A Nets remake in Lionel Hollins image

They got younger, more athletic and better defensively. There are more players willing to sacrifice their bodies. The roster is filled with players on second chances, even a few on third chances. Sounds like a Lionel Hollins team. Is Billy King trying to turn Barclays Center into Grindhouse North?

That's what Tim Bontemps writes Wednesday.

Nets general manager Billy King has made a series of moves the past few weeks to remake the roster, and you can begin to see the makings of a cohesive plan — one that constructs the team in the image of its coach, Lionel Hollins.

Bontemps identifies one move after another that looks like an attempt, as he writes, to "create the one thing they aspire to: a real and lasting identity" -- starting with the acquisition of an "elite wing athlete" in Rondae Hollis-Jefferson through the signing of point guard, Shane Larkin, a Hollins favorite, and shooter Wayne Ellington, who Hollins coached in Memphis. The biggest and riskiest move was dumping Deron Williams and anointing Jarrett Jack as his successor, something Hollins clearly wanted.

As Bontemps notes...

Though outside of Williams, none of those moves were far from ground-breaking, taken collectively it has left the Nets with a group filled with the kind of athletes and grinders who fit Hollins’ personality.

• Nets’ latest transformation: A team in Lionel Hollins’ image - Tim Bontemps - New York Post