Kyrie Irving Wants Nets, But Does Nets Want Him?

As the Nets’ disappointing season came to an end after being swept away by the Boston Celtics in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs, Kyrie Irving has made it clear that he is committed to the Nets for the long term.

But after a season in which he played just 29 of 82 regular season games due to Irving’s refusal to comply with a local vaccine regulation, do the Nets want him back?

That question popped up at the team’s end-of-season press conference Wednesday, hosted by General Manager Sean Marks and Coach Steve Nash. While Marks was reluctant to give a clear answer, he spoke as clear as anything he could say, not saying “yes” right away. The Nets have yet to decide whether Irving will be a part of his future.

“I think we know what we’re looking for,” said Marks. “We’re looking for guys who want to come here and be a part of something bigger than themselves, to play with dedication, to play team basketball and to be available. That goes for everyone here, not just Kyrie.”

This theme of availability continued throughout Marks’ statements and proved challenging for the Nets star players.

Irving and Kevin Durant signed on to a huge fan base with Brooklyn in 2019, but the Nets have yet to see the benefits of adding two stars, each winning championships on their own. Durant missed the entire 2019-20 season while recovering from an Achilles tendon injury in the 2019 final for Golden State.

Last season, they added James Harden in a trade to Houston and needed to build a tough roster. Last season’s Eastern Conference semifinals lost to Milwaukee by a 2-pointer to tie the game into regulation, despite Durant scoring 48 points in Game 7 of the game. His finger was on the 3-pointer – the shot was just millimeters away from winning the game.

Rather than building on that near miss, the Nets went backwards this season.

Irving refused to be vaccinated against the coronavirus, which meant he couldn’t play in Brooklyn or Madison Square Garden for most of the season. The Nets initially decided they didn’t want a part-time player and said Irving would not play all of their games until they were qualified. They abruptly changed course in January, and Irving only started playing at road games outside of New York and Toronto.

On Wednesday afternoon, Marks refused to reconsider that decision and reiterated the importance of a player’s suitability.

“When you have a player of Kyrie’s caliber, you try to figure out: How do we recruit him and for how long do we recruit him?” said Mark. “Because the team was formed by saying, ‘Well, Kyrie and Kevin will be available.’”

Irving’s absence has made the Nets’ margins much thinner. Whenever Durant or Harden got injured, this team was two starts down instead of one. As many teams do, they had fewer players to rely on as they were dealing with coronavirus-related absences.

“There were various teams out there and teams still playing to this day might not have quite the scope of the excuses we could find, but they also needed to manage Covid, they had to navigate the injuries,” said Marks. they got it.”

Harden is fed up with Irving’s absence and the challenges they pose. He was traded to the Philadelphia 76ers on Thursday night, playing Game 6 of their second-round series against the Miami Heat.

The Nets bought Ben Simmons, who wasn’t playing for them in the trade. Marks said Simmons had back surgery on May 5 after magnetic resonance imaging showed an “enlarged hernia.”

When talking about the team’s big stars, Marks mostly just talked about Durant. He said Durant was a draw for other players in the league and people wanted to play for him. He said that Durant is the team’s top player development coach. He mentioned that he wanted to involve Durant in staffing decisions, without asking him to make those decisions.

“People think that player empowerment means you let them do whatever they want to do,” Marks said. “That wasn’t the case when Steve was an actor. This was not the case when we were players in any of the teams we were in. This is not the case here. I think involving players in key decisions at certain points in the season is the right way to do it. There’s nothing worse than when players are surprised by something.”

Whether Irving will return to the team is not only in the hands of the Nets. It has a $36.5 million player option for next season and is also eligible for a $200 million extension over five years. If he declined the player option, he would become an unlimited free agent.

He’s shown his dynamism on the pitch this season in several games, scoring 50 points against the Charlotte Hornets in March and 60 against the Orlando Magic a week later.

But what good is this explosiveness if it’s not playing?

“I think there’s been a lot of discussion, debate, scuttlebutt — whatever you call it — about distractions and things that are really outside of basketball,” Marks said. “Whereas we want to focus on doing some of the things that got us here in the first place.”

Marks made this comment in his keynote speech at Wednesday’s press conference, before anyone asked him about Irving.

Still, it fit the message he seemed to be sending throughout the press conference. It was a message to Irving about making a genuine commitment, not just contractually, to a team that could use him more this season.