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Nets to retire Jason Kidd's No. 5 Jersey

By Tom Lorenzo

The Brooklyn Nets announced today that they will be retiring Jason Kidd's No. 5 jersey this season via their Twitter account.

The team will retire the No. 5 jersey prior to their October 17th preseason matchup with the Miami Heat. The game will be televised locally by the YES Network and nationally by TNT.

Kidd, who led the Nets to two consecutive NBA Finals appearances is without a doubt one of the great players in the history of the franchise, so this news comes as no surprise.

From the press release:

"My warmest congratulations to Jason as we commemorate his outstanding career as an NBA player and his unparalleled contribution to the Nets franchise," said Nets Principal Owner Mikhail Prokhorov. "As one chapter closes, another will soon be written and I know that we are all looking forward to Jason’s continued successes."

"This honor is richly deserved," said Nets General Manager Billy King. "Jason is firmly established in the Nets' record books as the greatest player in the team's NBA history, and the retirement of his #5 is a fitting conclusion to his legacy as a Nets' player."

"This is a very humbling honor and one that I will always cherish," said Kidd. "There can be no greater recognition of an athlete's time with any team than to have his number retired, and this gesture by the Nets organization validates a very significant portion of my career that was spent as a player with this franchise."

He played six-plus seasons with the Nets and, now, is most recently known as the newest head coach of the team, which should make the retirement ceremony all the more special this season. Kidd will be the seventh player in franchise history to have his number retired.

That list includes Darzen Petrovic (3), Wendell Ladner (4), John Williamson (23), Bill Melchionni (25), Julius Erving (32) and Buck Williams (52).

Why, though, are they retiring his jersey during a preseason game? Well, Stefan Bondy has the story:

That would make sense, especially after Kidd was chided for taking a phone call about the Nets signing Andrei Kirilenko during a Summer League game that he wasn't even coaching in. So, it would seem smart to make sure that he doesn't get distracted and make back-page headlines for something other than his performance as a head coach.

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