so…and Dooling’s contract, with Najera and maybe the 1st round draft picks next yr, could be the difference.

We should boycott games. I have gone to at least 10 nets games a season for the last 15 years, but this year I will refuse. I suggest that everyone does the same.If the attandance drops down to 7,000 per then The Rat will get the message.

“–Hated giving up Anderson but the only way the trade could get made with Lee required it.”

So, either he is admitting that (a) he screwed up by picking Anderson last year (if Lee is better than Anderson), or admitting that (b) they couldn’t give away Vince for garbage without also giving away Anderson for a worse youngster (if Anderson is better than Lee).

Personally, I think that Anderson is better than Lee, and they made the right pick last year. But that makes this deal all that much worse.

@ Chris

Dooling is due to make 3.8 mil in 10-11 but has only 500K guaranteed. If they really need nickels and dimes to sign to MAX players, making the wrong trade will actually INCREASE the Nets cap space.

Rod and KIKI got us the starting backcourt from a Finals team, in exchange for VC, and saved us 20 million. I think they did well. They face a tough, smart press corps, and they do fine.
I believe we will win almost as many games this year, and be able to draft a much better player, in a much better draft.

However, and this is the BIG however, I don’t believe that we will sign two max free agents next year, unless the ownership dynamic changes AND the Brooklyn arena foundation and financing are in place. If neither of these things happen, I don’t expect that we will even sign one max player. If Brooklyn falls through completely, The Rat sells the team to a meat packing company in Kansas City or to a Russian commodity trader…

Your “starting backcourt from a finals team” really didn’t play all that well in the finals, so don’t push that card upon us. They are OK, but not highlight reel players or huge contributors.

Is it just losing VC that’s causing all the crying?

Or is it the lack of trust in Thorn?

Let’s start with the first reality… VC needed to go and we weren’t going to get a star player for him. And VC was overjoyed to be gone.

We got a good young player in return and have the building blocks for a very good team.

We may not be able to land Lebron or Wade. But an Amare or Bosh are very possilbe. If you add a player like that to this team along with Brook, Devin, T Will, and Courtney Lee, we’ll be a top team in the East.

So let’s be patient and stop being so mad that we won’t have a 35 win team with a 32 year old aging star.

I understand that people hate change. But this time change was needed…

trenton is right. team success from the magic last yr came in big parts from Rashard, Hedo, and Dwight.

has anyone thought that sending vince to the magic was done for two specific reasons?

traditional thinking is that you don’t trade your good players to a team in your conference. you don’t want them beating you out of a playoff spot.

maybe with the vc trade we kill two birds with one stone; dump vinces salary and make it even harder for the cavs to get to the finals this year. two dissappointing years in a row might make lebron really want a change of scenery.

if vince can help keep lebron from winning a championship, maybe he actually helps push lebron out of cleveland (and maybe to brooklyn).

VC could be here and we could still sign 1 marquee player with the room we had already. He didn’t have to go. He could add some credibility to the franchise if he was still here to help attract a name player which they will need with everything that is unsettled here—awful arena, team losing its shirt, ownership that is right up there with Donald Sterling. I also belive Thorn and Kiki’s deals are also up after this season so we have the stability of the San Andreas fault.

They refuse to admit it was a salary dump. It is pure and simple. They should admit it and stop insulting our intelligence. It will be a long year next year.

I just know they are going to give Frank another pass because of all the change and young players. So looking forward to that…

This owner isn’t spending money. Thorn is full of it. The coach doesn’t know what it takes to win. According to Thorn our starting PF (starting cuz of $ not talent) is getting stronger but needs to get ALOT stronger which will never happen and he has no ability to influence shots so he sucks on D. “Boone and Swat need to be consistant”. So does the coach they play for who is clueless when dealing with them. Eveything else was irrelevent. Sussman likes to hear himself talk. An aging superstar on a bad team is ok when he is still productive and you can’t get equal value in a trade. The problem was when you signed VC, you paid a guy big $ who does not make you better. Big guys make little one better but not the other way aroung. The two best Kobe and Wade both need big guys as opposed to Orl. who rode Howard. I got news for Orl. if they lose Turk even with the addition of VC they will not be better only spending more.

