I’ve never watched those finals with the Nets, but they made it back-to-back so they must have been really good. My question is, how did they even get that far? The roster on paper is quite thin depth wise and Kidd, Martin and Van Horn we their 3 best players I reckon does not scream championship contender. Was the East really bad back then? Was it a matter of the sum was better than the individuals? Am I undervaluing that roster? Really wonder if anyone can provide some insight. Tnx
Kidd was very good, perhaps MVP caliber, and the pieces around him fit perfectly so they were more than the sum of the parts. However, the East was really bad.
That's pretty much it. Would have been lucky to get out of the 1st round in the west. As bad as the east has been overall for the last 20 years, it has never been worse than 00-03. The Nets and Iverson 76ers were joke finalists. The Pacers were pretty bad as well for an NBA finals team.
The East was that bad and Jason Kidd was that good. He should have won MVP one of those years. But Kenyon Martin was also really good and Keith Van Horn was a pretty solid third option there for a while. They also had Kerry Kittles if I recall and he was better than most remember.
Richard Jefferson was also really good on the break. I did watch the playoffs those years and Kidd was a maestro
Jason Kidd is one of the most criminally underrated players in history in my opinion. Him and Grant Hill...
those Nets teams were nothing special at all...they made the finals because the East was HOT TRASH the Nets were a very good defensive team and were dangerous in transition with Kidd running point and dropping dimes, but whoever was coming out the West would handle them with ease if the Kings had beaten the Lakers, they would’ve washed the Nets in the finals just like the Lakers did...there were quite a few WC teams that would’ve destroyed them in 01-02, the Nets were the 1 seed in the East with 52 wins...the 4th seeded Mavs were a 57 win team in 02-03, the Pistons were the 1 seed in the East with 50 wins...the Blazers were the 6th seed in the West with 50 wins the East was where all the freshman squads did battle will Varsity teams were killing each other out West
The Nets of those years definitely benefitted from a weak East. But there was something more to them than Jason Kidd. In the years prior, the Nets were really dysfunctional, especially with the very selfish Stephon Marbury as their PG. Trading Marbury away for Kidd had a huge impact on the team culture and chemistry...and then implementing the modified "Princeton Offense" amplified the team chemistry in a big way. The team had players who could run (Kittles, Jefferson, K-Mart), players who could shoot (Kidd, Kittles, Van Horn, Lucious Harris), players who could defend (Kidd, Kittles, Jefferson, K-Mart, Aaron Williams) and Kidd's playmaking and leadership was the perfect fit. The teamwork was a thing of beauty. No superstars other than Kidd, but a team that really played "the right way".
I think this is main factor. The nets would've been 5th or 6th in the West I believe (probably a first round and out). The East was putrid.
pretty sure the current suns team would have made the finals in the east in the early 2000s. twas truly a joke.
Jason Kidd is very underrated. Those nets teams were like the early Kings team but had no answer downlow for Shaq and Tim Duncan.
Yup. Moronic logic at its best. Rockets sucked back then. I am sure everyone was excited to watch the annual Antoine Walker and Kenyon Martin slugfest haha. Those Nets teams were trash. Imagine trotting Keith Van Horn as one of your best players. Ouch. That team was so bad for a Finalist team that perhaps even Airemy Lin would be able to sniff some playing time on that team in the finals, on a short leash of course. The only reason that team was relevant was because of Kidd and as good of a play-maker he was, dude couldn't shoot/make shots to save his life. Eastern conference was absolutely pathetic back then and which ever team came out of the East was a fodder for the Western team. NBA finals were a formality during those years. The champions were decided in the West.
Fwiw, the 2001-2002 Nets had a 1-1 or 2-0 record against all but one Western Conference team during the regular season (they were only 0-2 against Dallas). And the 2002-2003 Nets only went 0-2 against 3 Western Conference teams (Dallas, Sacramento and Utah). So no...they weren't garbage. They were competitive...like someone else here said, probably would have been the 4 or 5 seed in the West. And no, Keith Van Horn was not one of the Nets' best players. In fact, he was traded after the 2001-02 season and K-Mart took the starting PF spot. Agree that there were no superstars on the team other than Kidd, but that was one of the great things about the team...it was all chemistry and teamwork. And not sure why you'd bring up Lin in a thread about the 2001-2003 Nets. Are you so obsessed with him that you have to bring him up wherever you go?
Kidd carried those teams. It's unfortunate that he never really got that great of a supporting cast in New Jersey, and they let Kenyon walk. If only Kidd dealt with decent management, he'd be better remembered. Heck, imagine if he went to the Spurs after '03.
