The Brooklyn Nets roster - by the numbers

The roster is set, and so let's dig deep on what the numbers tell us.

--After being the second oldest team in the NBA last season, the Nets are currently the eighth, tied with the Bulls at 27.9 years, according to hispanosnba.com.  Dumping Marquis Teague for Jorge Gutierrez jumped that a little bit. The Nets have nine players under 30 and two others who are 30. Sergey Karasev is the youngest at 21; Kevin Garnett the oldest at 38. The team's starters average around 30.5 years old, still among the league's oldest.  The team has an average of 5.3 years experience, 10th most.

--The Nets have biggest payroll by far in the NBA with salaries at around $93.7 million and luxury tax (at present) at $35.6million for a total we estimate at $129.3 million. That's less than the $190 million Mikhail Prokhorov paid last year, but still above the Knicks, whose total is around $116 million.

--The Nets have six international players, from Russia (2), Bosnia, Mexico, Croatia and Jamaica. Thats the most ever for the Nets who were the first NBA team to draft an international player (Oscar Schmidt in 1984) and the first NBA team to have an international player make the All-NBA team (Drazen Petrovic in 1992). Not to mention the first international owner (Mikhail Prokhorov in 2010). With six internationals, the Nets are tied for second in the NBA (with the Timberwoves). The Spurs have nine.  All six Nets players have played for their country's national team, with Bojan Bogdanovic and Jorge Gutierrez joining Mason Plumlee in the World Cup last summer.

--Despite having no picks in the 2014 NBA Draft, the Nets will have three rookies, all taken with second round picks: Bogdanovic at #31 in 2011; Markel Brown at #44 and Cory Jefferson at #60 in 2014. Total cost of the three picks: $2.7 million, $1.3 million for Bogdanovic; Brown for $1.1 million and Jefferson for $300,000.

--Only12 of the Nets 15 contracts are fully guaranteed, with Gutierrez ($25,000); Jefferson ($75,000) and Jerome Jordan ($100,000) having partial guarantees. All three contracts will become fully guaranteed on January 5 unless cut beforehand. And yes, the Nets have to pay luxury taxes on the guarantees. Total value of the three contracts is around $2 million.

Of course the big numbers start to be tallied on Wednesday night in Boston.