Charlie Villaneuava just became an unrestricted free agent. Local kid; plays PF which we need; and can score the ball which we definitely need.

What the nets have to do is package Dooling and Najera in a deal to the Heat or Jazz(who have no bench and no back up PG) in exchange for someone like Matt Harpring – Nice player; can play the SG, SF or PF positions depending on the lineup and his contract is expiring.

Then we should try signing Villaneuva to about a 5-6 million dollar deal for 3-4 years. The 5-6 million is total salary amount that Dooling and Najera wouldve made in 2011 so it shouldnt affect our chances at the big FA that year.

Lopez/ Boone / SWAT
Villaneuva/Harpring
Hayes/Harpring/Simmons
Lee/CDR/TWILL
Harris/ Alston

I hope the Nets sign Charlie Villanueva

“libigman Says:
June 29th, 2009 at 6:19 pm

This owner isn’t spending money. Thorn is full of it."

Yep. Until I see otherwise, or a solid move being made, this press conference was nothing but a bunch of spin

And that stuff about Alston is absolute nonsense. The Nets better try to trade him quickly and hope that Dooling will be okay to play before that guy starts to whine.

Ronnie, we would have to first do a S&T if we would be able to sign Charlie V, meaning the Bucks would want to have to take back some an expiring deal.

I wouldn’t be against signing Charlie, in fact he’d be a solid addition to our team. But I don’t see the Nets doing something positive at this point and they are spinning this crap about Yi being our starting PF, that means that they aren’t willing to spend or make a solid move to get someone at PF.

At the end of the day Rod Thorn is doing the best he can, but he is lying through his teeth about EVERYTHING. Note the sentence: "if we so choose, to sign two maxed-out players" The key words in that sentence are “if we so choose”. They also could choose not to spend a damn DIME!!!!

Wow. Get Villaneuva and I’ll stop crying about everything else that is going on.

Its amazing when you think of what a great player Carter is, he essentially has gotten traded for scrubs TWICE. Has such a good player ever been traded repeatedly for garbage in their career?

why didnt the bucks give us villanueva instead of yi if villanueva wasn’t part of their future plan?

we arent going to sign him guys we have yi…plus next years draft only as pf.

No, Charlie V has zero defense, and is similar to Yi…to sign a big contract now, must be guaranteed talent and at PF needs to be an inside force, wich Charlie V isn’t, like Yi…
Let’s trade Alston for a decent SF or PF, mostly PF, because I’m hoping Twill can do the job at SF!

Yi might be stronger but you can’t learn killer instinct, and he doesn’t have it. I still like him but as a role player…the question is where does a starting 4 come from. It will probably come from 2010 FA class, so we can score in the next draft.

What is Cleveland without LeBron? a 20 to 30 win team. LeBron, Harris, Lopez, Lee, Yi, CDR, TWill, 3 or 4 lotter picks in the next two years, and potentially Bosh or other super 4 will make him want to come. All we need to do is confirm Brooklyn. EVERYTHING has been planned for LeBron and Brooklyn, and it has a great chance of happening.

“There will be lot of experiment” Thorn said. That’s probably they re-hire LF, he was good at that last year. lots of combination, in chemistry probably the right term is lot’s of mixtures, it is so dizzying.

I usually enjoy hearing Kiki or Rod interviewed but I could not listen to the entire call. It was painful. I did not have hip waders on.

I don’t beleive in Yi but I do think we’re one big man away from being a good team that a FA would want to come and play with. The NBA is business and there aren’t too many times I remember a good free agent leaving money on the table because they didn’t like a team. The Nets just freed up a ton of it. If they shoud decide to spend it we’ll get one of the top FA’s if we offer them the best deal. it’s still the NBA and it’s still the new York metro area..

We’ll be ok

Dribble Drive

Yi

upside potential

We’ve heard the same stuff before.

in 2010, the NEts should take Lebron and Bosh which looks kinda possible because if we can get one the other is going to want to come even for just a little less cuz they realize they can win a championship

Dreaming on yi`s development we wont sign guys with a decent name.

