Jeff Green: ‘I’d love to settle down in Brooklyn’

As Sopan Deb writes Tuesday, Jeff Green has no interest in breaking the NBA record for most teams. The Nets are his 10th team, two shy of the record. He already tied the NBA record for most playoff teams, which is seven.

Instead, he says he wants to “settle” in Brooklyn.

“I’d love to settle down in one place,” said the peripatetic Green. “There’s Brooklyn. I’d love to settle down in Brooklyn. I’m not too concerned with the NBA. record or how many teams. When you think about it, if I was to play 22 years, played on 15 teams, what does that say? It has no teeth behind it.”

But the 34-year-old would like to have some salary protection, some job security. His last five contracts — with the Nets, Houston Rockets, Utah Jazz, Washington Wizards and Cleveland Cavaliers — were for one year or less, at the minimum rate, Deb notes, adding one of them, with the Rockets wasn’t even a vets’ minimum. It was a 10-day!

As any amateur capologist can tell you, the vets minimum is usually reserved for those at the end of the bench, on the way in or on the way out of the “L.” And as any Nets fan can tell you, that is definitely not Jeff Green.

Green averaged 11 points and 3.9 rebounds per game this season, with 39 dunks, many of them highlight reel quality, and more than 100 3-pointers to his credit. His offensive efficiency and 3-point shooting were the best of his career.

So will he get a multi-year deal at more than the vets minimum this off-season? He is one of nine free agent decisions the Nets will have to make. In addition they and their “Big Three” can work out extensions this summer. Same with rising star Nic Claxton. Could Uncle Jeff get lost in the shuffle ... again? Under the CBA, they can offer him $3.6 million or give up a piece of the taxpayers MLE which will be around $6 million.

Despite the love he’s gotten from fans, teammates and the game’s greats, Green is seemingly resigned to his fate.

“You can’t take this career, these opportunities for granted,” Green said. “Regardless of how many teams that I’ve been on, the end of the day, my goal was to play in the NBA. and I’m still doing that.”

• The N.B.A.’s Roving Role Player Hopes to Settle Down in Brooklyn - Sopan Deb - New York Times