Kiki Remains Optimistic Turnaround Can Happen Quickly

I feel a lot better about the state of the Nets until Kiki opens his mouth.

He’s been saying the same thing for almost two months now.

For me, when he talks it just reminds me of how bad things can be, its not reassuring at all. I feel more confident as I hear less from the man.

cut kiki’s salary in half, and see how optimistic he is.

probably only half as optimistic.

I think the Nets are doing everything right, finally. Acquire young talent (Yi, Lopez, CDR, Lee), stop signing half-assed players (Boozer, Gooden, Davis etc.), get rid of over paided assistant coaches (what a country club the NBA runs for these unsuccesful has beens) and bide your time. Waiting is the hardest part. All these so called longtime Nets fans see the same mistakes being made over and over. We are always (1) player away from the promised land. Build a solid young team first or like the Celtics get very lucky in the FA market with top talent and (1) sided trades. I rather build within and add missing pieces when we are ready. We are not ready right now. Whats wrong with that?

I still have my season tickets but its over folks. When you analyze all of the factors there is nothing to be optimistic over. The team has an overpaid coach, the best coach and mentor to the players (VC) was traded, Brian Hill the best mentor the LG is going to the Pistons, Roy Rogers is going back to college (RU) and Bruce is going to Russia to see if they want to invest in the team. Being a fan for over 30 years I cannot remember a time like this. Even when we were a cellar dweller we had least had an ownership group that had financing.

Mike, in a league where pick 30 of 1st round makes $824,000 guaranteed year 1, and refs make nearly $200,000 plus traveling expenses, you think asst coach Roy Rogers is “over paid” at $100,000?? Roy Rogers is credited with developing Brook, and CDR credits asst coach Doug Overton in improving his NBA game. $100,000 is below minimum wage in NBA… it’s practically slave labor. without qualified and knowledgeable asst coaches around, who do you think develops the young players?

I’m sorry but never use the words 100,000 salary and slave labor in the same sentence. To be exact “Slave Labor” means when you work for free and against your will. Nets will find younger more hungry assistants that will be paid the best seats in the house to watch our nets lose.

“He argues the Nets had to trade away its big assets for "flexibility" and points to what he did with cap space and picks in Denver.”

Yeah, giving away 3 picks in order to sign KMart to a ridiculous max contract. And don’t forget Kiki created all that cap space to have a shot a Kobe Bryant that summer. This guy is a complete moron.

I still plan on watching and supporting this year and while the state of the team right now isn’t great, I am still somewhat optimistic about the future because we do have some talented young players who can develop and we do have the POTENTIAL to sign some good free agents because of how much cap space we now have.

However, what frustrates and concerns me the most is that I do not believe the team is going to spend a dime when they are confronted with the option to sign someone who could help us win. It seems as if the Nets management truly cares very little about winning and more about cutting costs and making money. I also do not trust what Kiki says at all. He was saying over and over again how there were no big moves in the Nets foreseable future and then they go ahead and trade Carter, which we all knew as coming and which was apparently a three to four day conversation. I just wish that the management was honest with the fans and said that this is not about basketball but about money. Please don’t fill our heads with the hopes that you will actually spend the money to make us better.

But again, I hope to be proven wrong. I want to see the Nets win so if Kiki does spend then great, I’m all for it.