(cuz name = $$$)

see this:

Ben gordon, trevor ariza, ron artest, carlos boozer, hedo turkoglu, david lee.

all this guys but David lee (restricted) are avaiable, they are FA with nice offense or defense. ill give tons of cash to see a low post based on Lopez-Lee-Yi (if yi is trully coming strong)

for me id love to see:

Lopez / Boone
David Lee / Yi
Twill / Hayes
Courtney Lee / CDR
Harris / Alston / Dooling

we can dump all other guys and sign promising rookies or cheap FA with a brighter future than the guys i didnt mentioned here (we could replace boone too!)

Go nets go!!! win 25 games plz

To me, the two people who have made the most significant impact for this franchise have been Jason Kidd and Rod Thorn. I have always loved Rod Thorn’s ability to make great trades and it seems like he is becoming better at drafting talented players as well with the help of Kiki. Above all, Rod brings a respectability to our team around the league. Both Rod and Kiki are a first class management team, HOWEVER, both of their hands are tied by the ownership this team has now and my basketball dream is that we are bought by NEW JERSEY investors. Anyway, I like the nucleus of young talent we have, but, we just did a major salary dump. There is no way you can tell me other wise. I understand that this may have been the direction to go in, but, don’t keep telling the fans that it was not a salary dump! Courtney Lee can become a very nice player, but, so can Ryan Anderson. Ryan was taken at 21 and Courntey Lee was taken at 22. To me that was just an even swap of two players. Therefore, Vince was traded for Tony Battie and Rafer Alston because their contracts come off the books sooner and they won’t make the money Vince will in the next three years. BUT, they are both role players to me and they will never be the face of a franchise like Vince had become. I also, would feel much more confident seeing Ryan Anderson in our starting lineup at the 4 rather than Yi. So, now here is the tough part, we shall see what direction management goes in. We have all this “cap space” and if we gave up a player like Vince we better use that cap space later this off season or next off season. If this extra flexibility to spend on star players is not used wisely then this trade was a joke. If we can get one or two stars, then it was a brilliant move. I am not holding my breathe though. On a positive note, I feel the key to success is running the offense through Brook. To me that is on Brook to develop a greater post game this off season and Lawrence Frank developing an offense that focuses on Brook getting most of the touches. Hopefully, Devin becomes a leader and continues to develop. I do, also, like the young defensive minded team we should put on the floor this year. I do MISS the defensive intensity our teams used to play with in the first three years of the Jason Kidd era. We all know how exciting those years were for us! Lets go Nets! Lets go ROD!

The key to this whole Vince Carter trade and the state of the team is this:

Yes, the Nets are in the position to sign two maxed out players in 2010, but will they? Was this deal about eventually making our team better or just saving money because Brooklyn is making us bleed so much?

Until the Nets spend money, I will not buy that they are doing anything in an effort to make us better. The VC trade helped us save and the RJ trade brought us a horrible PF who is now a starter because of marketing reasons. I want to see the Nets get better, not positioned better for marketing and Brooklyn reasons.

Any season ticketholders not renewing as a result of losing VC & ryan? Will the fallout from this trade top the fallout from losing KMart/Kittles. I hung in for 2004/05 season because we still had JKidd and RJ. But the number of empty pink seats has increased each season – even though the Nets give away thousands of tix each game. Now with VC gone, and the team not willing to invest in the coming season, I wonder how many other season ticketholders will continue to invest in the Nets. I still can’t decide.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!

Thorn must think the Nets fans are fools.
Liar, liar, LIAR!!!!!!!!

Well, maybe he isnt lying when he says we may be in a position to sign 2 max contracts in 2010 IF THEY CHOOSE, thats true, we have the cap space, but nobody worth it will want to take it, even if the Nets CHOOSE to offer those contracts.

Screw you Rod, you’re FULL of it!!!!!!

On realgm.com, it says that an insider source claims LebRON and bosh want to play together. Mayb in Jersey?

can we call you ‘scorch’ for short?